Baby figuring cake topper tutorial

This great fondant baby tutorial comes to us from the uber talented Lisa Hansen. You can click to blow up each page and print off for future reference. It requires little in the way of equipment and is suitable for all skill levels.

Cute fondant Penguin figurine tutorial

How cute are these penguins?. This tutorial was designed for us, by Lisa from The Whole Cake and Caboodle. Click on the photos to enlarge, and you can print the pages, for step by step how to.

Friendly reindeer Christmas fondant icing tutorial

Continuing on with our cool fondant cookie tutorials, brought to you by the lovely Lisa from the Whole Cake and Caboodle here in Whangarei. Today's tutorial is the friendly reindeer

Roll stiffened fondant with tylo or gumpaste  out to a depth of around 4-5 mm thick. Overlay with a piece of gladwrap and stamp out required amount of heads using the reindeer head from the Wilton set of mini Christmas cookie cutters The gladwrap softens and rounds the edges. You don’t need to do this, its just a nice effect. The glad wrap will more than likely distort the antlers but they are to be removed. Using the end of the cutter  as shown remove the antlers and soften cuts if needed.

Using a medium snowflake plunger cutter  cut out some black snowflakes and cut in the positions shown into three pieces each snowflake. You don’t need to emboss the detail on the snowflakes. Glue to the back of the reindeer head as shown.

Using a knife press down in the position shown to accentuate mouth/jaw

Using the knife tip mark ears as shown and mark mouth on the jaw using the end of a scallop/arc/similar tool 

Glue a rolled ball of red for his nose quite low on his face near his jaw (approx. pea sized) . I have slightly squashed mine into a oval shape which isn’t essential – just my preference. Dust cheeks right at their edges using a small amount of Rainbow dust rose (or pearl blush pink for a lustre effect) 

Dot eyes using some black gel-paste and a toothpick. The toothpick dipped into the gel-paste then poked gently into the face gives even and controlled dots. I have dotted mine close to the nose and close together. The closer they are the cuter they are.

Cut some holly using the smaller of the three leaf ejector plunger cutter set and glue to the face and indent the holly with a ball tool or the end of a paintbrush/whatever is handy. This is to help stop the berries rolling off the leaves when it comes to placing them

Put a small amount of edible glue in the indent  and drop in a few red non-pareils between pinched fingers. Alternatively roll small balls of fondant for berries and place instead of the sprinkles. Another option is to pipe small red royal icing balls and in this case you don’t need to indent the leaf. If you have placed too many sprinkles use a dry brush to flick off excess or push into better positions. See snowman friend photo above for how to do this.

NOTE : You can use normal fondant for all toppers, but fondant stiffened with tylo will make your work so much easier as it will easily keep its shape while working and dry quickly. You need to use enough tylo to get a bluetack feel to the icing.

Christmas Holly-day fondant snowman tutorial

Over the next few days, we've got some cool fondant cookie tutorials, brought to you by the lovely Lisa from the Whole Cake and Caboodle here in Whangarei. Today's tutorial is the friendly snowman.

Roll stiffened fondant with tylosese or use gumpaste  to a depth of around 4-5 mm thick. Overlay with a piece of plastic wrap and stamp out required amount of heads using an approx. 4-5 cm round cutter. The wrap softens and rounds the edges. You don’t need to do this, its just a nice effect

Using an approx. 2.5-3 cm round cutter holding it at an angle as shown, press down to mark a half round smile on the faces.

Dot the ends of the smiles with a pointed tool to accentuate them and roll a carrot shape using a pea sized piece of orange fondant. Dust cheeks using a small amount of Rainbow dust rose (or pearl blush pink for a lustre effect)

Glue the carrot nose to the face in a position as shown, about halfway between the smile ends and no more than halfway up the face. Make sure you have left enough room to place eyes, angle the nose outwards then up if needed. Dot eyes using some black gel-paste and a toothpick. The toothpick dipped into the gel-paste then poked gently into the face gives even and controlled dots.

