Icing for Chrismas Cake

stefejb

I definitely want to ice my cakes but no -one in the family likes marzipan - can I leave it out?

Jolaaled

kethry wrote: »

I did this for mom's cake last year as they fancied a change.. i used a mix of nuts and fruits. It looked great and apparently tasted even better. you can see a pic of it here.

HTH

keth
xx

That looks sooooo professional, Kethry!

Justamum

stefejb wrote: »

I definitely want to ice my cakes but no -one in the family likes marzipan - can I leave it out?

My mum used to always ice and marzipan our Christmas cake when we were younger, then when I was about 15 I took over the job. However, out of the 6 of us in the family only one of my brothers actually liked the stuff. I don't bother making one at all now because my own children don't like dried fruit and I can't imagine the damage to my waistline if I ate half of one (and my dh the other half!)

Horace

stefejb wrote: »

I definitely want to ice my cakes but no -one in the family likes marzipan - can I leave it out?

If you are using royal icing then you should put marzipan between it and the cake. However, if you are using that roll-on icing (American soft paste, I think it is called) then I think you can leave out the marzipan.

kethry

Jolaaled wrote: »

kethry wrote:

I did this for mom's cake last year as they fancied a change.. i used a mix of nuts and fruits. It looked great and apparently tasted even better. you can see a pic of it here.

That looks sooooo professional, Kethry!

thankyou, but in all honesty: that was the first christmas cake i'd ever made. couldn't believe how easy it was. The ribbon was a wired velvet one (with a poinsetta pattern, as you can see), i cut enough to go around once, pinned it in place with dressmaker pins (count how many you put in, and count them out again so you don't do what i did and give someone a bit of cake with a pin in it!), then made a bow, pushed a pin through a hidden bit then stuck it into the cake. If you're worried about hygiene you could disinfect the pins in boiling water - they're metal, after all.

If i can do it, anyone can!

keth
xx

stefejb

Kethry - wow - might do that instead then as it seems I can't do without the marzipan

bommer

Hi,

I did an course for cake making years ago and we made fondant icing and mazipan.

Yes it is good cause you use all the natural ingrediants but no don't think i have ever saved any money on making my own icing or mazipan. It is also bloody hard work.

Have you tried going to a specialist cake decorating shop..

I have since always used these. I don't like to processed yellow marzipan but cake shops sell more natural marzipan which is not coloured and therefore nicer and less almondy than the yellow crap. The white fondant icing is usually ok and easy to use/ pick up

Penelope_Penguin

bommer wrote: »

The white fondant icing is usually ok and easy to use/ pick up

.............and tastes vile (IMHO, of course )

Swan_2

stefejb wrote: »

I definitely want to ice my cakes but no -one in the family likes marzipan - can I leave it out?

I'm sure I've seen royal iced cakes without the marzipan, in fact I'm sure I've done one myself in the dim & distant past, but can't remember how I got round stopping getting cake crumbs in the icing & it getting discoloured ... guess it's senior thing

the reason I did it was because I used to hate marzipan myself, until I tried the real thing made with proper ground almonds, that commercial 'pastey' stuff is vile

fishing-girl

you need to use marzipan as it acts as a barrier,the cake is moist and it leaks colour into the icing.leaving the icing with lots of unatractive brown stains(i know as i have tried it) but it just tastes the same.:santa2: