Fabulous post, gave me the needed hysterical giggles I needed.

The stuff, I bought, used once and will now be sent to a consignment shop.

Wilton Products
The icing sculptor, great idea, works if all the parts actually stay in it's holder. Unfortunately, they inevitably fall out when you only have one inch left to do on the cake.

Tip covers, it's just easier to buy a big roll of cling wrap from Sam's or Costco and it works better.

Fondant punch, another item going to consignment shop. Used once and hated it.

Flower scissors, useless. Too light weight. Blunt scissors purchased for preschool and elementary kids, so much better.

Dusting sac, didn't buy because a knee hi stockings work.

Rolling cutter with spacers, just sucks.

Tilting turntable, if it actually locks won't spin properly. PITA to clean.

Tool boxes, old style, going to consignment shop.

Favorite stuff

Privately made turntable. Can handle a 16 inch round, spins evenly and level. Bought over 20 years ago.

Cheap spackle knives, from any hardware store. I buy 5", thin and flexible.

My electric knife. Great for 3 D carving or cutting square cakes. I like to call it my kitchen chainsaw.

All my old stuff for cutting patterns, when I was a fashion design major.

Dehydrator, it can be used for other things, besides jerky.

Today, my Dremel tool.

Not related to cake stuff; yet! My 2 quart crockpot with the removable ceramic liner. Approx. $10 at Wally World. It 's only flaw is it only comes with a plastic lid.

I think the Wilton Castle Kit as sold is a PITA. There are many things on their website that show you what you can do with the different pans, accessories, etc. and there is no way in the real "cake world" some of those things can be accomplished and get the same look they are showing you examples of by using real cake. I'm assuming the samples they are showing you that they are using dummy cakes. The towers of the castle will not stand up/hold up on their own and travel any distance over 2 inches without falling over if you do what they suggest. Many people, including myself, have had to rig up the towers by drilling holes and using dowels to help secure them.....Who exactly is thinking up these brilliant ideas? I would like to meet them and ask them if they've ever really used REAL CAKE to create some of the examples they show!

I can't WAIT to get home and toss out all these things that I thought I was just too DUMB to use!!!!!!!

Think of all the new space I'll have in the cabinets!!!!!!

........like egg trays better for formers because they give it a cupped shape without being perfectly round.......
........been using the cardboard egg cartons for flower formers, I cut them up and use them individually,............


YIKES!! Don't let a health dept inspector EVER see you using them The chance of transferring salmonella is super great !

........use for the flower formers, shared by another CCer, was to use them for marking equal lines around cakes for doing basketweave...I don't remember who shared that one, but it works great too (the plastic keeps its' rigidity and form better than pt tubes.........

I think that was my suggestion. I've used and taught that for years when I was teaching Wilton classes.

I haven't used it, but my instructor said that the Cake Dividing Set from, guess who, is useless, especially on round cakes. You have to curve it around the cake, and quite often it falls out of the handle (usually when it's still touching the cake).

No offense to the good instructors, but the instructors.

The money I have spent retaking Wilton classes, because the instructor was more interested in selling W. products, then actually teaching me.

I've been asked to be instructor at least 5 times in the last 2 years. Always get shot down, because I won't blatantly tell anyone that Wilton is the best and only the best. I won't do this because they aren't the best.

My first experience, for a Wilton class, I actually owned every thing but the clown heads. She told me, if I didn't show up with all Wilton; she would not teach me.

Now that I want to expand my knowledge, my instructors; say if you show up with Wilton, then don't show at all.

[quote="indydebi"]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bbmom

...
The most famous one in our collection is the spatula that you flip eggs with. It had a button on the handle. Press the button and the flipper part fanned out on both sides to make a triple size flipper! Great for pancakes, he said!

I said it looked like a kinky sex toy.

I always wondered how someone could take this item to a banker, ask for a loan to mass produce it .... and the banker says, "Yeah! That'll sell BIG!"

I have that!!!! My mom also has a knack for finding bizarre kitchen items that, for some reason, she thinks I need to have. I love it for making quesadillas. It can hold the quesadilla in the air while I add more butter to the pan.

For his birthday, my mom gave my hubby a spatula with a spring-loaded handle, like you'd see on an ice cream scoop. Squeeze the handle and the spatula turns 90 degrees. No wrist action required! LOL

Don't get me wrong. I retook all the classes and retook the classes. I still suck.

My thing is they won't even tell you there is something out there. When I started. I asked about GP and fondant, in the beginning. It was eleven years ago, they didn't have a clue. 5 years ago, they wouldn't cough up any information, unless it was to bash.

My favorite, was when I was trying to learn the Wilton Rose. Couldn't get it to save my soul. Did they tell me Wilton has a video that you can replay over the internet? Nope! Did I find that little gem, yep. My roses are seriously always lopsided, but I can actually do the Wilton rose.

I also use both of the wilton levelers. I level my cakes while they are in the pan, so I have never had a problem with the blade bending.


oh, I forgot about the icing sculptor, that is a joke

Ohh I got one!! When I was first starting my MIL bought me the betty crocker cake decorating kit. WOW. Terrible!!! The bags were square are not triangle, and it made no sense to me.

http://www.asseenontv.com/prod-pages/bc_cmplt_decor_set.html

This isn't a cake tool, but the stoopidest tool ever (and I have one!). My mom gave me a long rod with a little spatulay-looking thing on the end, but the spatula part is horizontal instead of vertical. Viola! It's a bottom-of-the-ketsup-bottle scraper tool! Can anyone top that???

The letter press from Wilton is one of the worst items I have. The letters keep moving and shifting.

Here's my all-time most useless non-cake item:

A molcajete which was given to me by my father-in-law as a birthday gift because I like to cook. It's like a big mortar and pestle made out of cinder block stuff. Really useful...a couple of hundred years ago, maybe. I kept it under the kitchen sink until I quit talking to him, then I took it to work and used it as a doorstop.

this has been really funny to read but I have to admit I have no idea what some of the things are that you are all talking about, maybe we don't have the same stuff available over her in GB. But on the vexed subject of cake testers- I have a fantastic one, it's metal & is ever so slightly thicker at one end but this thick bit tapers to a point & is coated with some kind of heat-reactive paint on the first 3/4 inch or so which is almost black in colour. Just above the dark paint there is a narrow band of red. You insert the tester into the cake for 5 seconds then remove, if the dark tip has turned the same shade of red as the band above it the cake is done. If the tip is still dark leave the cake in for a little longer. I t is really usefull for testing deep cakes & for those times when a skewer would come out clean but the cake would really benefit from a few more minutes in the oven. I got it from a company called Lakeland Ltd, I have loads of gadgets from them & love them all.

I also have the letter press, in both block and italic letters. To keep the letters from shifting, I put a small ball of fondant on each end. Works okay, but don't press too hard into the icing, or the balls will leave an indent.

Anney - I think I would love that cake tester. Sounds far more useful than the Wilton one. (www.wilton.com if you want to see the things we're talking about.)

I have the betty crocker kit too, it was a gift from a friend when I was first starting... I use the impression things some but not the other stuff.

Definitly the bands for the fondant rolling pins..... hate those things.