5 Conventional Icings
It’s time to end baking perplexity and discuss how to utilize the five conventional icings used in cake decorating. Learning a new skill like baking can sometimes feel like learning a foreign language. There’s so many terms that you’ve never heard of and learning everything can sometimes feel like a full time job. My goal is to breakdown these terms into easily digestible, bite-sized pieces so that you can focus on your creativity, and not daunting translations.
While there are many different types of icings you can use, there are five that are probably the most utilized. These are; buttercream, whipped icing, royal icing, fondant, and gum paste. We already talked about buttercream icing in my previous post, but now we are going to breakdown the uses for not only buttercream, but these four other traditional icings.
Buttercream Icing: A Classic
Buttercream. A Classic. This creamy and sugary icing is used in most grocery store cakes, bakeries, and baking tv shows. The nice thing about this frosting is that it is versatile. You can easily make this frosting stiff or soft depending on your needs. You can stiffen the icing by adding cornstarch or including less liquid, and you can thin out the icing by adding more liquid (Obvious… I know). When I was teaching this was the only type of frosting that I used for the beginner classes. It’s easy to make and very forgiving.
So what can buttercream be used for? Let’s dive in.
- Crumb Coat
- A crumb coat is a very thin layer of icing on a bare cake. This layer is intended to catch all the crumbs so that you can have a clean outer layer of icing.
- Icing Cake
- Exactly what you think. Icing the outside of the cake.
- Writing
- Thin out the frosting so that you can smoothly write messages on your cake!
- Boarders
- Create beautiful borders on the top and bottom of your cake. Buttercream does well at holding it’s shape ensuring your borders stay in place.
- Decorations
- Versatile in most decorations you can think of! From piping to flowers, from basket-weaves to star drops.
- Fillings
- You can use buttercream to fill multilayered cakes or to create a wall so that thinner fillings don’t flow out of your cake.
Whipped Icing: Delicious, but limited
I do love whipped icing, but its fragile. Whipped icing has a similar taste and consistency to cool whip. Have you ever had a shortcake from a grocery store? In my experience as the cake decorator for multiple different grocery stores, they use whipped icing on their fruit topped or short cakes. It’s less sweet then buttercream, and a lot lighter. This is a great option for people who don’t like the intense sweetness of buttercream.
Whipped icing really is delicious, but due to it’s consistency it can be very limited.
- Icing Cake
- The thinner and lighter consistency makes this icing great for frosting cakes.
- Writing
- As I said earlier, writing tips are small and need a thinner icing to flow smoothly.
- Limited Decorations
- You can make flowers and piping designs with whipped icing but just remember its not as durable as buttercream try not to make stacked or buildable decorations.
- Boarders
- A lot of boarders hold their shape well even with a lighter icing
- Fillings
- Whipped icing as a filling can be so good because it’s not as sweet. You can use it as a wall for other filling like buttercream, but remember it’s not as durable!
Royal Icing
Royal Icing is not nearly as versatile as the previous two that we discussed. It definitely has it’s uses, but you are not going to want to ice a cake in royal icing. The reason being that it dries solid, like rock hard. Have you ever gotten those little candies from the store that you peel off the paper? Those are royal icing. When it dries it can’t be cut or molded, it will just shatter. I hear you… what is even the point? Well, I’ll tell you.
- Decorations
- Since it dries solid, this icing is great for creating decorations. They won’t melt or lose their shape. You can create beautiful flowers and other decorations without fear of them getting ruined. You also can prepare these ahead of time so all you have to do is assemble. This is also what is used to make those beautiful decorated cookies!
Fondant
Fondant is, in my opinion, one of the greatest things to happen to cake decorating. It’s basically edible playdough. It’s easy to use and so useful when it comes to modeling and building. It opens up so many new avenues for decorating. Plus it just creates a really clean, professional look for your cake. The other nice thing about fondant is that you can either make it, or buy it. There’s a ton of pre-made and pre-colored fondant available if you don’t feel like making your own. But I’ve found a great fondant recipe using marshmallows (here).
- Icing Cake
- While you can’t really use fondant for a crumb coat, once a first icing coat has been completed you can cover the entire cake in fondant. This creates a really clean look to the cake and opens up possibilities for imprinted designs.
- Borders
- There are so many impression boards that you can use with fondant to create different types of borders and decorations.
- Decorations
- Fondant is so easy to use for decorations! It’s moldable and buildable so you can create designs that you wouldn’t be able to with frosting alone.
- Sculpting
- Have you ever seen those cake decorating shows where they build life like cakes? A lot of the time they will use fondant because you can easily sculpt using a variety of tools. You can cover structures made out of cake or rice crispies and then sculpt the details.
Gum Paste
I know it sounds like some kind of dental product but I promise it’s not. Gum paste is kind of a mix between fondant and royal icing. It has a similar consistency to fondant, but dries hard like royal icing. This is useful because you can make decorations for your cake without the worry that it will melt, wilt, or get damaged when handled. It also can be used to create structures that are free standing.
- Decorations
- You can use gum paste on its own, or mix it with fondant to create a variety of decorations. I usually use gum paste or a gum paste/fondant mix to make structures that I need to be free standing, like a bow, or cage. I also like to use gum paste to make flowers that I will later hand paint because it won’t change shape when handled.
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