Piping on Cakes With Fondant Icing
How to Write or Pipe Royal Icing Patterns When Cake Decorating
Wedding and Christmas cakes are often embellished with piped writing, curclicues or even pictures. Doing it yourself takes practice, but is not difficult.
Use Royal Icing
Royal icing is the icing of choice for piping, as it sets hard, has a smooth consistency and is neither too runny nor too stiff. To make it, beat an egg white until stiff, then add sifted pure icing sugar and lemon juice alternately while beating until the desired consistency is reached. Royal icing should be just stiff enough that it does not drop off a spoon held upside-down.
It is possible to tint royal icing. Add colouring in tiny amounts, as cake decorating colours can be intensely concentrated. Do not use the cheap, supermarket liquid food colours, as they may leach from the royal icing into the fondant, causing your letters to 'bleed'.
Making and Filling a Piping Bag
Cake decorating shops sell piping bags in disposable plastic or reusable fabric. The latter is invaluable for those who plan to do a lot of cake decorating. For the occasional cake, however, a disposable or homemade piping bag is ideal.
To make your own, cut a square of baking paper (greaseproof paper) and fold diagonally in half to make a triangle. Hold the triangle with the longest side down, and bring the left-hand point up and curled around, so the back side of the point touches the top point. Then curl the right-hand point around the whole thing until it touches the back side of the top point, making a cone with all three points touching. Fold down all the points together to secure them, snip off the point of the cone and pop in the piping nozzle.
To fill a piping bag, simply spoon the royal icing into the bag until no more than three-quarters full. For a fabric bag, turn down a 'cuff' of an inch or two before filling, to avoid mess. Shake down the icing to remove air bubbles.
Piping Words Onto a Cake
Always practice before piping in order to check the consistency of the icing and get the feel of the movements required. Mark out the spacing of the letters and words with a pin. If the fondant is still slightly soft, a pin can be used to 'scratch' the letters on the cake before piping over the top. Always double-check spellings, grammar and names before piping! Some novices who are using coloured icing like to pipe the words in white with a narrower nozzle first, and then go over the top with the tinted icing.
For the very nervous, a plaque made of thinly-rolled fondant can be used to pipe the words on and then attached to the top of the cake with a few dabs of royal icing.
Twist the top of the piping bag to close it, and hold between your thumb and forefinger. Squeeze with all four fingers to release the icing. When the bag begins to feel empty, give the top a few more twists to force the icing down into the nozzle.
White royal icing can usually be wiped off if a mistake has been made. When piping, squeeze with a steady, even pressure, and do not hold the piping bag too close to the surface of the cake. To finish a line, press the piping bag down onto the cake's surface and stop squeezing before you lift it up again. For fancy tails on letters such as 'y' or 'j', hold the piping bag away from the cake to create a long string of icing, then lower the piping bag without squeezing as you coil the string onto the cake. This gives a smoother, more fluid look.
Piping Patterns Onto a Cake
There are countless variations of patterns that can be piped on cakes. One of the easiest and most common is cornelli, which is a random design of squiggles. Hold the piping bag away from the cake and quickly create a wriggly 'snail-trail', not stopping until the cake is covered or the icing runs out.
S-shaped scrolls of varying sizes, piped close together in a random pattern, are another popular wedding cake decoration. A more romantic look places mirror-imaged S-shaped scrolls against each other to form hearts. A few hearts can decorate a cake quite simply, or the hearts can cover an entire cake for an embossed, filigree look.
Piped dots in little groups of three can be randomly placed over a cake for a cute and countryish effect—this is particularly effective on a plain cake, decorated only with a few fresh flowers.
Combine piping with other easy cake decorating ideas for a stunning cake.
