My First Topsy Turvey.. And The Problems I Had!
Decorating By winjobit77 Updated 29 Jul 2007 , 7:29pm by leah_s
hello! Well, last weekend i attempted my first topsy turvey. I basically followed the tutorial on this site, except that i did not use the graduated sizes (6,7,
. Instead i used 6,8,8 and 8,10,10. I thought i could just carve it to look right. The first problem that i encountered was when i went to slice the top in two to make the slant. First, my cut was not at all straight.. and when i went to take it off to match the sides it kind of all fell apart.. i was able to piece it all together and kind of just go with it. Everything was fine after that until it was time to put the tiers together. When i cut the hole in the bottom tier.. i had no idea how to get it straight across the bottom! So, i just did the best i could, and again, went with it lol... are we seeing a pattern???! Anyways, when i actually put the cake together...all was well for a little while.. eventually the right side started to crack.. thank goodness this was for family and it was a freebie.. so they didn't have much room to care! I'm just wondering how i prevent this from happening next time??? Also, i used luster dust for one of the first times.. i dry dusted the bow and it just came out really uneven and ugly.. any tips on this?? I'd appreciate any tips or comments.. here's the cake!
k, i'm bumping myself.. i know someone out there knows just what went wrong.
Sometimes to do these topsy turvy cakes you need a more dense cake, I made a tupsy turvy (in my gallery) and later learned so many things I did that could have gone wrong but wow did my cake come together
bottom tier 4 layers 10" devil's food straight from the box 
layer on layer never realized I had to support it half way through the layers
top tier 4 layers 6" vanilla cake and with fillings!
try a dense cake next that is the only explanation
I will admit to not looking at the tutorial, but it looks like the top tier is actually sitting at an angle. Yeah, I know that's the optical illusion you're trying to produce. But in reality you carved a circle out of the top of the bottom tier so that the top tier was actually sitting flat, right?
leahs, i attempted to do that.. i just didn't really know how to get my cut in the cake to be straight! Any ideas? As for the use of a dense cake... i used duncan hines with the added pudding and egg... is there any way to get something more dense that that and have it still taste decent???
Maybe if i would have doweled between the second and third layer of the bottom cake?? and maybe the same for the top... but then that wouldn't give me any room for the circular cut at the top??! I'm so frustrated with this. I want to be able to get it the next time.. i don't want to give up because i really love the look of these cakes! Thanks for the help!
I would love to know this as well. I am so intimidated by the topsy turvy cakes...they look so difficult! Would love the hints and tips!!
Your cake looks great to me for a 1st attempt!!!! I fear my 1st attempt (whenever I get up the nerve 
) will be a disaster, but it will be my disaster!!!
okay, i just learned a very different way of doing topsy turvy's using the single plate system, no carving out of bottom tier required. looks much, much easier to me. so if you're interested i can email you the photos and instructions that i have.
I don't know if this will help or not, but to do the topsy turvey cake my friend and I did in my gallery, we cut a pice of wax pap the same size as the top tier. then we put it on top of the bottom tier and made a mark on a knife at 1/2". I cut straight down into the bottom tier and cut in a circle being careful to keep the knife from goin deeper into the cake until the knife tip came out even with the top of the cake. Then on the lowest side of the angle I put the knife straight in and cut like I was leveling the cake. I had to do it in several pieces so that I could see if it was actually going to be level or not. We actually used a small level sitting on top of a cake board to make sure we had enough cut out. I don't know if this makes any sense or not, but I hope it helps a little. When we did ours, we actually had to toss a 12" bottom tier because we cut to much out of the center, and bake another one. We used the tutorial off of CC also, but we didn't graduate the size of each tier.
i've just gotten 3 pm's asking for my instructions. i would post them right here, but the files are too big. they are also too big to attach in a pm, so anyone who wants them just email me at [email protected] and i'll send it on to your email. they're in jpeg format so you will need an image viewing program to read them. if you dont have one, let me know and i'll convert them to a pdf for you.
becca
As for getting the bottom flat, I just used a long skinny knife, cut the circle around the size I needed, and then cut into the "shorter" side of the angle at the level I needed and the pulled the cake out. Try doing it at least partially frozen. That helps. And for your bow, if it had any shortening residue on it, it will come out streaky. Use powdered sugar to roll it out. All in all, your cake looks good. These really are a bit tough.
OK, first I don't taper the cakes. And each of my tiers has four layers. I stack and fill the first three. Then put a cardboard circle on top of the fourth layer and cut around the cardboard. You now have one layer with a center circle missing. Then I make a diagonal cut with a long serrated knife from the top corner on one side to the bottom corner of the opposite side. Put this layer on the tier.
Top tier is easier--just whack off some of the top layer.
Ice everything.
Now dowel to the top of the third layer (to the bottom of the cut out. Now, pull your dowels up so that they're in their holes, but sticking up in the air. Set the top tier onto the dowels and the weight of the cake will push the dowels back down into their holes and the cake should settle into place.
If you're using SPS, same theory. Just pull the plate and leg assembly up partially out of the cake and then let the cake's weight settle it back down.
Border and finish decorating.
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