Summer Cake Décor Tips

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The air is warming up and we’re in the last stretch before the glorious December holidays. This means, flowers and the scent of fresh blooms, long balmy days and summer! So why not let your cakes reflect the season celebrating the coming of sun, fun and the enjoyment of outdoors? Here are 3 easy tips to take your cakes from the ordinary to the extraordinary from the summery baking-gurus at Stork.

#Tip 1 – Dirty Icing and Fresh Flowers

Take Stork’s standard  “beat and bake” vanilla cake recipe and make your favourite buttercream icing. Bake the cake as per the recipe and then “dirty ice” it with the buttercream. Dirty icing may sound well, dirty, but it is actually a common time saving method used in cake decorating. The dirty ice, or crumb coat, prevents crumbs from getting stuck in the frosting of a cake and also helps additional layers like fondant stick to the cake’s surface. Once you’ve completed your dirty icing, go into garden and collect some flowers (just make sure they’re not poisonous – here is a good list of non-toxic plants if in doubt) and add them to the top of your cake. Think roses, lavender and even some succulents. Voila, you will have a spring garden on a plate to wow your guests.

#Tip 2 – Make a Succulent Cake

Speaking of succulents, you can also make beautiful succulent decorations out of buttercream. This method usually requires quite a few tools to create the intricate shapes of the succulent leaves and can be quite time-consuming but the results will be well worth it.  You will need some piping bags, food colourant and a variety of piping tips and couplers. There are plenty of blogs and online videos which can teach you how to do these decorations like a pro.

#Tip 3 – Taste Summer With Spekboom

Spekboom is a common succulent and referred to as a miracle plant which is found in most South African gardens and parks. Samara states that “hectare for hectare, a Spekboom thicket is ten times more effective than the Amazon rainforest at removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. One hectare of Spekboom can sequester between 4 and 10 tonnes of carbon per year”. Spekboom is also edible and has a uniquely sour-tang that elephants (and now humans) love. Why not incorporate this amazing plant into your next cake with this novel Spekboom Citrus Cake recipe from the Stork Baking Kitchen?

Long live the tastes and cakes of summer!