Pros, I just saw a tutorial by Alan Tetrault of Global Sugar Art,  [I love his tutorials!!] which showed him damming a wedding cake with a rope of fondant and filled with raspberry filling. I am baking a wedding cake and wanted to know what you pros thought!! Fondant or Buttercream dam?????

Ganache

I prefer butter cream

and why??

I'm sure they all work well in their respective applications.  It's just about having different options and using different techniques.  Everyone develops a preference after a while.

I prefer buttercream.  I have worked with it the most.  It's a comfortable choice for me.  :-)  Doesn't mean I won't have a reason to use a fondant or ganache dam on a future cake. 

I saw that one too.  I use BC because I can't imagine getting a side piece with a big chunk of fondant in there.  He did several things I don't do though, that wasn't the only one.

I guess one of my concerns would be as Jess said, a big chunk of fondant..in addition to the fondant on the cake..do you think that would be too much fondant?? Do you think that it would bulge  out? That's my biggest question!

I'm just curious Jess, what else did he do that you don't..being a newbie, I want to learn.

He left the BC layer very uneven and not smooth at all.  That's going to show through fondant.  He only put a very thin layer of BC on, I use a nice full layer because people like BC and I make sure I take the time to make it perfect before I put on the fondant.  That's why his fondant is lumpy.  Those are the major ones.  Some minor preferences - I don't like the weird flower spray on top, I don't like the plastic pillars ( I use SPS) and he didn't mention putting a smear of BC on your cake board before your cake goes on there to help it stay in place for the BC layer.  Other than that it was ok ;)

Link to tutorial, please?

It's the one on the CC home page.

I would NEVER create a dam out of fondant--it makes me shudder to even think about doing that. 

I prefer to use buttercream for the dam and a full coat of smooth buttercream under the fondant.

I don't even use a dam,but I guess icing the cake with buttercream counts as using a buttercream dam of sorts. I wouldn't put a rope of fondant dam under a fondant cake, what the heck?

If I am crumb coating in buttercream, I use a buttercream dam. If I'm doing ganache, I use a ganache dam.

I actually don't dam at all either, unless I have a 'oozy' filling, like curd. In that case, whatever I'm icing the cake with, either ganache or buttercream.

Definitely not fondant, I like putting some surprise/unexpected elements in my cakes, but not 'what the heck is this thick roll of chewy stuff" surprises :)

yep, that's what I thought...just wanted to be sure that I wasn't being weird because I'm a newbie..

Definitely buttercream because when you are eating the cake, buttercream tastes much better, and provides a better seal to prevent any filling from leaking onto outer surface.