Why should I use a crumb coat on a cake?

What is a crumb coat? Should you use one? Why should you use one? Is this the answer for great looking, smooth cakes? Is this where you can find out?

You betcha!

When I used to decorate cakes, I didn't know anything about crumb coating but then again, my cakes never looked anything like you would find in a bakery, either. I finally realized that using a crumb coat is the way to go if I wanted a great looking cake instead of just a frosted cake that was hard to decorate.


Crumb coating is applying a thin layer of butter cream over the outside of a cake to keep the crumbs from mixing in with the frosting and to smooth over holes that are on or around the cake. If you have ever tried getting a stuck cake out of a cake pan and lost a piece of it, the crumb coating will help put it back in place or cover that empty space and it fills in gaps between layers.

The crumb coat helps shape your cake, too. Have you ever wondered how they get smooth sides on a cake or smooth corners? The crumb coat is the secret!


First thing after you make a cake and it cools is to put on a layer of butter cream frosting. The recipe I use for butter cream frosting, you can find on this link: http://learninghowtodecoratecakesmzz.blogspot.com/2012/10/chocolate-wedding-cake.html   The recipe here makes a lot of frosting (approximately 16 cups) but you can always refrigerate your frosting and save to use later if you aren't going to use it all in the same day!

--> You can trim your cake, the top and outside of it so that no one gets a crusty piece of cake. then you put on your crumb coat, as smooth as possible, put it in the fridge for half hour or until the cake isn't tacky to the touch. (nothing should stick to your finger when touched) and do the same with your second and third layers. 

Each layer of frosting that you add, you need to smooth out and shape your cake. When you use this process, it looks messy but when you see the finished product, it is well worth the extra time and effort if you want a great looking cake!

3 Tier Wedding Cake Info

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For the 3 tier wedding cake, I had used 14 X 3, 10 X 3 and 6 X 3 inch round pans.

For each pan, here is the information you would need to make this cake as per the Wilton website.

With all three layers there are:

128 Servings

28   Cups of batter (1 cake mix makes approx. 4.5 Cups. 7 Boxes will leave you with 3.5 Cups of extra batter, 6 will leave you 1 Cup short.)
 
175 Minutes Minimum Baking time (that is 2 hours 55 minutes!)

200 Minutes Maximum Baking Time (that is 3 hours 20 minutes!)

16   Cups of Frosting

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Bottom Layer
Pan Size:  14 X 3 inch   
Servings: 78
Cups of Batter for 1 layer: 15
Baking Temperature: 325
Baking Time Minutes: 75-85
Cups Icing to Frost & Decorate: 8
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Middle Layer
Pan Size:  10 X 3 inch   
Servings: 38
Cups of Batter for 1 layer: 8
Baking Temperature: 325
Baking Time Minutes: 65-75
Cups Icing to Frost & Decorate: 5
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Top Layer
Pan Size:  6 X 3 inch   
Servings: 12
Cups of Batter for 1 layer: 3
Baking Temperature: 350
Baking Time Minutes: 35-40
Cups Icing to Frost & Decorate: 3
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You can find the recipes I used for the cake, frosting and glaze here: http://learninghowtodecoratecakesmzz.blogspot.com/2012/10/chocolate-wedding-cake.html

Ice Cream Cone Cake

 Ice Cream Cone Cake

This cake is as much fun to make as it is to eat!
By themselves, the cones taste a lot like sugar wafer cookies but bigger! 

For this cake, I used the Marble One-Egg Cake Recipe, the Butter cream frosting and the glaze that you can find here:
 http://learninghowtodecoratecakesmzz.blogspot.com/2012/10/chocolate-wedding-cake.html       
 
For the cones on the cake, I cut the cones in half, stuck them on the sides of the cake and filled them with icing, I used half white, half chocolate in the decorating bag with a star tip and then used a swirling motion to make them look like real ice cream cones.

The little colored balls are just bubble gum balls.

