Hey, I'm very, very new here so I'm not good on the boards, I barely found how to post My main trouble area is covering cakes. Do I buttercream, fondant or royal ice them?! So many options and none are easy. (Well... For me!) Any tips could be fantastic.ALSO, 1does anyone have a fondant recipe, the type you can roll to put on a cake? I'm in the UK BTW. T.I.A

Welcome to CC!! You'll find so much helpful information on here.

As for your question, you can cover cakes with either buttercream or fondant. (don't really know about the royal icing) A lot just depends on what the customer wants and is willing to pay for.
There are many fondant recipes here on the site, the most popular being marshmallow fondant or Michele Foster's fondant. You can also buy fondant, but I'm not sure of what's available in the UK. I'm sure there are some UK bakers on here that can help with that.

Hi Kaya-cakes! Welcome to CC! I'm from the UK too.

Ok, so covering cakes, people don't really use Royal Icing to cover sponge cakes, because Royal icing sets so hard, but some people use royal icing for dense fruit cakes, like Christmas cakes.

The most popular method of covering celebration and wedding cakes is fondant because it gives a flat solid surface to work on. People coat the cake in a layer of buttercream first so that the fondant sticks to it.

Some people cover their cakes with buttercream, which has good and bad points. the good is that you don't have to cover the cake with fondant after you've coated it with the buttercream, the bad is that its not much a solid surface to work on (and can easily be prodded!)

You can make your own fondant and their is a UK recipe here,
http://allrecipes.co.uk/recipe/11919/rollable-fondant-icing.aspx

But fondant can be bought in lots of colours in lots of places.
Most supermarkets have white fondant! and for other colours you can check Lakeland and Hobbycraft.

The people on this forum are great and so helpful so don't hesitate to ask if you need help with anything!
Hope that helps!

Hi kaya-cakes
i am also from the uk.a good site for fondant and other cake items is www.cake-stuff.com i use their covering paste and find it easy work with and good to eat.delivery is free if you spend over £75 see website for details

I just found a couple of tutorials for you too,

Have you seen Cake Boss? Buddy shows you how to ice a cake with buttercream,