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Stacking B'cream Cakes w/out ruining the icing


greenbean

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How do you unstack tiered buttercream cakes without ruining the frosting underneath? When I have stacked cakes in the past, when I try to unstack them, the buttercream on the lower layers sticks to the bottom of the board above, which makes for a very unattrative presentation. I use internal supports for the cakes (straws), but perhaps they need to be longer to provide some space in betweeen? Would parchment help or perhaps a second cake board with the wax side down? I'm just trying to avoid anyone having to serve ripped up cake.

Also, what are the best foam boards to use for a cake base, and where can I find them?

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Using an icing that crusts and allowing it to crust before construction will help. I should start doing that for the area under the boards. Some people sprinkle powdered sugar or coconut or using a parchment as you suggested is an idea. But truth to tell having it stick some is good so the cakes don't slide all over. But then it does make serving it messier.

Leaving a gap is an idea but then you have to work that into the design. Everybody wants stacked these days. An experienced cake person could scrape that icing off the board and re-ice the cake a bit. It's just kinda messy sometimes.

I had a relationship with this one venue where she liked for me to leave a turntable, a flat one to facilitate serving. Where the cake could be turned around and around so the servers could stay in one spot. I made sure the icing crusted very well on those cakes because that made them happy. Cake boxes under the table for leftovers made her happy too. It's the little things. :biggrin:

But somehwere where you have a relationship and a turntable they could run a spatula under the board before removing it to prevent the problem. It's always gonna be a bit messy though.

Colette Peters and lots of folks use foamcore board from the art or hobby stores. Comes in the big sheets and you just cut 'em out to fit your cakes. Those are nice and umm, I also like to use the corrugated cardboard with kabob sticks slid down the corrugations for strength.

The foam board is nicest though because it is white already, sometimes the brown edges of the cardboard peek through so since the foamcore board is all white this is a non-factor with the foamboards.

Oh oh you mean for the base??? Yes same place you can get the thicker foamboards at the hobby & art stores like Michael's, Hobby Lobby. Or y'know at cake stores you can get the masonite boards.

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I use a Swiss Buttercream on cakes, so crusting is not an option.

K8, thanks for the links, those foam boards are exactly what I was looking for. I will try the parchment and hope for the best. I will not be the one unstacking the cakes, so I don't know what will happen. Also, there will not be an opportunity to chill the cakes before unstacking.

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I use swiss buttercream too. But I wonder if a layer of crusting buttercream on top of the stacked area would help. LIke if we got our iced cakes real cold so you could just pipe a thin layer of crusting stuff there where it won't show. Sounds like a pain in the boo but it's an idea.

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Sprinkle some kind of crumbs in between the board and the cake below, to about 1" from the edge of the smaller tier. This way you'll still get a flush look, and that edge will still stick, but the center will not.

I use cake or cookie crumbs for this, some people use coconut.

Edited by reenicake (log)
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