Okay, so I have another BORING retirement cake to do for this friday for 100 people. My DH wants me to do yet again more FBCT! I'm already so tired of them. I am really tired of having to border/trim the raw edges of the transfer once I put it on the cake. Is there anything I can do to avoid this and still get a professional look?


Amy

What about a Color Flow Piece?

Never thought of that! The cake is going to be iced in BC though. I'd have to set it on sugar cubes! That would still work!! I do like how smooth color flow pieces are! HMMMMM!!!!!


Amy

Amy,
this is where a projector would come in handy, you could then do your design directly on the cake, saving a step or 2.
as for you edging on the FBCT, you could fill in around the shape in a square or circle, then once frozen cut off the edges to them get nice, sharp and crisp, then you wont have to pipe around the edges as they will already be nice after you flip it onto your cake.

Okay, I like the squared off idea! I could do that then trim it using that basket weave tip without the ridges! That's a great idea!


Amy

Well, sometimes a colorflo piece will break down fairly quickly, depends on your luck. Another option is to put fondant on the back of it.
You could also make your transfer the full size of your cake top, up to where the top border will be. Just fill in around the transfer with the colour of the icing your cake top will be.
Hugs Squirrelly

One of the 2 I did recently (was my first fbct ) I did almost the size of the cake then made some pretty drop flowers and placed them around the entire edge as an option instead of just piping a border...If you look at my pics I did a second one..blues clues and for that one I just left it alone and pushed it into the cake so that it would blend in..The icing softened up a lot and I didn't make the transfer too thick so once it was on the cake I was able to press the edges down so it looked like it belonged there..no border added

Ditto on what CuteCookie said...
I did a FBCT rather thin, 1/4" maybe. I filled in my image, smoothed it down and left it. (I didn't put another layer of frosting over it) After it firmed up in the freezer, I flopped it on the cake and did what one of the other gals suggested on smoothing a FBCT image and when it softened, I placed the Bounty paper towel on top and gently pressed it in. It worked very well.



kos

I just do the BCT, let it harden, then with a tip #5 and my base icing color, I go carefully around the edge of the bct to create a nice smooth edge. Then I fill in the rest and let it harden. When it gets put on the cake, you do see the height difference, but it doesn't matter (I think) because the base is the same color as the cake icing and it tends to blend in.

I also press my bct into the cake as much as possible when I put it on. Sometimes I crack my cake icing, but I can always fix that with a spatula (do this before doing your borders.

These are great ideas! Don't know how well smoothing out the edges of the transfer will work when my icing on the cake has already crusted pretty good!

I too thought of not putting a final icing coat on my transfer and just leaving it with my fill-in colors just to reduce the height of the entire transfer.

I'd love to use mini drop flowers or something to border the transfer but the only cakes right now that I am doing transfers on are military cakes and flowers are a NO GO on those. Everyone ordering a cake specifically mentions "No flowers"! PHOOEY!!!! I want to do one with a cascade of flowers!!!!

Again, thank you for the great tips. I'm going to be doing my transfers today probably so wish me luck!!


Amy

hmmm- n flowers... no fun LOL
How bout some chocolate chevrons(sp) or chocolate stars..something you could place around the edges of the design but still within a military theme. I suppose it depends on the design but as I mentioned earlier..no need to worry bout it..I placed blue on my CCC after it had crusted and was just dainty about pressing the edges down..I had some areas of outline break so just repiped them already on the cake...Be careful if you go thinner on the transfer..mine thawed so fast that it fought me coming off the wax paper...I just ever so carefully touched up spots and then once it crusted a bit resmoothed the design after

First of all I have to say that I looked at your website and your cakes and cookies are awesome you do wonderful work......

As far at the FBCT I never put a boarder on mine and I think that they look great - you can feel free to look at my pics and see for yourself, I just make sure that I don't do them too thick.

If doing royal color flow transfers, I have often left the waxed paper on the back of the tranfer just taking an exacto knife to cut around it and let the person know who I give the cake too, they can take the images off of the cake before cutting and save or they can peel off the backing and eat it. Some people like the idea of keeping the image.

Thank you for the compliment on my cakes and cookies. I really love doing cookies but just don't have the time with a 3 yr old and a 1 yr old.

I'll try putting a thinner backing on the transfer and see how that works. Thank you so much everyone for your help on the transfers. I let you all know how it works out. The cake is for Friday morning so I have to have it completed by Thursday night!





Amy

CakeMommy,

How did your cake turn out?

It turned out really good! I've already posted it. It's the retirement cake. I had to end up putting a border on the transfers after all but it didn't need to be nearly as large a trim. The transfers needed something to go with the rest of the design of the cake. When I put the white icing on the back of the transfer to finish it...I made sure it wasn't too thick AND I made sure it was in the shape of the design itself. It worked okay for the "keys" but not on the anchor. The top of the anchor broke off so I'll have to broaden that a bit more next time.

Thanks for everyone's suggestions.


Amy

Amy,

You did a great job. Those little bcts must have been tough! Glad it worked out. I like the corneli on the sides too, and the dragees are perfect!

Thank you thank you both! I just heard from my DH that everyone loved the cake. Only an 1/8th of it was left and there were 100 people at the ceremony so I think I judged it well! People were amazed and wondered how much it cost! My DH told them and they were like "well worth it!" They also thought the fondant rope was a real rope. I dusted it with super gold which you can't tell in the picture but upon closer look they realized it wasn't real but they said they were fooled!

I can breathe now! WHEW!!!!! Glad that one is over with. Now just have to wait until the 26th and 27th when I do a miniature stacked demo for my MOPS group! Wish me luck!!!


Amy

OMGoodness! I'm blushing!!


Amy