I have always thought that I was never a creative person, in the sense that I could never draw, never paint, never play an instrument ... you catch my drift. But over the last couple of years I have come to learn that I am creative and through my cooking I do actually have a creative side. Whether it is coming up with my own recipes, or decorating tables for special occasions but mainly though cake decorating.
I never thought I had a knack for cake decorating but my one of my besties who is by far an amazing baker (Shoutout to Annike) and a super talent when it comes to cake decorating was my inspiration to take up cake decorating. It was a slow process and lots of misses to discover my strengths when it came cake decorating.
I have come accept that I am not talented when it comes to piping, I have tried normally piping methods and even the Russian Piping Methods. But I will put it out there that I will challenge myself to practice and learn to master the art of piping.
Once I came to find my strengths and having free time due to not working for a long period of time as the hotel was closed due to COVID, I was able to practice my cake decorating skills.
One thing living in the tropics, the right icing is crucial ... very crucial, with the heat and humidity if you don't have the right icing will just make your decorating time frustrating and extremely difficult.
Buttercream is by far the best icing to use as it gives that smooth finish that makes the rest of your decorating easier as you get the best blank canvas. As you can imagine as its mainly made of butter so it tends to melt very quickly in such a hot humid country like the Seychelles. After researching many other blogs and online for the best buttercream for the climate, the secret is adding cornstarch (or cornflour) to your buttercream icing! Something so simple yet so effective.
In my main researches and reading up about cake decorating, I learnt something that I never knew was an important step into having that smooth layer of icing around your cake, that illustrious blank canvas as I call it. This important step is to always do a crumb coat, this is a rough thin layer of icing that covers the entire cake and locks in the crumbs. Once you have done your crumb coat, always chill it for a while and then you can do you final smooth layer.
Stay Tuned for Part II
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