EntriesLearning how to handle sugarpaste/rolled fondant comes with practice, however my practical tips may help shorten your learning curve!
- Knead the sugarpaste until it is soft and pliable – for comments on the consistency of your paste, please see my blog post on ‘why does my sugarpaste crack?’
- Smear your work surface with white vegetable fat e.g. White flora or Trex. I never use icing sugar, as it dries out the sugarpaste and can leave unwanted marks on the paste.
- Start with a ball of sugarpaste that is perfectly smooth a free of any blemishes.
- Place 5mm spacers either side of your paste. I use strip wood that I have cut to size, its available from DIY stores such as B&Q, Wicks etc
- Use a large non stick rolling pin – if you are a beginner, my advice is that it’s worth investing in one of these early on.
- Roll the paste out a little in one direction, rotate the paste 90° and roll a little more, you are aiming to keep the sugarpaste in a more or less circular shape. As the circle becomes larger and thinner pick up the paste using the rolling pin rather than your hands as this prevents the sugarpaste stretching.
- If you have an air bubble in your sugarpaste, pop it as soon as you see it, by inserting a scriber needle or pin at 45°and stroke out the air, then continue to roll.
- Keep rotating the paste and rolling a little more until the rolling pin runs smoothly over the spacers.
You should now have a circle of sugarpaste of even thickness that is ready to cover your cake.
If you’d like to see me demonstrate this and are unable to come to any of my workshops, then my new ‘Wonky’ Cake DVD, which is out in May, is an option – if you’d like more details please take a look at some of my other posts!
Lindy
Tags: beginners, dvd, rolled fondant, scriber, spacers, sugarpaste, white vetetable fat
60 Comments
I have always used icing sugar to roll out my sugarpaste, and wondered why sometimes it dries & cracks, now I know why! I would have never thought of putting white fat on the surface. I have a wooden rolling pin since forever, I suppose its time to get another one! Keep the tips coming, its really helpful!
I am new to the cake decorating lark and throughly enjoying it. I especially like your book Cakes to inspire and desire.
When I roll my sugarpaste, I tend to use cornflour. Is this ok? I am a bit hesitant to use white fat, because I worry in case it makes the paste greasy.
Your advice would be appreciated
Hi Davina
The problem with cornflour is that it can cause fermentation between the icing and the cake causing the cake to ‘blow’. This is also true of some icing sugars as they contain anti caking agents. Why not give white vegetable fat a go, you only need a very little! To most people I teach its a complete revelation!
Keep enjoying your new found hobby
Lindy
Hi Lindy,
I use one of those big green non stick boards and I have never had the paste stick to it. Should I be using Cookeen (Irish Brand) does it help with making the paste softer.
I just pre-ordered your DVDs can’t wait.
Keep Inspiring
Hilary
Hi Hilary
Pleased to hear that you’ve ordered by DVD’s, I can’t wait either – everything is being edited at the moment, all 19 hours worth!
Regards using white vegetable fat, yes try adding it to your paste, it really depends on which brand you are using as to the effect it has, Regalice certainly improves with a little white fat.
Thank you for being a loyal customer
Lindy
Hi Lindy,
I am new to cake decoration though ur book
CELEBRATE WITH A CAKE has been of great help.
I have problem with rolling out my sugarpaste and I still do not understand how to use the spacers. I know you just explained it above
Your advice is important, please keep it rolling
Hi Adeola
Spacers are just placed either side of your sugarpaste so that when you roll out your paste, they stop it getting too thin. Make sure when using them that you always roll in the direction of the spacers. In the States you can buy rubber rings to place onto your rolling pins which act in much the same way. Be warned however – these rings do not fit our UK rolling pins!!
Thanks for all this helpful advice! For spacers, I ordered some rubber rings, (£1.75) which works great on my non-stick roller pin. How ever! I was a bit miffed when I realized they are just O-rings really! I could have gone to the garage and got some O-rings to fit! Have a look at your well stocked garage, they are even available in different thicknesses, for thinner or thicker rolling. Bring your rolling pin with you!
Thanks for the tip Emma, I’d only ever seen these rings in the States but yesturday one of my students brought some to class. They do work well, but I still perfer my wooden DIY spacers but its probably because I’m so used to using them!
hi lindy, i’m new to sugar craft, & really enjoying it. I was looking for tips when modelling sugar paste when i got to your site & saw the vegetable fat tip! Does that work on your hands to? I find that icing sugar makes my hands too sticky & cornflour leaves white marks on the sugar paste (even when dry). Thanks for all these tips there really helpful.
