Cake Decorating Tools for Beginners
You are starting cake decorating and when you go to the store to buy basic tools, there are just way too many of them. You easily get overwhelmed and want to start buying everything they sell for cake decorating. Well, DON’T.
That happened to me, I bought more than tools that what I really needed. Some of them I just gave up on them and threw them away. I had no use for them anyway.
I wish I knew what I needed to start, I would have saved a couple of bucks. So let me give you a list of tools I think you need to start decorating cakes.
1. Baking Pans
The square pans have sharp edges and square corners. Those are really nice to have, your cake comes out very “squarish”
For round pans I use the Magic Line 3″ deep and Wilton 2″ deep. Both brands work well. The Fat Daddios brand I used it to make a 2″ x 2″ little cake and it did work pretty well too.
I usually use the magic line 8″ x 3″ because their are made of heavy gauge aluminum, they feel very sturdy. Wilton brand I use it when I have to make several 1.5′ to 2″ deep cakes. It works pretty nice since the aluminum is very light and a very good conductor of heat. Cakes take a little less time to bake on those pans.
If you are baking cakes bigger than 10″ I would recommend you use a heating core. This will help by distributing heat in the middle of the cake.
2.Spatulas
S
You can find the straight and the angled ones. When I am icing the sides of the cake I like to use the straight one, and for the top of the cake and for filling I use the angled one. I bought the Wilton brand when I started decorating and until this day the work really nice. I am sure you can get the spatulas from your craft store bout you can also find them on amazon. Here is the link for the two brands I have: Wilton Spatula and the Ateco brand.
There are different sizes but mainly I use the 6″, 8″ and 10″
Silicone spatulas are highly recommended for when you are making your cakes, butter creams and fillings. Specially when making SMBC.
3.Scraper
This will help you get streetlight sides and sharp edges.
I have used a couple different scrapers in my cake career and lately I’ve been using the Wilton brand and the PME brand. I like both but more the PME brand since the it has a sharp corner…it is pretty square. The PME is a plastic scraper and the Wilton has a great grip but the “corner” is rounded since the scraper is made out of metal.
At the end both will do the job of smoothing the cakes.
4.Mixer
I use a hand held one to make some of the tutorials but when I am making cakes for the family or to sell I use a Kitchen Aid. This machine sure is an aid in the kitchen. I used to have a 4.5 Qt until it was not big enough for me. I wanted to make two batched of buttercream at the time so I bought a 6 Qt mixer.
5.Turntable
6. Piping bags and tips
Disposable bags, Couplers and pipping tips. These items are needed when you are decorating cakes with buttercream. Usually that’s were you start when learning to decorate cakes. Once you know how to cover cakes in buttercream and the sides are smooth and the top is flat you move on to fondant and for that you need other tools. But for now these are the ones you do need for buttercream.
7. Cake boards and Drums
You need them to support your cake. The cake boards are used to place your baked cake and start filling and icing. The drum is to place the decorated cake on top and serves as a ” presentation board” and to handle the cake. If you want a sturdy tiered cake use the drums in each tier as if you would use the board.
8. Recipes.
Recipes are as important as having the right equipment. I have tried more than a couple hundreds of recipes for cakes, fillings, buttercream and cake techniques. I have failed on some of them but then I have found really good recipes that I currently use. Of course it is always good to tweak them and make them your own.
Let me share with you the ones I have made my own and that I use successfully every time I make a cake.
Easiest Meringue based buttercream
If you want to learn more about how to decorate cakes, here in the site I have a couple of tutorials you can watch and learn something new perhaps.
Any questions? Join the conversation in the Facebook Group
