I was just wondering if anyone has any tips on sculpted cakes? I would love to try my hand at it, but I don't really know where to start. I am sure most of you just winged it and tried it out with little or no instruction. Also, people usually use fondant for sculpted cakes, but I do not like the taste of it. Has anyone had luck with buttercream on sculpted cakes? If so, photos attached would be awesome!

Thanks
Jamie

Hi,

I don't know how other people are doing there sculpted cakes, but I am making one right now and had wondered the same before I started....

I read up on forums and this is what I decided to do for my cake:

My cake is to be a 3D foot cake for a podiatry graduation on this upcoming Friday..........I used DH pound cake recipe for sturdy moist cake.

*Baked 2 (9x2 in cakes)........then cool, wrap in plastic wrap tight and freeze

*cut both cakes in half for torting to yield 4 layers and then i filled (3 layers with BC)...........wrap in plastic wrap good & refreeze entire cake

*remove frozen cake from freezer and carve or sculpt, whatever you'd like to call it.......cover cake with decrumbing coat of BC.....

I am out of town for a few days, so i covered cake in plastic wrap to seal in flavor and put in my fridge until Thurs (i did all of this on Sun). My plan is to cover cake again in BC (relatively thin layer) and then to cover in Fondant. I will let you know how it goes This is sort of experimental for me, so I am also making a back-up cake that is an 8x3 in torted white butter cake (will torte with lemon curd and blackberry curd- first time trying this recipe too, though), that I will cover with BC and apply crystallized flowers to the top.

I have a current forum about this w/recipes and tips going if you'd like to read further:

http://forum.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-297933.html

Good luck

A

Forgot to say that I had a small plastic foot that i used as my model for carving my cake from.......it really helps to have a 3D object to use as a model if you are going to carve a cake from scratch

The sturdier the cake (hence freezing) the less it will break apart when you carve it. when i torted it, i used 50% less BC than i usually use to torte my layers, b/c i was fearful it would slide during carving.

let me know how your cake turns out

I've done sculpted cakes many times. I always have a vision, but usually look on the internet for ideas. What I've learned is to let go of REALITY to an extent! It is cake after all, and certainly people will at least recognize what it's supposed to be. With that in mind, have fun with it! As long as you don't have to sculpt red velvet cake (I usually have it all over the table, me, cake board and ceiling) it will be fine! I use buttercream like the glue to hold it together while I work. Just make sure to make enough cake to work with.
If you have the chance, some of my sculpted cakes are in my profile. There's even a foot, Dusek! I did one a while back for a podiatrist specializing in bunion surgery! Small world.....