Having A Little Trouble With The Silicone Mold.
Decorating By springlakecake Updated 26 Apr 2007 , 11:39am by springlakecake
I just bought an *expensive* silicone mold of a cross. I figured I would be able to use it several times, but now I dont know if I can even use it once LOL! I have never molded anything in gumpaste before and I am having trouble getting the details to show up. It has a verse on it so when I try to smoosh the gumpaste in it gets distorted. Plus I jsut dont know if I am supposed to push a whole hunk of the gumpaste in there or should I try to roll it out and lay it on the mold nicely? I feel like I have tried everything and havent quite gotten the right result yet.
I knead a ball of dough large enough to fit in the mold with a bit of extra at the top. Dust the mold lightly with cornstarch and then turn it over and tap out the excess starch. I imagine with the cross I would make the ball of dough kind of an oval or rectangle so you have enough to fill all the spaces. You can start by lightly pushing the dough into the shape of the cross but then what really helps in picking up the detail is a very thin piece of foam rubber, like the type used in packing breakables in a box. I save any that comes in packages I have ordered on line. Lay the piece of foam over the paste and press pretty firmly with the palm of your hand, remove the foam, with a pair of sharp scissors cut away the excess paste so the molded item will lie flat. Turn the mold over, flex one end to begin to release it, continue flexing as you move up towards the cross arms of the cross and then to the top. It should unmold quite easily. Then use a sharp bladed knife or Xacto knife and cut neatly along the outside design of the cross. Let dry at least overnight.
okay thanks, I will keep trying. I am getting all of the details pretty good except for the writing. I may just have to give in and not worry about it. It will still look pretty good. So firmly might be the trick though? I was sort of worried I might be distorting the image.
Can you use anything else in these molds? Can you use chocolate? I assume silicone would withstand the heat right? Just curious!
Shirley you are a lifesaver! It was the cornstarch of all things. I didnt think the gumpaste was sticking so I thought I didnt need it. But then I started to notice it was only the words in the center of the cross that were getting distorted. So I got to thinking maybe they were sticking a little bit as I was unmolding it and kind of stretching. Anyway I dont know if my assumption was right, but I tried the corn starch and it worked like a charm! Thanks a lot!
If you get any cornstarch stuck in the nooks and crannies, you can use a cosmetic brush to lightly brush it out before casting your mold.
Theresa 
Glad it worked for you Merissa. And yes, you can mold chocolate in the molds as well. The seashells are very pretty done in white or semi sweet chocolate. I just fill and put them in the freezer for about 10 minutes, they pop right out and your ready to do another one.
I did 150 white chocolate shells for a wedding aboard a yacht in the San Francisco Bay, did the cake as well. But the seashells were a lot of work. A waiter carrying the tray tripped and dropped all of them on the floor, they all ended up in the trash. 
OMG! That is terrible! Thanks for the info though about the chocolate. I was thinking of trying it if the gumpaste didnt work. But it looks pretty good now. I had a little trouble trying to insert a stick into without distorting it (because I want to stand it up on the cake) but it looks pretty good I think.
Oh Merissa, too late now, but what you could have done was make a base of gumpaste or mix Tylose into fondant. Make a slit across the base the same width as the cross. Brush a little gum glue into the slit, push the dried cross into the slit, prop it up with a drinking glass or something tall enough to hold it erect till it has dried. That way you don't have to insert a stick or dowel in the cross itself. That's how I did this one. I rolled the gumpaste fairly thick and cut out the base with a 5 petal rose cutter, after the cross was inserted and it was all completely dried I piped around the edge with royal icing in a #2 bead or pearl border. Then dusted the whole thing with pearl luster dust.
http://www.cakecentral.com/modules.php?name=coppermine&file=displayimage&meta=allby&uname=ShirleyW&cat=0&pos=81
Oh that is nice! I didnt get it until I saw your picture. Beautiful work as always! Thanks, I will remember that for next time.
Gosh Shirley, is that waiter still alaive or is he buried in the back yard LOL?
As always you are a fountain of information. What would we do without you.?
LOL, I think he felt worse about it than I did. He looked like he was wishng the hatch would open up and he would fall into the ocean.
awwww....gotta feel for the waiters. I was a waitress one summer and I was pretty bad. I spilled a drink on a woman once. She said she saw it coming! I could never remember what people ordered and sometimes I couldnt even remember what table drinks were for! ha ha! okay it sounds worse now that I am writing it out....I wasnt THAT bad,I never got fired....but that was the one and only time I did waitressing! I could probably be good at it now that I have 3 children, alll asking me for something at once, got dinner on the stove, folding laundry, cleaning the house, decorating a cake, and checking cake central all at once! LOL
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