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Struggling with condensation, piping bag fails, messy lettering and crumbling cake? Find out how to avoid and fix these common cake mistakes in this tutorial!
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0:00
In this tutorial, I'm going to show you how to avoid and fix condensation on your cakes
0:04
piping bag fails, messy lettering, crumbling cake, and more. I think this one has happened to everyone. You put in lots of time and effort into getting really smooth frosting and then..
0:20
Oops! You poke a finger into the cake by mistake. Spread some more frosting over the damaged area and scrape
0:25
around the cake again with a cake comb to smooth it and this will push a bit of frosting up above
0:30
the top edge so you'll need to swipe sideways with an offset spatula or cake comb to tidy that up too
0:36
As good as new. After the frosting on the cake sets, if you dent a cake against a shelf or another
0:42
cake in the fridge you can add a detail over that area. Something textured is ideal because
0:47
once the frosting sets and it's firm, creating any detail that's completely flat against the existing
0:53
frosting is almost impossible. If you pipe a border onto a cake and decide you don't like it
0:59
there's an easy fix if the frosting on the cake has set. It's always a good idea to chill your cake
1:04
before piping any border so that the frosting gets firm and can support the weight of the
1:09
piped border without drooping. And it also means you can easily scrape off any borders you don't
1:14
like because the frosted cake will hold its shape and won get damaged but the freshly piped border will slide straight off If you reuse your piping bags you notice that eventually they get holes in them and your frosting squirts through those holes while you piping
1:29
To prevent it getting all over your cake, wipe the frosting off the outside of the piping bag so that the bag is clean and then stick tape over the holes
1:37
And the tape will stick to clean plastic or canvas and block those holes
1:41
Then you can finish piping without making a mess. If the hole at the end of your piping bag is a little bit too big for your piping tip
1:49
or if the frosting has quite a stiff consistency so you have to squeeze the bag quite hard to pipe it
1:55
the tip might burst out through the end of the piping bag. A quick fix is to drop that tip into a new piping bag with a slightly smaller hole cut at the end
2:04
and then drop the entire piping bag into the new piping bag and continue piping
2:09
I have a lot of free tutorials on my YouTube channel with a new one added every week
2:14
But if you want to deep dive into hundreds of cake decorating techniques and designs
2:18
visit my online cake school by clicking up here or go to British Girl Bakes.com. I have a membership option called the Club Plus
2:24
where you'll have access to every master course, mini-course, and live workshop. If you decorate a cake with details or a design you don't like
2:31
or if a stencil doesn't work properly, as long as the frosting on the cake has set you can scrape the design off without damaging the frosting underneath Then you can try the stencil again or use a different design to decorate the cake Writing on cakes can be tricky but if you don like your letters you can tidy them up with a toothpick
2:51
lengthening or adjusting lines and widening the holes in letters like E or A
2:56
Always do lettering on a cake that has been chilled so that if you really don't like the letters
3:01
you can scrape them off without damaging the frosting underneath. If you have air bubbles in your frosting or an obvious join in a stencil design, use strategic
3:10
piping to cover up those imperfections. Here I'm using piped flowers to cover up the messier parts
3:15
of my stencil design. Buttercream dries out when it's exposed to air, so if there's a gap of
3:21
more than about 30 minutes between preparing piping bags and using them, the frosting at the
3:27
tip of the bag will be hard and it won't be sticky anymore so it won't work for piping. There's a very
3:32
quick fix for this. Squeeze the bag to push out that first bit of hard buttercream and the buttercream
3:37
left in the bag will be soft and sticky and ready to pipe with. To prevent this from happening
3:43
cover your piping bags with cling film or saran wrap when you're not using them for long periods of time
3:48
and that way the buttercream won't dry out. If your cake layers crumble or pieces break off while
3:53
you assembling it use buttercream as glue to attach the broken pieces back onto the cake Butter cream gets very firm when it sets so after pushing the piece where you want it to go put the cake in the freezer for five minutes and the butter cream will secure the broken piece there while you frost and decorate your cake By the time you
4:10
finished your cake, you'll never know it's pieced together like a puzzle inside. One of the most
4:15
common problems for cake decorators is condensation on their cakes. These tiny droplets form for two
4:21
reasons. The first is a drastic change in temperature, for example, if you move a cake from the fridge
4:27
to a hot room, or from the freezer to room temperature. If the frosting has set, you can dab these
4:32
gently with a paper towel to absorb them, and as the cake warms up, the droplets will stop
4:37
forming. To prevent condensation, change temperatures gradually, moving the cake from the freezer
4:43
to fridge, to a cool room. The other cause of condensation is the moisture in the fridge or
4:48
freezer, so after chilling a cake to set the frosting, wrap it in cling film or saran wrap
4:53
to seal the cake and protect it from moisture in the fridge or freezer. When you take the cake out
4:58
unwrap it straight away while the frosting is still cold and firm and you won't damage it
5:03
I hope these quick fixes have been useful. Learn more cake designs, techniques, tips and tricks
5:07
on my online cake school by clicking up here or visit vicious girlbakes.com and tell me in the comments
5:11
about your cake fails that you're ready to laugh at. No
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