Cake Decorating Ideas

Have you always wanted to have your face imprinted on top of a cake? With today’s modern technology, you finally can. Edible photo cakes are made possible with edible inks made from food coloring and icing paper that’s from rice or cornstarch. Though this icing paper has no effect whatsoever in the taste of the cake itself, the rice icing paper can add an extra thin layer to it. The cornstarch icing paper, however, creates a much more beautiful effect because it melts as soon as the paper is placed on the cake icing and leaves only the photo behind.

An edible photo cake is an extraordinary cake decorating idea that’s gaining a lot of popularity especially in children’s parties. Making your own photo cake at home is a wonderful but expensive investment. Two to three hundred dollars can get you edible photo cake kits that include the icing papers and edible inks. Remember that though these kits are designed for a home printer, leftover industrial ink may be ingested by your guests. Also if you will be using the same printer for office or school work, rigorous scrubbing is definitely needed. A much cheaper and hassle-free alternative is to take the desired photo and take it to your local baker to be printed into the frosting sheet.

Once you’ve got your edible photo printed, it’s time to put it on top of the cake. With this, you can use any type of cake. Be it sponge, or chocolate. Any icing type such as fondant, butter-cream or sugar paste can be used as well. It is advisable that you use an icing that’s not too wet or dry for easy edible photo application

As soon as your cake is ready to be decorated, peel the backing paper off the edible photo. This usually peels off immediately but if you do encounter some problems, leave it in its bag and try again after a few minutes. Once you got the edible photo off, hold the sides gently and place it gently on the cake. If bubbles appear, just pat it with your dry fingers or else the colors will run. Accidents happen and you might just rip the photo. Don’t fret! just gently rub the torn edges to merge them back. Again, do this with dry fingers.

The edible photo cake will surely delight and impress your guests as well as the guest of honour. Try making one and add it into your cake decorating techniques hall of fame.