Ok, so I am making a present cake for my Aunt's surprise 60th birthday. My plan was to do a 10" square with a 10" styrofoam lid covered in fondant (the cake itself covered in buttercream with fondant accents). So when I was at Walmart they had the green type of block (not the kind that you stick flowers in, more styrofoamy than that if that makes sense) and I have been trying for 2 days to cover it. I'm using Satin ice fondant. My corners are tearing and the fondant is not adhering to the block. So, now what do I do? Should I try to find an actual styrofoam square instead of this green styrofoam/plastic stuff? Is that the problem? Or should I do a round cake and lid? Would that be easier?? At this point I feel like chucking the whole thing out the window but I want this to be special since it's a surprise for my aunt plus it's the first time I've made a cake for the extended family. Please help!!! TIA!
Angela
have you tried:
1) rounding the corners of the styrofoam with sandpaper to discourage tearing?
2) running sandpaper over all the surfaces to give it a wee bit more texture (tooth) so things will grip better?
3) covering first in BC or even apricot jam (in essence a sticky food glue) so fondant can adhere to that?
have you tried:
1) rounding the corners of the styrofoam with sandpaper to discourage tearing?
2) running sandpaper over all the surfaces to give it a wee bit more texture (tooth) so things will grip better?
3) covering first in BC or even apricot jam (in essence a sticky food glue) so fondant can adhere to that?
I do the first 2 things above, but not the 3rd--too much trouble and too messy. Instead, I either mist the styro with water and rub it around, or my favorite method is to massage the styro liberally with crisco and then apply the fondant. The crisco fills in any tiny holes and the finish is then very smooth.
Oh, and I very much prefer the green or white floral styrofoam over the white pebble foam dummies.
HTH
Rae
I made one quite some time ago - so it wasn't really very good - but I did round, so sort of like a hot box - and it wasn't really too hard. Yes, I think the round might be easier.
I would round out the edges a bit so they don't tear through an dI just watched an amazing wedding cakes eppisode this afternoon where the girls at cake alchemy covered the styrofoam with piping gel first then fondant.
I used the same green floral foam for the head of my Wall-e cake and I covered with buttercream and then fondant. It wasn't too messy, I would probably do the same thing again. It worked great.
If you want to do it without the styrofoam , you could form your lid out of gumpaste on the bottom of the pan (turned upside down) let it dry and take it off the pan it would then be lightweight and hollow underneath like a real box lid. If you do this i recommend covering the bottom of the pan in plastic wrap and it will lift right off.
Thank you all SO much for your help. I ended up rounding the edges as many of you suggested and put crisco on it and it worked perfectly. I will still need a few "strategically" placed circles to cover a place or 2 of seaming but overall I'm very pleased. Now that I've done that, I realize that I've got to put it on a board or something because I didn't cover the bottom of the lid. Oops! I guess I'll be putting it on a board just slightly smaller than it. Any ideas of the best method to attach board to lid?? I'm going to use a dowel bigger than the cake to get the slightly open look so it'll have to go thru the cake board too. Thanks again!!
Angela
i'm glad it all worked out for you. if the bottom is exposed styrofoam you can hot glue a board to it and cover the board with a little coordinating scrapbook paper so it has a matching print. just a thought 
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