I'm working on a project - hopefully to enter in the local fair this coming week. and its also my first time working with gumpaste/fondant mixture

heck of a project to take on eh? lol..

I've worked with mmf (recipe found here on CC) and wanted to know a couple things..

1. can mmf be mixed with gumpaste? (i have some already made gumpaste and the gumpaste powder too)

2. will a figure like (below\\/) be stable enough to enter in the fair by thursday?

3. am i crazy to be trying all the above in this time frame? lol


#3 is optional lol..

thank you for any and all your help and thanks to Saxpetzi (the wonderful person who made this cake) for the inspiration

It should be fine by Thursday. I've only mixed 50/50 gumpaste and fondant. I've never tried it with MMF.

hi i'd use 50/50 i've had fondant takes weeks to get hard , if fondant and making something large you might be able to put something inside so it's not so thick, but i'd still go with the 50/50

i'm thinking of making the chair out of Rk and covered with the 50/50 mmf/gumpaste mix.

the design i've got in mind is grandma similar to above but instead of knitting in her hands, a baby in one arm, a book in the other with its title after our fair's theme "Proud past- Bright Future"

both granny and baby sitting on the fondant/gumpaste covered RK chair on top of a cake shaped like a book.. . it too- titled the same as the book granny's reading from. I'm hoping i can get the mmf to roll out the way i want so i can cover with it. but if all else fails i'll go the buttercream method.

another question i had thought of before but forgot to post about- what should i use for glue for this? thinned mmf or gumpaste? and should i use a wire "skeleton" would the mmf/gumpaste granny figure stay solid enough?

Sorry to ask so many questions. i just worry when i think about the cake sitting there over night for display and out of my hands lol.

I've used 50/50 with mmf. For a cake for this past Friday, the characters (kneeling hunter, sitting fisherman, pointer dog....)were made Wednesday night - Thursday night and they held up just fine. I glued them with gumpaste/water mix. For stability, I inserted spaghetti into the body protuding enough from the neck area to stick the head on.

thanks for all the help!!

I haven't had any luck with the powdered gumpaste. I always just buy the already made Wilton gumpaste. It's 8.99 and I just use a 40% off coupon.

But if it works for you...then keep using it!

welli bought the powder cause the ready made stuff in the packets at the store, including the one i already had at home (friend picked up a packet for me a month ago, kept it stored and unopened) all the packets had this airpocket inside of it and about a third of the product was dried up. so i thought maybe i'd better go with the powder. i've never tried either before lol

GenGen... I know what you mean by the air pocket drying out the gumpaste! I've only ever experienced the top edge drying out on mine; however. Sometimes it is only an outer crust and you can salvage the inner moist gumpaste by scraping off the outside with a paring knife and then heating it in the microwave. I've used the powdered mix as well, and keep it on hand for emergencies, but prefer the pre-packaged. If you are using the powdered, usually it requires that you knead in shortening to get it as pliable as the pre-packaged.

As for the fondant and gumpaste mixture --go about 60 gumpaste to 50 MMF IF you use the pre-packaged type. If you go with the powder that you have to make yourself, you will find 50/50 okay. Everything should dry sufficiently. I'd suggest building in stages so things do have time to dry and won't sag upon final assembly. Spaghetti for support as recommended above... or, because you are in competition, toothpicks are more support and acceptable.

I agree that you should build the chair from a different material. You could use any number of things including the rkt, but also brownies, or granola bars. As well, for a Fair/Competition setting you usually use "dummy" cakes so it would be acceptable to make your chair from styrofoam.

HTH!

I found that if I trimmed off the dried areas of the Wilton (no other brand I've tried does that...) gumpaste and either placed it in a ziploc with a damp paper towel or placed it under plastic wrap w/ a damp towel on top it will soften it again...then, grease hands lightly and reknead it and it's good as new (if not better)

I've never entered one but I thought styrofoam couldn't be used for carved cakes...

i'm just using rkt for the chair fondant for the person and all this will be resting on a cake shaped like a book.

excellent tip for the gumpaste! thanks

while i was trimming off the dried stuff and i do mean dried, i dropped it and my border collie snapped it up, he just loved it. thank god its mostly sugar lol.

satin ice gumpaste? interesting. never heard of it

well whatdayaknow...

our local fair which is just a small town is allowing DEcorated cake entries to be made with a mix because they were being judged only on decoration not how they tasted. (did not see anything about the use of styrofoam hm)


the cakes that were being judged on Taste had to be made from Scratch and entered in the Baked Goods category. the cake i'm working on is going in the open class / Decorated cakes category. i should ask them about wether or not styrofoam could be used for this category next year.

pffft, had too many things interfering and just now getting started on this. doing a practice run right now to figure how i want to incorporate all the little things in the design i want to do that isn't in the one thats my inspiration. so it will have about 3 days drying time.. am i "up the creek w/o a paddle"? or doing ok so far? heh. i'll post a pic of my first attempt when hubby comes home with the camera tonight.

this is my first run doing a Person figure.. And chair.. i've done animals etc but never a person.. so i figure if it turns out.. it goes in the fair, if not... it was fun trying lol

well.. my trial run is going well. i have the lower body; hips legs feet skirt etc in one area, and the trunk; arms head and arms drying in another area. so its half and half assembled lol. still to come are the hands. then to create a baby in a blanket and the hand holding the book.

keep in mind this is all untinted and just a trial run. learning alot on how to do it better and can't wait to see the final result.

i haven't created the chair yet. will do so tonight. i should have done this first yes, i am using some boxes in place of the "chair" but i wanted to wait for hubby to give me a hand on making the chair then i will make the final one so that its my work going in.

for anyone still following this i'm grateful *smiles*

here's what i've been doing so far, the grandma and such are all just practice to see what i needed to do and fix etc.

the chair is not practice however i've only gotten the buttercream coat on it. i haven't had a chance to fondant cover it yet. i'm too tired, its almost 1 am and i could have been done earlier had i not been butting heads with my oldest- extended efforts proved fruitless to say the least *sigh

anywho. i hope the chair looks ok. its covered for now.i know i may have to do something to it tomorrow before i try to cover it with the mmf/gumpaste mixture. the krispy layers are supported internally with toothpicks.

god i hope this works else granny will be a sitting on-a stool!! lol
oh and the glasses aren't final either. need to see how the final granny turns out!

i've never done people shaped things before or anything this complex.. i hope it looks ok so far.. (yeh i'm that insecure lol j/k)

you can click on the small pics for bigger views. when i posted them they were too big for this forum but when viewed actually aren't that big. ohvell. thanks for looking!

ps pay no attention to granny's eyes lol tried to follow the pic but it didn't work for me, granny may end up getting buttercream eyes! lol

well as luck would have it both the practice girl and the RKT chair are still intact come morning.

hey GenGen... I'm still watching. Can't wait to find out how it all turned out for you! Post final pics for us!


Edited to add:
Oh, and it all looked great -- can't wait for final results!

thanks Win! here it is. it turned out so wonderful! thanks everyone for standing by me and helping me through untested waters (for me that is lol) it was also my first fondant covered cake too!

http://www.cakecentral.com/modules.php?name=gallery&file=displayimage&pid=1465141

Wonderful job!

oh, GenGen, it's so adorable!