One of the most beautiful and stylish girls I know had a big birthday this weekend. Being such a special occasion I wanted to make a cake for her that could match her beauty and style. So, I surprised one of my dearest friends, Jenn, with this ruffled, 2-tiered cake. It will never compare to how awesome she is but I still love how it turned out!
This was my first time making ruffles on a cake so I used this video as a reference. Ruffles are super easy to make and really add a dramatic effect. The flowers and bows were 100% gum paste and the ruffles and letters were a mixture (about half and half) of fondant and gum paste.
It is really hard to achieve black using food coloring so I mixed together pre-made black fondant with white gum paste and added additional black food coloring gel for a darker color. The bottom two layers of ruffles are a dark shade of slate blue/purple and actually black food coloring gel is a concentrate of really dark purple (to me it is at least) so I just used less food coloring there.
Another reason why I didn't use all gum paste for the ruffles is because it just doesn't taste very good by itself, but adding it to the fondant gives it more stretch without it cracking.
Gumpaste roses.
The big 3-0!
Pink bow on the back of the cake.
The shininess of the bow comes from edible pearl dust. One additional thing I did to the top layer of ruffles was to trim to the tops (where it gathers) with a pizza cutter so that there would be a nice even edge.
So one of the things I dislike doing is finding supplies for cake making. There is a baking supply store that is somewhat close to me but if I ever forget something it is not convenient for me to make that extra drive out to. That is usually where I buy my fondant and other supplies. Lately, the Michael's store by me has really increased their baking supply inventory, adding lots of stuff from Wilton and also Duff Goldman's (from Ace of Cakes) brand of cake decorating tools and buttercream fondant. I read somewhere that his fondant is actually very good so I used it for the first time on this cake.
Right out of the container you can smell how buttery it is and working with it was great because it stretches really easily without causing cracks or holes. I think this is the smoothest my cakes have every looked (underneath the ruffles). I will definitely be using the Duff brand of fondants again.
The flavor of the cake was devil's food cake with a dark chocolate ganache filling.
Happy birthday, Jenn!!!
