making a cake from scratch

If you have never made a cake before, I wouldn't even attempt this....it looks simple and it is for someone experienced in fondant, baking and icing.  I applaud your wanting to do this, but I'd leave it to the experts!  Unless you have a limited supply of patience, you will be in years, I'm quite sure.

 

But if you are super determined, as I would be if I were you...lol:

 

You would need a sturdy cake that will hold up to the weight of the fondant, flavor of your choice.

 

Buttercream will cover nicely prior to fondant.  Be sure to refrigerate to firm up that buttercream before putting on the fondant.

 

A clay extruder will produce nice clean, uniform tubes that can be shaped into a stethoscope (you can buy small metal models at the craft store in the clay section, make sure you knead in some shortening so that it glides through the extruder easily.  Circle cutters and good old fashioned hand modeling will do the trick on the rest.  Or you can hand roll the fondant, but it won't look as clean.

 

Please let us know how it goes and some pics.  If you find it easy, you may have found a new passion!  Good luck!

Welcome to the forum.   It appears that you are not in the USA.  UK?  Australia? 

 

Here is a CakeCentral thread with excellent mud cake recipes:

 

http://cakecentral.com/t/726071/august-scratch-off-mud-cake

 

In the UK/Europe, sugar paste is generally what we call fondant in the USA.  Are you near any cake specialty supply stores?  Many of them will sell pre-made fondant (sugarpaste) that you could use to cover your cake.  Depending on the flavor on the mudcake, you could use apricot jam on the bare cake before applying fondant.  Many of the UK/Aust. bakers use ganache as the base coat.

 

You could hand-model the stethoscope out of sugar paste fairly easily.  You will need the appropriate gel colors.  You could purchase tiny  cut-outs for the letters.  (Like mini cookie cutters.)

 

You tube has a wealth of information!   Also, if you do purchase supplies at a specialty cake supply store, bring a photo of your inspiration cake with you and ask them for help with your purchases.

Yes, make sure you let your cake completely cool prior to putting anything on it.  I would bake it the night before.

 

A little trick I do, that I think I learned on here years ago, is allow the cakes to cool in the pan for 10 minutes or so.  Turn them out onto plastic wrap, wrap well and put the warm cakes in the freezer.  Traps in the moisture, rather than letting it all out in the cooling process on a rack.  Make sure you use a toothpick or skewer to test for doneness in the center of the cake.  If you do freeze it, take it out of the freezer the morning you're going to ice it and put it in the fridge.  Cold cakes are easier to work with.

 

You can look up tons of recipes on here or on epicurious.  Most cakes will work for this, just nothing like angel food.  I'm a scratch baker, but you can try a box...they are difficult to mess up!
 

Buttercream

 

If you are making a buttercream that requires you to cook the egg whites and sugar, it has to be COMPLETELY cool to the touch.  Which ALWAYS took forever in my kitchenaides, even though all the recipes that i have tried in the past only said to whip for 5-10 min or until cool to the touch.  I have since started using Duff Goldman's French Buttercream recipe, which doesn't require the heating process.  Google that, if you can't find it, PM me and I will give it to you.  Not sure if it's a free-for-all recipe (i got mine in a food show brochure that he was attending in my area).  Don't wanna give it out to everyone for free if he doesn't offer it to all!
 

Referring to "does one pack of box make 1 or 2 layers". That will depend on the box you are using AND how thick or thin you want your layers to be. DEFFINATELY work with a semi frozen cake & cut with a thin bladed knife or serrated bread knife. This will cut your frozen cake easily and the sooner you have your layers filled and back together, the less crumbs there wil be when you crumb coat. Go for it.

I googled the Duff recipe, does it really use raw egg whites and no heat? That sounds a little crazy, especially for an American chef.

 

yes duff makes his from uncooked egg whites

 

i've used that for dummies before but not to eat or serve to anyone

 

but it must be fine--it's been all over the tv etc.

 

fine for them--not for moi ;)

Well if its on tv...

 

 

wow

 

in the sense it's fully published and out there in the news cycle

 

not that it establishes the standard for everyone to follow

 

but yeah raw egg whites

LOL!

I use Duff's mixed with my own.  His alone is just like eating slightly sweetened vanilla butter, which it actually is.

 

I have considered about the raw egg whites.  And yes because it's on TV, I assume it's OK, but in hind sight isn't the best option and will make a change.  Let me say why I chose that over say Italian or Swiss methods.  Every recipe I've tried (Whimsical Bakehouse - yummo, Nick Malgieri, others).  No doubt, they are DELICIOUS!

 

Each of these recipes say to whip the mixture until cool to the touch (which in a class that I took with Nick M, he said that means ABSOLUTELY no heat coming off the bowl).  About 5-10 min.  Really??!!  It takes my KA mixer NO LESS THAN a half hour.  No lie.  I guess I got fed up with the whole time-consuming process and the annoying buzzing of my mixer, that when I saw Duff's I just thought THIS IS THE ANSWER TO MY PRAYERS TO THE BAKING GODS!  Although the texture was so very thick, almost too thick to spread on a cake and the taste was like eating butter, I was right in thinking that mixing it with my american buttercream recipe would work.  It is a delicious blend of sweet, but not too sweet.  And it sets up so nice and firm, but doesn't crust, which I kinda think is gross!  IMO....

 

Does anyone else have this problem of the cooling taking so long.  The only time it works quickly is doing a half-recipe which would take a whole day to make enough to cover a large cake.  I have a 4qt and a pro600 KA. 

 

Do you think it's possible to cook the whites and sugars and then refrigerate?  Then add back into mixer and incorporate your butter?  I think it's worth the experiment for me as I hate most american buttercreams. 

 

I will attempt to repost this in the main forum so that others may comment, too.  But I am very interested to see if my idea works.  Maybe someone who's attempted it can verify!?

Thanks all!

 

And sorry Bika, for hijacking this from our private message!!  Hopefully this isn't confusing/frustrating you!