White fat is a wonderful product for sugarcraft and yes it does work on your hands too. Also I always rub some into my hands before colouring paste as it prevents the paste colour staining my hands so much!
i’m new to cake making and wanted to know what brand of white fat is suitable? i need help!! love the blog though
louisa
Hi Louisa
I prefer to use white flora, but trex is also fine. If you are not in the UK then I suggest you ask locally for a brand name.
Hope this helps
Lindy
thankyou very much lindy, thats really useful information i will definately give white fat a go, hopefully i will have much better experiences now while modelling. I do have 1 other question, do you add the fat to the regalice paste aswell to the work surface? If so how much? Thank you again joanne
I usually add it just to the work surface but if your batch of regalice is dry and crumbly then add a pea sized amount to the paste as well and may be a drop or too of water.
thank you so much, ive just finished watching your dvd clips on youtube, the bead fountains look amazing! I will definately be purchasing them when they are available to buy. Thank you once again & look forward to seeing more hints & tips soon. Joanne
I want to make my own Sugarpast. I’ve got the recipe on a website. But i don’t know what “Gum tragacanth or Gum arabic” is, the ingrediance also includes “white fat” and “liquid glucose”. I have an upcoming tea party. Im 20 years old and would appreciate if someone could help me out plz!!!!
Firstly, take a look at my sugarpaste recipe and all the comments below. Gum tragacanth, gum arabic and liquid glucose are all explained and are available on the Lindy’s Cakes online shop . Regards white fat, I’ve written a whole post about this so I suggest you take a look.
Hope this helps and good luck with your tea party.
Lindy
What a wonderful helpful blog! I am icing my first cake at the moment for my son’s first birthday party. I have had most of the problems I have read about already! Sugarpaste cracking, sticking to the rlling pin, my hands, my work surface argh!
I have been using icing sugar to prevent sticking and now my sugarpaste has white marks, is there any way of removing these? I will be using white fat from now on!
I don’t think there is a lot you can do so either….live with the white marks…..hide them under some decoration. What ever you do don’t use water as this will discolve the surface of the sugarpaste as well!! Does anyone else have any suggestions?
Hello there – you could try getting a big blob of leftover sugar paste and flattening one side against the work top to make a flat surface, then using it in circular movements to “polish” the top of your cake. This should smooth out any lumps and bumps and get rid of the white marks. It will also give your sugarpaste a slight sheen.
hello, i think i might be a bit late but i was watching a woman on youtube making sugar flowers using cornflour to roll out her flower paste, she ended up with lots of white marks on her roses! but at the end of it she dangled the rose over a boiling kettle for 10 seconds & said that all the white marks dissolve and it helps to bond the petals! i don’t know about cake surfaces though! i used white flora to roll out the sugarpaste and got really good results for a 1st attempt! ive just ordered some of lindy’s beads and wire to make a fountain for my daughter’s 5th birthday! trying something new is exciting, but with cake decoration your imagination can run very wild its great. joanne
Steaming sugarflowers is a trick that sugar florisits use all the time, as it sets the dusts use to add a realistic finish – it makes the flowers more vibrant and lifelike.
I just got your DVD on Jewellery gems and love it. But I was trying to download the wire converting chart, but could not find it on your site. Please let me know.
You’ll find it in a couple of places, the easiest to direct you to is the dvd page of the online shop
hi lindy, im making my 2nd cake for my daughter’s 5th birthday party & i wanted some advice because i wanted to paint some letters gold, what do i need to colour them is it dust or paint? Also what colour should the reagalice be for gold to have full effect? Thankyou
Hi Joanne
Colour your sugarpaste with sugarflair Autum leaf colour or similar and then use some edible lustre dust mixed with clear alchol or water to paint over the letters – the paste colour and lustre dust are available via our online shop
Good luck with the cake
Lindy
Hi Lindy, I live in Singapore. As it is humid here, I have problems with my sugarpaste getting very sticky and after moulding them into shapes, e.g. little animals or flower, I’ll find them drooping and the colours bleeds. It’s virtually impossible to get them dry – very disheartening! Do you have any suggestions on working with sugarpaste/fondant in hot and humid weather?
Hi Yin
I’m flying to Singapore myself today and I know it’s hot and humid, however it sounds as if you are using straight sugarpaste to model and make flowers. Can I suggest that you add some gum (gum tragacanth or CMC) to your sugarpaste to make a stiffer paste which will stand up to moisture better. Also add some white vegetable fat to the paste to help stop the paste sticking to your fingers. For flowers, I suggest that you use flower paste/gum paste to make these.
When covering cakes, try to work in air conditioning with prehaps with a dehumidifier and store finished items carefully with silica gel to help a absorb excess moisture. Can I also suggest that you ask a number of local cake decorators how they cope with your climate, as they will no doubt have other solutions – try asking in cake decorating supply shops, there a few in Singapore!
