The Fondant Wars!!! I came, we battled, I conquered (sort of)
This is the story of how I went from this…
Take one – I almost wept
to this…
Tears were gone at this point lol
Once upon a time in the City of London, there lived a young lass (let’s call her Miss C) who loved to make cakes. One unusually sunny day in the middle of Spring, her aunty commissioned her to make the cakes for her niece’s birthday party. Alas, there was a catch. The cake had to be decorated with fondant and Miss C was terrified of fondant. However she loved her niece and wanted her to have an amazing birthday party, so she braced herself for the upcoming war with fondant.
As an efiko (if you don’t know what that means, Google it) she completed three Craftsy courses on decorating cakes with fondant and bought all the requisite materials. How hard could this be she thought? The answer would leave her phoning a friend for help at 8am, but I digress. She planned to make all the cakes in advance and have a practice run before the big day (I strongly suggest that you do the same). Unfortunately, life had other plans in store for her.
Aww poor Miss C
She fell ill for three weeks and only managed to bake half of the cakes needed to make a three tiered cake (At this point you may look at the picture above and think that’s NOT a three tier cake – Patience my dear). So the day before the big day, Miss C set about making the remaining cakes together with a batch of 48 cupcakes and cookies (Miss C clearly has some delusions about being superwoman).
She tried to save time by baking two cakes at a time in her small oven but that didn’t quite work out. Alas, each cake had to be baked on its own. The final cake was ready at 1am, which meant that decorating had to be done on the big day. Remember the 8am distress call above? This is when it happened.
Accept your oven’s limitations folks…
With her friend (Miss R) in tow to help with cupcake decorating, she set about the task of kneading the fondant (surprisingly she enjoyed this part). But nothing could have prepared her for the overt tears in her fondant, thin roll outs and her rolling pin refusing to reach the corners. With three tiers to decorate and a 12pm deadline, Miss C needed a miracle.
She managed a botched job of covering the cakes and patching up the bits that had torn in the process. Despite the patches, she was pleased with the quilting effect and had the novel idea of covering up the patches with roses. Miss R suggested covering the patches in the tiers above with ribbons. Problems solved. Cakes stacked. Taxi booked. Nothing could stop Miss C now. Nothing that is apart from the cakes falling in transit. O dear! She’d definitely had enough at this point. The tears in her eyes were on the verge of falling. What could she do??? Her cousin suggested getting rid of the middle tier and smoothing out the remaining two tiers. Luckily she had packed her fondant smoother in her emergency bag (a bag full of tools and extra bits you may need at the venue) and was able to rescue the remaining tiers.
Her niece came in squealing for joy just as the last straggling rose was put back in place. Victory at last! As Miss C hugged her niece, she realised it was ALL worth it!
The grand finale
So what’s the point of this story you may ask? Simple – In the words of Aaliyah, if at first you don’t succeed, dust yourself up and try again!
The End!
Until next time… have a good cake day!!!
XOXO
This post is part of the monthly link up party Our Growing Edge. This event aims to connect food bloggers and inspire us to try new things. This month is hosted by Pia at Joie de Vivre and cupcakes.