For the upside down ice cream cone on top I used part of the cake that I trimmed off  the top and sides of the cake, before putting on the crumb coat, made a cake ball, put it in the cone, put the cone on top of the cake upside down & angled and pushed down on the cake ball part, so it looked like it could be melted ice cream and then I put the glaze on top of it. Wanting the effect of melted ice cream on top.

You can find the recipe for cake balls here:  http://learninghowtodecoratecakesmzz.blogspot.com/2012/10/cake-ball-lollipops.html      I didn't follow the recipe exactly for this, though. I just used the extra cake and icing and mixed them together until I could form a ball, roughly the size of a baseball.

One thing I have found out that helps keep the plate clean until you're ready to decorate the cake is to cut parchment paper into 4 squares and put under the cake before you initially frost it with the crumb coat. You can remove them by pulling slowly and straight out, one at a time when you finish frosting the cake and are ready to decorate.

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Granny's Banana Cake Recipe

Granny's Banana Cake Recipe

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups bananas, mashed, ripe
2 teaspoons lemon juice
3 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup butter, softened
2 1/8 cups sugar
3 large eggs
1 teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
Frosting
1 cup butter, softened
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
3 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar
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  Directions

1. Preheat oven to 275°. Grease and flour a 9 x 13 pan.
2. In a small bowl, mix mashed banana with the lemon juice; set aside.
3. In a medium bowl, mix flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.
4. In a large bowl, cream 3/4 cup butter and 2 1/8 cups sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, one at a time, then stir in 1 tsp vanilla & 1 tsp almond extract.
5.Beat in the flour mixture alternately with the buttermilk. Stir in banana mixture.
6. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake in preheated oven for one hour or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
7. Remove from oven and place directly into the freezer for 45 minutes. This will make the cake very moist.
8. For the frosting, cream the butter until smooth. Beat in 1/2 teaspoon vanilla & 1/2 teaspoon almond extract.
Add icing sugar and beat on low speed until combined, then on high speed until frosting is smooth.
9. Spread on cooled cake. 
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Okay, so I know baking the cake at 275 for an hour seems like a long time and a really low temp for a cake, usually I bake cakes at 350 at about half the time. For some reason, this cake baking at 275 and then putting it straight in the freezer makes it really moist.
This is a yummy recipe! If you don't want to use almond extract in the cake and frosting, you can just go ahead and use vanilla extract instead. Not a big problem, just a little different taste and either way you do it is good! 

This cake is for my Grandma's 94th Birthday and she has a hard time making cakes these days but still loves eating this cake! Usually I don't decorate a banana cake but I layered & decorated this one for this special occasion! 

And yes, I really need a lot of work with my writing on and decorating cakes!

Chocolate Wedding Cake

When my Daughter and new Son-in-Law decided they wanted an all chocolate cake, I told them I would try making it. They said if I couldn't, not to worry about it, they would settle for a cake made out of Ho Ho's and Twinkies but I really wanted them to have the cake they wanted and thought making a cake out of snack cakes was a kind of silly idea.

--> I learned all I could about about stacking tiered cakes, trimming the cakes and using a crumb coat, smoothing out the frosting, what to use for the chocolate drizzled part, how to make a glaze. This is a picture of the top two layers in the refrigerator.

 If I ever make a cake like this again, I'll do the base frosting first, put the layers together and then do the decorating, bottom to top.

 I did one layer at a time, top to bottom. I had to drive 30 miles to deliver it, up and down hills, down a bad patch of highway and I was scared driving, thinking it would fall all over the place, but I got it there in one piece. I added the strawberries once I got there.

My daughter & son-in-law  loved the cake even though I made the bottom layer marble. The top two layers were chocolate. (I used the Marble Cake Recipe below for the chocolate layers of the cake.)

