Warning: High sugar content - Fondant fun 101

Went to another cake decorating class at Cake Connection last Thursday. This time, it's working with fondant. Like the Cupcake fun 101 class, we were provided with the recipe and given points on making the cake they prepared for us but the decorating part was hands on. Everything was breezy at the beginning. I was working pretty fast, kneading the plain white fondant by adding Kelly green mixed with Electric green, splitting the cake into 2 and filling it (i have to get one of those cake leveller. It's so easy to work with!) and icing the cake with a thin layer of buttercream but when it came to the decorating part, i got delayed.

First, because i had produced an oblong shape of fondant to cover the 6" round cake. So i had to start kneading and rolling all over again. It was quite a task i tell you! After several minutes had passed, i stopped rolling and asked Lynette, the instructor if my fondant was ready and she said, "it's still quite small for your cake". Sigh. Yeah, my patience was running thin at that point. "Please avoid re-kneading your fondant too many times, please", cried Lynette after checking one of the other girls. Obviously i wasn't the only one. Hehe. Fondant dries very quickly, so we had to work fast to prevent it from cracking due to dryness. You can't tell from the picture below, but my cake actually has some kind of (slight) "stretch marks" because it took me quite a while to work my hands on it. Huhuhu...

Lynette also demonstrated the crimping technique, which i didn't apply, not wanting to risk having ugly holes because i think it requires some practice and of course, time is of essence. In fact, none of us actually did any crimping on our cakes. She also showed us how to create borders from fondant cut outs, making sugar flowers from modelling paste and the quilling technique. We were given the chance to work with royal icing too. But the fact that we were instructed to make a stem and leaves for our sugar flowers using the white royal icing, i thought i'd continue when i get home. Reason being, i think it kind of spoils the look. (If this was a test i would obviously fail.. haha). Well, time was running out as i was just about done with my sugar flowers (Lynette told us to make 15 of 'em) when i decided to stop anyways.

When i got home, i realised that i had accidentally left the flowers behind. So i only had sebijik of the little pink sugar flower on my cake. Yep, one sad little pink sugar flower. My brother's maid sempat tanya, "bunga ni satu je kak?..". -__- However, the husband was kind enough to drive me to a place nearby to get the tools to make new ones from the leftover modelling paste i brought home. (Thanks, sweetness!). Here's the upshot(s) of my very first fondant cake (one, with a fan :P):

I thought the shade of green was rather too pale at first, but i kind of like it after it's all done :)

Have a sweet week ahead, everyone!