Hope this helps
Lindy
Hi Lindy – i’ve actually recently switched to using white fat on sugarpaste and i must say its brilliant – i used to find icing sugar made my sugarpaste very fragile and hard so easier to crack. I’d like to know how would you place the sugarpaste onto a cake after you’ve rolled it – so many times my sugarpaste has ripped and means i have to start again – i have a long rolling pin but even using that as a support it rips
Any thoughts would be really great! Thanks a lot Deepika
Hi Deepika
Pleased to hear that you find the white fat helps. Regards your sugarpaste, you are doing the right thing by using a rolling pin to lift the paste however to prevent it tearing you need to make sure that the paste is the right consistency – read the tips on my blog post “why does my sugarpaste crack?” (just click on the orange text)
Hope this helps
Lindy
HI Lindy,
Do you have any tips on cutting the sugar paste after it has been rolled onto the cake. I’m finding that the sugar paste looks a bit scruffy at the base of the cake after cutting it ?
Thanks in advance.
Helen
Hi Helen
Lindy finds that using the smoother to smooth the sides and gently pressing as you get down to the board will gradually remove the excess sugarpaste. A knife can then be used to tidy up.
I hope that this helps
Kind regards
Andy
Hi,
How many days in advance can i cover and decorate my madiera cake with fondant, as I want to put buttercream filling in it? Is there an alternative to buttercream for a longer shelf life. It’s for my daughter’s 1st birthday party.
Thanks
Nutan
I usually say a week to decorate and a week to eat for madiera cakes
Hope this helps
Hi, love your work btw. Im interested in rolling out my sugarpaste on the trex as i do it when making my sugar flowers but im a bit wary of it tasting like fat, my sugar flowers are never eaten as they have wires etc in. Does it taint the flavour at all?
Hi Natasha
You only want to use a smear, so no it doesn’t taint the flavour. White vegetable fat is often added to various types of paste used in sugarcraft as it helps to prevent the icing becoming too sticky without it drying out the paste as well.
Hope this helps
Lindy
Hi. Love your web site.
I’ve made several large 25″ to 30″ chocolate cakes and they keep flopping in the center asaide from being raw while the sides a baked. What is happening please help/
thanks.
Hi,
I’ve been trying to cover mini sponge cakes with sugarpaste and I cant seem to get the sugarpaste smooth it looks bumpy. How do I solve this?
Thanks
Hi Vicky
You need to crumb coat the cakes with buttercream first i.e. spread a thin coat of soft buttercream over the cakes to fill in any holes and to act as glue for the sugarpaste. Then cover the cakes with sugarpaste using a smoother to smooth out any lumps and bumps – for mini cakes I find 2 smoothers work best.
Lindy
Hello Hany
That’s a very big cake! We’ve never baked such large cakes so unfortunately can’t help you this time. Can any other bloggers help?
Hi Lindy
I have used your recipe and books for making decorative cookies (brilliant book by-the-way). I have a small problem when I try to remove the cut out sugar-paste from my work surface to place on the cookie it tends to stretch and get a bit out of shape. The result is that my cookie and my cut out sugar paste aren’t the same shape. I noticed in your cookie book that the picture of you placing cut out sugar paste on the shoe cookie – the sugar paste looks surprisingly stiff. How do I achieve this?
Thanks for your help (if this is clear at all).
Louise
Hi Lindy!
Is it still possible to paint sugarpaste-covered cakes if you use white fat to roll the sugarpaste out? I’m quite keen to try it, but the next couple of cakes I have coming up all have painted elements.
Thank-you!
Hi Lindy-can i use lard instead of trex for rolling out sugarpaste.Also do you roll the paste from the middle out-then turn and roll again.Any tips on lifting large rounds of sugarpaste. i.e. for 12 x 4″ cake.Can i cover this on the actual presentation board or do i have to put it on its own cardboard disc first cos its a heavy cake! thanks
Hi Elaine
You should use an vegetable fat not an animal fat, so please no not use lard. If you want to see how I roll out my sugarpaste then I suggest to put a copy of my wonky cake DVD on your Christmas list, but it seems to me that you have the general idea. Regards large amounts of sugarpaste, you need a really large rolling pin and perhaps a spare pair of hands and by all means cover the cake on the presentation board.
Good luck
Lindy
Hi Angela
The white fat is only used to roll out the sugarpaste, you should not be flipping the sugarpaste so the white fat will not be on the upper surface of cake. Regards painting on cakes, I love doing this, use edible paste colours diluted in alcohol and good quality paintbrushes for a watercolour look. Add superwhite dust to the diluted colours to make paint more akin to acrylics.
