Hi all

My friend has asked me to make her carrot cake for her upcoming 30th celebrations and I'd like to surprise her by making a secret forest style cake with a sleeping dragon on top as she loves dragons.

The design means that I will have to use fondant and having read all about the horrors of fondant over cream cheese, I need to come up with a solid plan, particularly as my cream cheese frosting is definitely not a crusting frosting (it has mascarpone in addition to cream cheese and very little sugar). 

I am thinking to put a thin layer of vanilla buttercream on top of the cream cheese so as to act as the middle ground between the cream cheese and fondant and then mix in a little bit of tylose powder into my fondant for extra rigidity, particularly as it will have to sit in the fridge for a few hours or overnight.

Thoughts? Will it work?

The anchor layer of frosting is the most important one. If you try to anchor with a wobbly soft cream cheese to make such an intensive work of art on top... you will be building your castle on sand my dear.

Either make the cake, fill it with your lovely filling and use a strong buttercream to ice and decorate (telling your friend to fully scrape the decoration before enjoying the delightful cake) Or make a simple cake flavorful and lightly decorated...Goodness, not a dragon!... or maybe just a cute little one made out of fondant in a corner!

Something as delicate and delightful as a cream cheese-mascarpone filling...in meant to be enjoyed by the palate, not by the eyes!

reggie hit it right on! well done!

there is another alternative — look up the word balsamic in ‘recipes’ right up there ^^^ you can make a nice tangy sturdy faux cream cheese icing with white balsamic vinegar ~

here's the link:

https://www.cakecentral.com/recipe/61811/white-balsamic-american-buttercream