ok i seem to have gotten myself into a mess. i am doing cuppies for a friends halloween party, several dozen, thats no biggie. but she saw my new cupcake stand that i just recently got and wants me to bring that, AND a 6' cake she saw on a wilton site. u know the one, with the orange frosting and the witch flying around? ok, first of all, i do cupcakes. i am trying to learn how to do cakes with fondant. and i do cookies, royal icing is my friend. BUT i dont know how to put them together in a cake!!! of course i am a sucker, and said oh sure. no problem!!! my questions are......long......this: if i cover the cake with fondant, can i still pipe decorations, eg ghosts, pumpkins, fence on it? do i have to use fondant to do all decorations? and has anyone made a witch out of color flow? or is there something else i can use? please help!!! .....the things i get myself into.....

You can pipe on fondant w/either royal icing or buttercream. RI will obviously dry hard and depending on the BC you use it will either crust or need to be cold-set in the fridge. Yes, fondant can go in the fridge.

The key w/fondant is to get the underlying BC or ganache to be as smooth as possible. LOTS of tutorials here & on YouTube for that. 6in cakes are a good starter size for working with fondant--you don't have to roll out a huge, unwieldy piece in order to get a circle big enough to cover the cake.

I roll my fondant onto a piece of vinyl rubbed w/shortening so I can pick that up, flip it over, center over the cake and the peel the fondant off the vinyl to drape down the cake. There are also specialized mats for this (a whole 'nother debate there)

Good luck

Kristy

Just peeked at the Wilton witch cake. I would print their template and make the witch from fondant mixed w/tylose or gum-tex so that it dries hard. You can get pre-made black fondant.

Roll it to an even thickness that will hold bamboo skewers inserted into the bottom to hold up the witch. Cut out the template and use it to cut out the witch from the fondant.

OR--You could make her as a cookie pop and then decorate her w/RI. It wouldn't be exactly like the Wilton cake but then you would be putting your own spin on the design and working with something you are comfortable doing.

Kristy

ok, sounds like a plan! i know how to use ri so i can just pipe that onto the rolled fondant. i know they use buttercream for their icing but i cant get my iceing that smooth! so fondant it is!! LOL so i can make the decorations with ri and pipe it right onto the fondant. i was thinking that about the witch, that i could make a big cookie, i know how to do that!! would seems like it would be easier and little more forgiveing!! thanks much for the input and answers!!!

its just a cake, why am i so nervous about it??? i guess because no one besides my family has ever seen my attempts at cakes. they are getting better, but they are just practice cakes. LOL people are actually going to see this one, and know i did it, and maybe even eat it, gasp!!! that would be a first.....my practice cakes are rock hard that i have had in the freezer for a yr, no one eats them. LOL well, everyone had to start somewhere right.....whew. i feel better.

It will be fine! You can do it!

Kristy

ok, kristy!!! so ended up using cookie because the color flow kept breaking, made some lovely bats and spiderwebs, the biggest prob i had was the ganache got soft under the fondant, and so it started squishing out. next time i am using buttercream! i had a couple tears in the fondant but that wasnt much of a problem, the biggest prob i had was i didnt measure well, so the ribbon instead of it coming up halfway, it covered it completely! at least it didnt go over the top of the cake. i really expected the cake i used to rise more, so when i torted it, it would be taller, but it wasnt. we live and learn!! i will know next time! i will post pics tomorrow. still not real happy, but it is a practice cake, and i am still learning!! thanks for the encouragement!!!

just talked to them and they loved the cake!!! of course they loved the cuppies, but i know cupcakes, so i wasnt worried about that! but they loved the cake too!!! yeah, and whew!