Wasc Cake Recipe And Cake Settling!

Decorating By Misskitty90 Updated 8 Jun 2021 , 11:24pm by SandraSmiley

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Misskitty90 Posted 5 Jun 2021 , 4:24pm
post #1 of 14

Everytime i make a tier cake.... my cake settles overnight when i have 2 tiers and 8 inch and 6inch on top.  It leans and gets wonky. I do dowels...carboard everythimg i have been told.  Im thinking maybe the cake recipe has too much air in it? Why dont my cakes stand nice and straight?  They bulge and settle.  I dont understand.  I have tried everything other than changing my recipe.

13 replies
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Misskitty90 Posted 5 Jun 2021 , 4:25pm
post #2 of 14

I use the WASC recipe**

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ReginaCoeliB Posted 5 Jun 2021 , 6:04pm
post #3 of 14

The failure doesn't seem to be on your cake, your supports are failing, the supports should be slightly taller than your cake tier. If your top tiers rest and put slight pressure on your bottom tier then you get wrinkles, bulges and troubles. The cake(s) sitting on top should be floating on top of the bottom tier, you just have to fill the tiny gap between the two to keep the top in place. The size of your dowels must be absolutely precise, half a millimeter and you'll get a wonky cake. Put a cardboard on top of your supports and use a level to verify that the surface is completely level before adding a tier.

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jchuck Posted 5 Jun 2021 , 11:17pm
post #4 of 14

I agree with ReginaCoeliB

it’s not your cake. It’s very important how you assemble your cakes.  Firstly, I always, always freeze my cakes. Even if I’m decorating the next day, I freeze the 24 hrs. A freshly baked cake is much harder to ice and fill. I cut my cakes in half and put some wax paper in between before I freeze them. This makes it easier to take my cakes apart and fill.  I always ice my cakes semi frozen. Once I have filled my cakes, I dowel them right away. Then the cake stays in place as I’m crumb coating and adding my final icing. I also create a hole in the middle of the cake where my middle dowel will go. This helps any air escape that causes the bulging. I let the cake sit for a couple of hours to overnight in the fridge. I dowel each cake before I stack.  If I’m covering with fondant, I cover cake directly from the fridge while it’s still cold. The hole in the middle of the cake will be hidden by either the fondant, or another cake sitting on top. But I personally don’t smooth my fondant until several hours later to the next day. Because I’ve personally found that vigorously smoothing the fondant, the friction makes the icing underneath get soft. Then icing can leak out around the fondant at the bottom of the cake. Before I stack my cakes, if it’s just buttercream I make sure my buttercream is very firm and hard. If fondant, the fondant is set and firm. I use good sturdy cardboard rounds between the stack cakes. I purchase heavy 1/8” boards from a local bulk store. The sturdy cardboard rounds ensure stability. Your cake won’t look wonky. Then once the cakes are stacked, I drive a sharpened wooden dowel right through all of the stacked cakes, right through the cake boards right into the bottom cake drum. I hope my explanation is understandable. 

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ReginaCoeliB Posted 6 Jun 2021 , 12:30am
post #5 of 14

Hey June that was a master class Ma'am...I took advantage of every single line! 

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jchuck Posted 6 Jun 2021 , 12:26pm
post #6 of 14

Misskitty90 

I wanted to stress your cardboard rounds between your cakes are important as they keep your cakes straight and disperse the weight of the cake. Cake doesn’t implode into the cake below it.  I also wanted to mention that your bottom cake board/drum is extremely important. It basically holds the weight of your cakes. If your drum isn’t wide enough or thick enough, minimum 3” thick, will definitely affect your cake structure. Cake will begin to shift, cracks starting to appear, with possible leaning, or worse collapse. I write this from experience. And not a good experience!!!! 

ReginaCoeliB   Thanks. I was trying my best to help, which I like to do. Especially for newbies and problem issues. I so remember what it was like when I started out. There was no cakey information out there…..nothing, nada, zip. You had to either buy a decorating book and hope you understood the instructions, or know another experienced decorator who could help you.  Actually CC was it for learning/information. And cakeswebake, where I was a moderator. As Sandra can attest, we had a awesome information forum!! Past tense, “had”. Now there’s a abundance of information on YouTube, FB, and many, many cake decorators with their own teaching websites/fb pages. There a few decorators with there own websites early on, but a good majority of them have disappeared. Thank goodness for YouTube….so much great information!!

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Misskitty90 Posted 6 Jun 2021 , 4:20pm
post #7 of 14

So how do i make the top tier float?  Do i put a hole in the cardboard or the top tier and have the middle tier go through that?

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Misskitty90 Posted 6 Jun 2021 , 4:20pm
post #8 of 14

So how do i make the top tier float?  Do i put a hole in the cardboard or the top tier and have the middle tier go through that?

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Misskitty90 Posted 6 Jun 2021 , 4:20pm
post #9 of 14

So how do i make the top tier float?  Do i put a hole in the cardboard or the top tier and have the middle tier go through that?

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jchuck Posted 6 Jun 2021 , 10:54pm
post #10 of 14

No, you’re top tier doesn’t “float”. You put a sturdy cardboard round underneath your 1st tier. Then place the top tier on the 2nd tier, period. On al your cakes, whether you’re stacking 2, 3 or 4 tiers, I put a whole in the middle of the cake to let any air escape. After 24 hrs, the hole can be covered with either buttercream or fondant. Once you’re cakes are stacked, you take a long wooden dowel, sharpen the end, push the dowel through the middle of the top cake, right through cakes below, into the bottom cake drum. I hope this makes sense now.

Here is a tutorial that might help you.  




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kakeladi Posted 7 Jun 2021 , 1:36pm
post #11 of 14

To further explain a bit of what June has said:  to ensure the dowels are the correct size, 1st make sure each  cake layer is level.  Then make sure the tier is level.  Insert one dowel/straw & cut it ever sooo slightly above the top of the cake; remove it & cut all the others used in that tier exactly the same size before adding them to the cake.  Distribute them in a circle within the size of the tier they will be supporting & never put any in the center (at this point-that one is added later).   One could stack whipped cream with the right support system

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SandraSmiley Posted 8 Jun 2021 , 5:38pm
post #12 of 14

Further on the floating....If you cake tier is exactly 4" tall, cut your dowels 4-1/8" tall so the next tier "floats" directly above the bottom tier, but never actually comes into contact with it, because it is resting on the dowels. Generally, I frost and dowel my cakes, then put them in the refrigerator over night to stack and finish the next day.   Lots of times, the cake has shrunk enough that the dowels are sticking up a little bit above the cake.  No problem, just fill in the gap between the bottom and top tiers with a little buttercream or fondant sludge.

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jchuck Posted 8 Jun 2021 , 6:43pm
post #13 of 14

Good explanation Sandra. That’s what I guess I was trying to convey in my post. Didn’t come across very well. 

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SandraSmiley Posted 8 Jun 2021 , 11:24pm
post #14 of 14

June, you explanation made perfect sense to me, but for someone that maybe has not made as many cakes, I thought that might help.

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