can someone please explain to me the difference between fondant, gum paste, and marzapan??? and idealy how and what each should be used for? sorry if this is very basic.....my excuse is that i'm a newbie.....and i'm sticking to it! Thank you for your wonderful wisdom and patience!

Fondant takes longer to dry so it stays soft longer while gumpaste dries faster. That being said, fondant is great for covering cakes while gumpaste for decoration. I've only use marzipan once 6 years ago so I can't help with that.

Fondant is for covering cakes with. It takes longer to dry than gumpaste.

Gumpaste is for flowers and decorations. It dries rock hard and is usually not eaten. You can use a mix of gumpaste and fondant for things that need to dry faster but not necessarily rock hard.

Marzipan tastes great but unless you're in Great Britain you're unlikely to get any requests to cover a cake in it You can model figures with it and it has more texture than fondant so it stands up a bit better. It's also pretty expensive. The traditional use for it is as a covering for a rich fruit cake, to keep any brown liquid in the fruitcake from seeping out and ruining the royal icing or fondant, whichever the cake is ultimately covered with.

Also.....

Marzipan uses a base of ground blanched almonds.

Fondant & gumpaste are basically dough made from powdered sugar .