I have heard that others pour ganache on IMBC/SMBC covered cakes but it sure didn't work for me! My cake was beautiful. Covered nice and smooth with SMBC. I chilled it and had it out for a bit and poured the warm not hot ganache over it. To my horror, it separated and slid off the cake makiing a horrible mess. Why?????? I used the Chef Taz ganache recipe on here that has 1 TBS of butter. I love that recipe and use it all the time. It was a little thick.... Please people help me understand so I can avoid it in future....... Pat

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I wish I had an answer for you but I have only donew a poured ganache once. It was over room temperature SMBC. I hope someone may have an idea as to why. It would be interesting to find out. I wonder if there was condensation formed on the surface of the SMBC that caused the ganache not to stick to it. Again - just a guess since I know chocolate and water are not good friends. Anybody else have any ideas??

If you're going to pour ganache over a cake, make sure it's not chilled. Think about it like this, what would happen if you were to pour ganache over an ice sculpture or better yet, a giant bouncy ball? It would most likely just fall off. The ganache needs to hug some kind of surface and by chilling the cake you are inhibiting that surface from "catching" the ganache. Does that make sense? To be honest, I didn't even think of it until you had said something. I'm sorry for your trouble .

You said the cake was out at room temp for awhile, but if it wasn't long enough for the cake itself to come to room temp, then maybe the cooler icing was melted by the ganache being a bit above room temp?

I don't refrigerate the cakes that are going to be covered with poured ganache because I am always worried that this may happen.

Sorry for the mess and waste--so frustrating!

I have been wanting to try ganache also...and was worried it wouldn't work out but with all your advice i'm excited to try it. but what do you cover the cake in first i saw some people say imbc/smbc what is that? thanks again!

Italian Meringue Butter Cream, Swiss Meringue Butter Cream

ohhh thanks!!! would reg. buttercreme do ok also?

The same thing applies, regardless, the problem is that the buttercream was too cold and did not "catch" the ganache. As long as you don't chill it, it should be fine. You can try it on some cupcakes first if you like...to give yourself an idea of what it might be like

thank you all. Actually I think the ganache was too warm. I usually use it like this to get a smooth flow but I think it was just warm enough to start to melt the SMBC. Another kind caker told me to have the ganache below the melting point of butter. Around 80...I think. I figured if the SMBC was too warm it would melt... Anway... I may never do that again. It really was delicious though and when sliced very pretty. Chocolate cake with chocolate mousse filling. The cake had a raspberry soaking syrup too. So from the side there was a layer of the pink SMBC before the ganache. I ended up putting the ganache on top after it cooled a bit and covered teh messy sides with chocolate curls.

I didn't get e-mail that I had any replies.......I get them re messages though...hmmm?

Interesting that the consensus is that the cake was too cold... my opinion is that it was too warm! (and that the ganache was too warm as the op said).

The colder the cake, the more heat it takes to melt the buttercream and create sliding. The colder the cake, the faster it will chill and set the ganache. At my old job we only ganached frozen solid cakes (yes, iced with SMBC). You can get the ganache warmer so you get a thinner coat and you can really bang it down on the screen for a perfectly smooth finish.

Well....that was my thinking. I may have had it set out too long and could have had it colder and the ganache a little cooler so not to melt the butter. I think it is the melting butter that cause the majorly greasy looking separation and sliding. My ganache was a little thick too. I maybe should have thinned it with a little glucose...?? Not sure... I wanted a layer of pink raspberry flavored SMBC covered with a "drip side look" of ganache...