This is the recipe I used for the cake, out of an old Betty Crocker Cookbook that was passed down to me from my Mom. (old enough that there is no publishing date inside that I can find)

One-Egg Cake

2 Cups Flour
1 1/4 Cups Sugar
2 1/3 tsp. Baking Powder
1 tsp. Salt
1/4 Cup Soft Shortening (I used unsalted butter instead)
1 Cup Milk (I used half & half instead)
1 tsp. Vanilla
1 Egg (1/4 Cup)

Heat oven to 350. Grease and flour two layer pans, 8x1 1/2" or a square pan 9x9x1 3/4". Measure flour by dip-level-pour method of by sifting. Blend flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Add shortening, 2/3 of milk and vanilla. Beat 2 minutes, medium speed with mixer or  300 vigorous strokes by hand. Scrape sides and bottom of bowl constantly. Add rest of milk and egg.Beat 2 more minutes, scraping bowl frequently. Pour into pan(s). Bake layers about 30 minutes. cool. Frost with your favorite icing.

Marble One-Egg Cake

 Make One-Egg Cake (above) - except pour half of the batter into another bowl and add a mixture of 1square unsweetened chocolate (1 oz.), melted, 1/4 tsp. Baking Soda and 2 tsp. Water. Beat 1/2 minute. Spoon chocolate and white batters alternately into prepared pan or pans. Run knife through to give marbled effect.

Cup a Dee Cakes Kid's Buttercream Recipe - This recipe makes more than enough frosting to cover all three layers of this 3 tier cake!

2 lbs unsalted butter, at room temperature
16 Cups powdered sugar (4 lbs)
1 Tblsp plus 1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp salt
1 Cup heavy cream OR light corn syrup (not nearly as good, but works)
Chocolate:  4-6 oz melted chocolate per lb of icing (will be a light brown).

In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment add all butter, salt and vanilla to 5 Quart bowl and blend.  Scrape down bowl.  Add ½ of the powdered sugar in stages (put a clean dish towel over the mixer and bowl to keep sugar dust down).  Add all of the whipping cream and blend.  Scrape down bowl.  Add the rest of the powdered sugar in stages until it is blended in.  Scrape down bowl.  Now whip the fool out of it on super high for about 2-4 minutes depending on the strength of your mixer.  The icing will go much lighter in color, fluffier and a good spreading consistency.  You should notice the icing begin to increase in volume (it will fill the mixer bowl).

Thanks to Jennifer from Cup a Dee Cakes for the recipe I found on this page: http://cupadeecakes.blogspot.com/2010/11/how-do-i-get-my-cakes-smooth.html

Chocolate Glaze

Ingredients

1 Cup Powdered Sugar
1 Tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon unsweetened cocoa powder
1 Tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon water
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

In medium bowl, combine powdered sugar and cocoa powder. Stir in water and vanilla: mix well.

Cake Ball Pops!

My daughter loved going to Starbucks, especially to get cake balls because she couldn't find them anywhere else, until I started making them.

They are so cheap and easy to make, I can make them myself and save a bundle of money compared to what we were paying for them already made.

Basically, you only need a few things. You can use any flavor or color cake, frosting, candy melts, sprinkles.
1. An un-frosted, baked cake
2. 1 can of frosting
3. Chocolate candy melts (any color/flavor will work) or chocolate chips will also work well.
4. Candy sprinkles
5. Lollipop sticks

First you take the cake and break it up with your hands in a big mixing bowl, until you have nothing but crumbs. (Make sure your cake has cooled down after baking)
Add 1 can of frosting and mix together with your hands until it has the consistency of play-doh, after it is all mixed thoroughly, just start rolling the mixture into balls using approximately 1 Tablespoon of mixture for one. If they end up looking too big or small you can adjust them to the size you want.

**Refrigerate the balls on parchment paper for at least half an hour before dipping in the chocolate, or they will fall right off of the sticks.**

The chocolate melts, I melt in a double broiler. 

If you don't have a double broiler, you can melt your chocolate in the microwave but I don't do this because I tend to leave it in too long and burn it. Burnt chocolate...yuck!
 
Then there is also the option of putting the chocolate a bowl, setting the bowl in a skillet of simmering water on the stove, and melting the chocolate this way. Make sure that no water gets in your chocolate!
 
