As some of you might remember, I mentioned that I enrolled myself into a Wilton Cake Decorating class at my local Michael’s store. I have admired cake decorators for a while and I was really inspired by TJ’s 1st birthday cupcakes (you can read about them here). I loved making them and thought “why not?” and enrolled myself. I have my first class almost two weeks ago where our lovely teacher taught us tips and tricks in baking a great cake, how to fill and torte a cake, how to level a cake, how to make icing and how to ice a cake so that it is not crummy.
I took those tips and went home and made several batches of butter cream icing (delicious). I didn’t use the Wilton Class Butter cream recipe but instead used this one that is very similar:
1/2 cup shorting (I used Kroger brand)
1/2 cup water
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons meringue powder (for high humidity add one more tablespoon)
2 pounds powder sugar
1 teaspoon flavor (I used 1/2 teaspoon of compliment and 1/2 teaspoon of Creme Bouquet from a local bakery supply store)
Mix meringue powder into the powdered sugar. Put the shorting in the water, add the sale, flavoring and half the powdered sugar into a mixing bowl and beat about five minutes. Add the rest of the powdered sugar and beat just enough to mix together. Add additional water (or powdered sugar) if needed for the desired consistency. Store in an air-tight containers.
We needed to bake a cake at home and level it to bring to class the next week so I baked a yellow cake, and it fell in the middle so I baked a devils food cake and it fell a little as well but it wasn’t that noticeable so my husband made me bring that cake in to class to decorate (he doesn’t understand my perfectionism some times). I guess I will figure out the cake recipes later and focus more on the decorating of them.
I got to class and we iced our cakes and practiced using the star tip to create stars and zigzags. We also used th #12 tip to learn out to make dots and elongated shapes. After our icing dried a little we smoothed out the icing using parchment paper (Viva paper towels work just as well). We then uses piping gel to transfer a cupcake pattern onto our cakes. Using all of the skills we have learned so far we decorated our cupcakes. Here is how mine turned out:
I piped a little bead border around the edge of my cake using the 12 tip. I think it turned out okay. Please keep in mind that these pictures were taken after I got home and transported the cake in a cake carrier through a very strong storm that actually caused Michael’s to lose power. It was very hot and humid and the icing kind of melted and slid down the cake on the sides. Oh well, it still tasted good.
Next week we are going to be learning about how to create flowers and we will be decorating cupcakes. I will post later about how that went (by the way, I baked the cupcakes already and they didn’t fall!)
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Great job! I am sorry your cakes fell. I am a great baker but a HORRIBLE decorator! It looks like a 4 year old decorated it with their feet.
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I guess you can bake them and bring them over for me to practice on. I would love that!
When I decorate cakes that is!
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That looks great! I would love to take a class at Michael’s, our closest one is about 45 minutes away thought. Can’t wait to see what else you can do!
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I know other places do the Wilton classes as well. JoAnnes and a lot of little bakeries might have them!
Your cake looks great. Thank you for posting the butter cream icing recipe. I will be trying that on the next cake I make.
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The butter cream icing is yummy!
It looks great!! I actually taught those classes for a while. If you ever want to browse cakes I have some on my site that I’ve made.
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Thanks Paula, I will check it out!
This is interesting, I didn’t know that Michale’s held cake decorating classes, I’ll have to look into it. The cake looks nice,I didn’t see anything wrong with it.
Thanks for posting this. I thought I lost this recipe and here it is!!
So cute! I’m not the most creative person but you make this look so easy I might have to take a swing at it
Thank you so much for sharing this-I have been racking my brain over finding a good recipe for frosting!!! You did a great job at this cake!!! It is beautiful! I understand what you mean about your husband not understanding your perfectionism; I think I deal with the same here:) Keep up the good work-would love to have a chance to do a decorating class, I took a homeech class back in high school and I barely remember what I learned there-would love to relearn how to do cakes:) Looking forward to more of your wilton class posts-maybe I will learn something from you:)
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im taking the michaels class as well and i need to do the same thing you have done in this picture, however i dont have the cupcake pattern i need. can you send me a picture to my email please of the cupcake pattern that came in the student kit so i can print it out for the class?
please and thank you,
brittany.
I think you did a great job! I’d love to take a cake class someday also.
Yay! Aren’t you loving it? I didn’t think I’d like it because of the patience it requires. I love it though and I love when I actually make something that looks good LOL. Great job on your cake!
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Cute! I’ve debated enrolling in our local Michael’s classes- I’d love to learn how to make my baked goods look prettier
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I just had my second class tonight. You are not alone in the cake problems. I baked FOUR different cakes and they were all crap. Fell, stuck to the pan, whatever. They were junk. I had my niece make me a few cakes and they came out perfect. The decorating was super fun, though. I did the cupcake design, too. I’ll have to post a picture of it!
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SO jealous! I’ve been dying to attend a class!
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