I made this cake tonight for my mom.
Its a white cake with raspberry filling, white marshmallow fondant and ‘regular’ fondant with cocoa added (so i could make it black).

I dont understand how people make cakes to look…perfect?  i had issues putting the fondant on (curtain effect on one side) and the ribbon woulnd’t lay flat either. Plus, i cant forthe life of me get layer cakes to not have a big space in them between layers. I try to cut and make them even and it does nothing but make it worse. so then i LOAD frosting in them lol

argh

What a fabulous cake you have there, SweetNess14445! I think it looks great. As far as working with fondant,or just executing cake decorating techniques in general, I have found several video tutorials on the youtube.

Here’s one user who has posted several helpful videos. Whether you want to purchase any of the products from their website is up to you, of course, but at least their videos are helpful.
http://www.youtube.com/user/SweetWiseInc

Regarding the space between layers, can you clarify what you mean a little bit? Is this happening to you if you use a filling, frosting or otherwise, between them, or is this happening if you just stack one layer on top of another with no filling between them? For now, the only thing I can think of is to place something firm and flat (like a cardboard round, a cake lifter, or a baking sheet) over the cake and press down to squeeze out any air pockets between the layers. This will also help prevent any “blowouts” occurring later after you’ve frosted the cake or covered it with fondant. Even though cakes are soft and delicate, they’re not so delicate that pressing down on them using this method will destroy the cake (assuming it’s a good recipe and baked properly).

Great job with this cake, though. I like it a lot!

- MP

BTW, did you take any pics of the cupcakes for your daughter’s b-day?

Your cake is way cool! It looks perfect to me. What a nice thing to do for your mom.

Looks great to me!  Bet she loved it, and loved that you made it for her

Thanks for the kind words.  Too bad my daughter is sick so now the party which I made the cake for is cancelled. 

As far as the space, I mean the cakes just dont ever match up. So then when I place them on top of each other with a filling, they kind of indent…like
( (

Maybe I am crazy. 
I haven’t made the cupcakes yet, her birthday party is march 2 which is when I am making the cupcakes

SweetNess14445 - 09 February 2013 11:56 AM

Thanks for the kind words.  Too bad my daughter is sick so now the party which I made the cake for is cancelled. 

As far as the space, I mean the cakes just dont ever match up. So then when I place them on top of each other with a filling, they kind of indent…like
( (

Maybe I am crazy. 
I haven’t made the cupcakes yet, her birthday party is march 2 which is when I am making the cupcakes

I’m sorry to hear your daughter’s sick now. I hope she feels better soon.

If I understand you correctly now, you’re saying that the outside edges of your cake don’t always align with each other giving that nice flush effect of perfectly stacked layers? If so, I’ll tell that what I do is I will take my spatula blade and scrape the side of the cake so the layer of cake and the frosting or filling is flush with the side of the cake around the entire cake. This is especially helpful for larger cakes where once the next layer has been added it’s hard to adjust due to its size, but with smaller cakes I find that if the layer I have just put down on the previous layer isn’t flush, I can adjust it a little by hand to make it flush with the layer underneath it. After I scrape the sides with the spatula blade I then use a cake lifter or a baking sheet to transfer the next layer to be added. I line up the edges of the bottom layer and the layer to be added and then gently set the edge of the cake down. Once I feel good about the placement, I then place my left hand at the backside of the cake (the side closest to me) while I gently pull the cake lifter of baking sheet out from under the slice with my right hand and then the rest of the layer just falls into place. I hope this helps a little.

My mistake on the b-day cupcakes. For some reason I was under the impression you were doing those sooner. In any case, I’m excited to see what kind of designs you end up decorating them with.

Good luck!

- MP

Super pretty!

Do you mean you get a sort of “love handle” of frosting between the layers—it bulges out a little? 

If so, that happens to me, too, and I have no solution.

It’s like

Layer
love handle
Layer

I’m sure it’s the weight of the top layer, but refrigerating it doesn’t seem to prevent it, ultimately.

Anyway, your cake is really gorgeous. I love your flowy, flame-like stripes!

—ak

A long time ago, I noticed that when baking in a 2” high pan, the top 1/2 inch or so was sloped inward ever so slightly.  I assemble cakes using three layers of cake and two layers of filling.  So imagine I have two 2” tall cakes in front of me that have been leveled and then torted into 1” tall layers.  So Pan 1 has A and B layers.  The A layer is the one on the bottom (with the bottom crust).  The B layer has no crust because you leveled the cake and cut off the top crust.  Same for Pan 2.

The A layer (with the crust on the bottom) goes on the cake board, crust side down. Apply the layer of buttercream. The B layer is FLIPPED OVER so what was the leveled top is now the bottom and this goes on top of the filling you just applied.  That puts the “indent” in the middle.  You’re going to crumb coat this and be able to fill in that indent. Put another layer of filling on the B layer and then from Pan 2, you can use either layer A or B.  Normally I would go with the A layer because we will use the B layer in another cake or for samples if we need to.  I would put the Pan 2 A layer upside down so the crust is on top - nice level surface, no crumbs…   I hope this makes sense!

I dont understand LOL.  I wasnt referring to the frosting (andlove handles), more just the shape of the SIDES of the cake.  they are shaped like (  opposed to [

So then, when i stack them, they dont match up right. I dont know HOW anyone cuts their cakes on the side, i can’t seem to do that either.  And then, i always have a dome on the top of the cakes which i try to cut off, but i never can quite get them to still match up because i feel like im cutting half the cake off! And my layer went from two inches thick to one inch!

This is definitely one of those times when pictures would help!  We have a quiet week this week (mostly french macaron) - no weddings but a few birthdays so I’ll try to remember to take photos when we build cakes.

To level the top, you can either run the knife across the top of the pan and level it that way.  If the cake hasn’t risen that much, you can unmold it; wash the pan, and use cardboard rounds in the bottom of the pan to raise the level of the cake in the pan in order to cut the domed top.  If you’re using magi-cake strips, you might not have much of a dome to level.

I see what you mean, i do cut the top of the dome off, but the problem is, it seems as though if i run a knife across the top of the pan i still have an indent when i take cake out (meaning, the dome rose higher than the pan, but the sides of cake are INSIDE the pan. So basically, there is always a dome unless i cut the ENTIRE top of the cake to equal to the sides.

Im sure that made no sense.
I do use magic strips too…
Im not as concerned with the doming of the cake, more have the issues of the sides of the cakes once stacked.

Sounds like your cakes are doming quite a bit- if you wanted to cut down on that, you could use the strips on the sides of the pan, then if that isn’t enough consider either lowering the oven temp a little or adding a little baking powder to the dry ingredients.

Yea I think that’s the problem! I do use strips and sometimes when I take them out they loo great, but then after a couple minutes they look worse.