Have fun and enjoy
Lindy
Hi Louise
It sounds as if the sugarpaste you are using may be a little on the soft side, either leave the cut out shape to dry for a few minutes before transfering or add a little CMC to the sugarpaste to stiffen it up a bit. There is a knack to lifting the sugarpaste, I always lift the rolled out sugarpaste before cutting out the shape to make sure its not sticking to my worksurface, I then quickly swipe a pallet knife under the paste and lift.
Hope this helps
Lindy
Hi Lindy
I have been asked to cover a cake in army-type camouflage sugarpaste. How on earth would you go about creating this effect? I don’t think just marbelling dark green, beige and brown would work would it?
Kindest regards – Sally
To the lady baking 30″ cakes – when I make square/obong cakes this size I tend to make a few smaller ones and place them together with buttercream on the sides acting as a glue. As long as you use buttercream sufficiently enough to fill in the joins adn they are snug next to each other, the sugarpaste covering will hide all the rest.
Wow! What a find this blog is, thank you so much for all the advice. I have made two cakes for my son (tractor and Mr Men) but now it’s my little girl’s 2nd birthday so I will be using your tips to try and improve on the previous attempts. Many thanks again!
Hello Sally,
You would need to knead all the colours separately and roll each into sausages, put them together and make a large sausage shape. Slice the sausage into rounds and then stack them. Slice down the stack, line them up then roll out. Lindy recommends a book called patterned paste by Geraldine Dahlke with this technique in, here’s a link to it on Amazon
Jane
brilliant site , will be my 1st attempt with sugapaste for daughters 2nd birthday tomorrow have picked up some great tips that i will try . Thanks
Hi
Love your tips. Just attempted my first sugarpaste model – Iggle Piggle from the kids programme In the Night Garden for my little girls 2nd birthday.
However, I have two questions… how do I now store the model? Will it last for a week?
Also, how best do I store my left over icing? I want to use it for more decorations later in the week. Will it last ok?
Thanks
Hi Leanne
Thanks for your comment. Your model will be fine as long as you store it away from moisture, ideally store it in a cardboard box some where warm and dry – I use my airing cupboard!!! Icing lasts as long as it’s use by date, this is usually 6 months to a year from when you buy it. The secret in storing icing sucessfully is to exclude air, wrap the icing in thick plastic, not cling film, then place in an airtight box.
Hope this helps and your models are a hit – my niece loves ‘In the night garden’ as well!
Lindy
Hi
Thanks for your advice. I’ve just decided to check on Iggle Piggle and whilst he has been tucked away in a box, he is quite soft. Should I leave him out in the open air to harden a bit?
I am daring to make the cake tomorrow – should I be going for Madeira rather than traditional sponge mixture? It is a 9″ round cake and I think I need to use two separate 3 egg mixtures as I was thinking I’d rather make 2 cakes than cut one in half – is that the best way to do it?
The main reason I am going to do this is because we’ve just moved house and I’ve not got to know my oven yet and it can be a bit fierce!!! If I go with 2 separate cakes, I can then cook for less time, say at 150 for 1hr 15. Thats if I do Maderia of course. Any tips?
P.S my model obviously looks ok as my 2 year old recognised him so at least that is something!
Hi Leanne
I’m please to hear Iggle Piggle was reconsided! Yes you need Iggle Piggle to dry so somewhere warm and dry is ideal e.g. an airing cupboard. I’d always opt for a maderia but I’d cook it as one and if your oven is fierce at a lower temperature.
Good luck
Hi there my problem is that I have already put the fondant onto the cake and it is bumpy, I realise now i should have used a smoother but its too late, is there anything I can do now?
Hello Pam
Unfortuantely it is too late. Once the sugarpaste starts to crust there is nothing you can do. Sorry I can’t help you further.
Jane
Hi
I wonder if anyone could offer any advice on how to make a head board out of icing my local shop said it wouldn’t work either collapse or snap. If i use fondant and Tragacanth make it quite chunky and store it flat for a week would that work? Also when should i paint it, one side at a time or wait until i can pick it up to paint the whole thing.
Thanks for any help
Hi Emma
I once made a wedding bed cake, see below. The headboard was made from pastillage which I coloured and then painted once the shape was complete. Pastillage is very strong so ideal for a headboard, however it is also very brittle so you have to be carefull when putting it together. You could try using gum trag in sugarpaste but it is susceptable to moisture so may not retain it’s shape, I would recommend pastillage – recipe in my books.
good luck
Lindy
RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL
Leave a comment