Hi to everyone who reads this!

I made a 10 in 8 in and 6 in round cake seperate cakes, not stacked, one has strawberry filling and the others are filled with bettercream. My problem is they are all bulging around the sides, not really a big deal since it is for my sons party but just for future reference is there any way to fix it or make it less obvious after it happens? It is a really hot and humid day here and my air is not the greatest so I am thinking that may have somethin to do with it?? Thanks for all your help guys, I sure do appreciate everything you all teach me!!

I find that if I fill my cakes and let them set overnight in the fridge, they don't buldge. So Thursday am I'll bake....I'll fill the layers by the evening and let them firm up in the fridge over night. The next morning I ice them and cover them with fondant. So far its worked everytime. Humidity, though, could be a big part of it...sometimes no matter what we do, the heat will get it!

I always use thicker icing and put a dam between each layer and fill inside the dam. I use a bag with just a coupler on it to pipe the dam. Then I let it sit and settle for several hours before icing the cake and that has stopped the bulging problem.

I'm certanly not an expert at this, but I had a cake bulging incident a little while back. It was a cake for a wedding tasting and it had raspberry mousse filling. The filling broke through the buttercream damm while I was still trying to finish the buttercream icing. I tried and tried to push it back in with no luck, so I finally just gave up and iced as carefully as I could over the worst parts and put it in the fridge. Later I covered it with mmf (which I had planned to all along), and yes the bulge was very easy to see and the pink raspberry mousse was showing as a pink line through the white mmf.

So, I just threw the design I had planned out the window and cut a ribbon of pink mmf to cover it up. I also added a pink drape to cover the worst parts. My bride didn't even notice anything wrong with the cake (although it is still quite obvious to me ).

Here is the picture:
http://www.cakecentral.com/modules.php?name=gallery&file=displayimage&pid=1240281

Just an idea on how to cover it up. Hope it helps someone.

You might try using a dam. More info here:
http://stage.wilton.ignitesolutions.com/cakes/making-cakes/filling-cake-layers.cfm

Helpful article here also:
http://www.cakecentral.com/article5-Solution-For-Cake-Bulging-Between-Layers.html

Hope this helps!

Thanks for the advice! So far it is the 6 inch that is real noticable but I think I am gonna cover that with a race car check to hide it. Hopefully it works!!

what i do:

use firm cake
stiffen the BC with PS and pipe a dam then fill
let settle for hours or overnight
then ice and dec

HTH