 
I set mine on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper after I dipped the sticks (one at a time) in the melted chocolate, I pushed them halfway through the cake balls

Quickly dip 1/4 of a stick into the chocolate and then right into a cake ball.  Hold onto the stick and dip it into the chocolate, holding it sideways and rolling the stick between your fingers until the excess chocolate drips off. Put the sprinkles on, set it on your parchment paper and refrigerate if desired.
*if your chocolate is too thick and heavy, making the cake balls fall off of the sticks, add a little paraffin wax (the same wax used and found in the canning section at the store) into the chocolate.*

How I made the Bride and Groom Bridal Shower Cakes

This took me a lot of time. I woke up the around 7am the day of my daughters bridal shower and before I even had my first cup of coffee, I started baking the cakes. (I always need my coffee to start the day and without it, it takes me a while to comprehend anything going on around me or anything anyone says. Basically, I'm pretty darned slow before my first cuppa!) I didn't finish until 1pm and to me that seemed like forever.

 Making the cakes was the easy part, I've made cakes a lot out of a box or scratch, but that has never really been the hard part. My sister took a cake decorating class one time and refused to show me how to make a rose as perfect as hers, so I always just assumed it was super hard to do! I still can't make a rose, but I'm going to be working on that soon! 

 I put the neckline part of the cakes in first. I needed a skin tone color, that was a hard part for me because I couldn't just go buy a tan colored frosting. For experimenting, I used probably about three separate cups of water in a clear glass before I figured out what I needed. I used the little, cheap, liquid food coloring that you can get at the grocery store in the baking aisle, mixed the food coloring with the water and if it didn't look right, I dumped it out, rinsed the glass out and started over. This was a better method than messing up my frosting! I started with with 1 drop red, 1 drop yellow and 1 drop of green. (I know, it sounds crazy, right?! But it works!) Then one drop at a time add red and if needed a bit more yellow. Mix thoroughly after each drop. Holding the glass in a good light helps get the color to where you want it. I ended up using more yellow drops than the red. For a darker skin tone use red, yellow and blue in equal amounts (1 -2 drops each) to start. Mix well. Adjust by eye with red and yellow until you reach the desired color. I wrote each combination down that I did with the food coloring and water and when I got it right, added the same amount of drops to the frosting. Just remember that when you mix the white frosting  with the food coloring, just mix it very well after each drop of coloring. 

I took the tan frosting, made a 'V' shape at the top of one cake for the bride and used white on the rest of the cake. I put the cake in the refrigerator for half an hour and then smoothed it out with a steel spatula, running the spatula under hot water, and I just kept doing that to get it smooth. I took white frosting in a decorating bag, used a star tip and just made the stars along the V. The necklace and pearls on the dress part of the cake were made out of sugar pearls you can buy just about anywhere. 

For the groom, I made a white V at the top of the cake and made the darkest blue I could make for the jacket part, putting that on the rest of the cake. I added a little more white frosting to the dark blue I made so it was a little lighter to do the lapel and just tried making the shape of a lapel, as you can see in the picture, it wasn't even but I was more worried about the bride cake more than the groom cake. 

I put it in the fridge for half an hour and smoothed the frosting out the same way I did for the other cake, added the buttons and I was done!

--> Up close, they really don't look that great, but I plan on doing and learning more for better results next time! 

On these two cakes I used one cake mix out of the box, where I just added the water, oil & eggs, which tasted good, but I want to try different recipes and make the cakes from scratch.

The biggest mistake I made here was trying to smooth out the frosting. Everyone keeps saying Viva paper towel for smoothing the frosting and I had paper towel that had designs in it. Big mistake! All the frosting wanted to stick to the paper towel and make the frosting peak where ever I tried to smooth it out. 

Next I tried waxed paper (doesn't work) and parchment paper (doesn't work, either) and then my last try was with a straight edged spatula for grilling (because it is big & straight and I don't have all of the cake tools most people use ) but what I didn't realize here is that when you rinse the spatula off in hot water, you have to dry the spatula! This is why the frosting looks light and dark in different places.