Make some royal icing to your own recipe or by beating 1 size 6 egg white and approx. 1-1.25 cups of icing sugar together. I beat the egg white until foamy then add the icing sugar in two lots. This used about 1 cup but if you wish to have a stiffer mix to hold piped ruffled shapes you will need to add a little more. Pipe eyebrows starting with a heavy dot at the end and then drag to get a thin brow shape. I have used a disposable bag with a tiny cut at the end.

Cut some holly using the smaller of the three leaf holly ejector plunger cutter set  and glue to the face.

Indent the holly with a ball tool or the end of a paintbrush/whatever is handy, this is to help stop the berries rolling off the leaves when it comes to placing them

Put a small amount of edible glue in the indent  and drop in a few red non-pareils between pinched fingers.  . Alternatively roll small balls of fondant for berries and place instead of the sprinkles. Another option is to pipe small red royal icing balls and in this case you don’t need to indent the leaf. If you have placed too many sprinkles use a dry brush to flick off excess or push into better positions.

 NOTE : you can use normal fondant for all but fondant stiffened with tylo will make your work so much easier as it will easily keep its shape while working and dry quickly. You need to use enough tylo to get a bluetack feel to the icing.

Happy Birthday Sienna - beautiful blossoms

At the recent Cake and Craft show in Napier, I was joined by Stacey Johnson from Design at 409​ Stacey made some amazing display cakes for the Kiwicakes stand using a combination of Kiwicakes products and her special cake toppers. For those of you who were unable to attend in person and see these cakes up close, over the next few days I'll be sharing the photos with you here.

Stacey used a gorgeous handmade wooden topper to celebrate Sienna's birthday. The blossom are made using cutter & veiner sets  The super cute house uses the FMM more than a birdhouse cutter set. The trees use the FMM fluffy cloud set. And there's even the FMM picket fence cutter. The little butterflies are created with gumpaste using the butterfly plunger cutters. This cake was greatly admired at the show.

Frozen Olaf - no sign of letting go

At the recent Cake and Craft show in Napier, I was joined by Stacey Johnson from Design at 409​ Stacey made some amazing display cakes for the Kiwicakes stand using a combination of Kiwicakes products and her special cake toppers. For those of you who were unable to attend in person and see these cakes up close, over the next few days I'll be sharing the photos with you here.

Stacey used our lovely snowflake wafer paper for the bottom tier of this cake and topped it with one of her custom topper.

50th wedding anniversary cake by Kiwicaker Janette

This stunning golden wedding anniversary cake was created by Kiwicaker Janette Robinson. The party was originally intended to be held inside, so it was created as a hanging cake, with internal lights. However due to it being a glorious sunny winters day, the cake was taken outside along with the guests.

Janette has used a great many techniques including Claire Bowman's gold cake lace and Rainbow Dust gold paints & lustre to create the stunning effects shown here. Well done Janette we adore your birdcage cake.

Stacey's Parisian Dream - Eiffel Tower cake

Earlier this year, the uber talented Stacey from Design@409 said to me "Sandra I'd like a Parisian bistro or street scene wafer paper please". I sent Stacey some options and Stacey's Parisian Dream wafer paper was born.

We got to discussing these wonderful acrylic Eiffel Tower toppers Stacey had designed and was having produced right here in NZ. I told Stacey I simply must stock these at Kiwicakes - and she made it happen.

So yesterday when I received photos of this finished cake from Stacey - I was blown away. I mean seriously How cool is this? I just wanna reach right in to my computer screen and pluck that macaron off the top. The little pink pearls are Kiwicakes pink sugar pearls

If you've a special idea for a cake topper you can, contact Stacey  through her website. Check out her work to date. She's amazingly creative and will certainly create something special for you

Cookie Fun For A Rainy Day - from Kiwicakes test kitchen

Here are a few covered cookie ideas to inspire. I find that cookies always go down well with the recipients and its a double-win because nothing beats creative time to yourself

Visitors to the recent Cake and Craft shows may have seen these being demonstrated on the Kiwicakes stand. All of the fondant toppers were stuck to the cookies with a little swipe of edible glue.

This little rocket was made with a rocket cookie cutter . A little turquoise and yellow fondant was used and impressions were highlighted with pearlescent yellow and midnight blue metallic food paint.

This crown wouldn't be out of place at an Alice in Wonderland high tea party. The cookie is covered in ivory fondant then a printed card suits wafer paper topper. I pressed the cookie cutter onto the wafer paper to make an indentation then cut around it with kitchen scissors. It is adhered to the fondant with the tiniest amount of sugar glue.

This cookie is made using the same cookie cutter as above but has more of a princess tiara feeling due to the strategic placement of shimmery cachous. Baby pink fondant covered the biscuits and was impressed with a press ice tool (pictured in yellow). You can get these in cool zigzag, diamond and drape designs as well as other polka and ribbon effects. They make decorating patterns a breeze, especially adding detail to the side of a cake evenly.

The impressions made with the tool are little dimples that can be touched with a drop of edible glue using a really fine brush. The large pink and small white sugar pearls are added with the help of sugar pearl tweezers that save you handling them all individually.

This medieval castle is covered in grey fondant and was impressed with a crocodile skin rolling pin. The grand drawbridge door is made with a little brown fondant and the shape was cut out using the same rocket cutter used above! It was impressed vertically with the tree bark mat and double handles were added for focus. 

This delicate floral shoe was made with a cherry blossom wafer paper design that I cut out following the shoe cutter template. Another yellow variation on a shoe is shown below to show you that anything goes! This one has awesome texture as it is covered in yellow edible glitter. The photo doesn't do justice. A sole was suggested by a string of silver rice shape dragees.

We hope this gets you inspired to include cookie crafting in your next rainy day activities!

Whatever your passion Kiwicakes will see you right

Did you know we've an ENORMOUS range of cookie cutters. Whether your passions, is owls elephants horses or anything in between we've got you sorted.

Batman Boys Party - from Kiwicakes test kitchen

Our eldest recently turned 7 and he requested a superhero party with a batman cake. Decisive children sure make party planning easy! I decided to buy a bat cutter to make my life easier, safe in knowing that I could use it multiple ways for maximum value. You can copy my spider man tablecloth idea with a similar spider web table cover we stock here at Kiwicakes.

On the party morning we pressed bat shapes out of a loaf of fluffy toast slice white bread and put them back in the airtight bread bag. Just before the party we spread them with a thin layer of softened butter and sprinkled with 100s&1000s. These would have looked extra awesome with yellow sprinkles instead. Mind you, the plate was clear in seconds so they must have had kid appeal as they were.

We used the bat bread off cuts to make our kids french toast for breakfast before the party began. I love the looks of pure delight they reward us with for the simplest things!

For his cake I baked two 9" chocolate cakes and sliced off their dome tops. I sandwiched them with a generous layer of orange buttercream made simple using orange flavacol (or you can buy pre-made coloured buttercream to use). Then I crumb coated the cake exterior with the same buttercream using a spatula and covered it in orange pettinice. I trimmed the excess but didnt need to be too picky making the base beautiful as it was to be covered up anyway. I used the bat cutter yet another time for the black logo stuck on top.

I used refill paper to mock up a cityscape and moved them all around until I was happy. I used them as pattern pieces to cut out black fondant buildings, which I stuck around with sugar glue. Little yellow fondant squares (made simple with a square plunger cutter) look like evening lights when placed randomly. Tall black candles completed the look.  

Here is the happy superhero with his birthday cake!

Yet another way I used the same bat cutter was creating iced cookies for take-home gifts. Little superheroes-in-the-making sure need loads of food for sustenance. I used my alphabet cutter set to personalise the cookies with our birthday boys name.