Fun With Fondant Plus A Giveaway

Have you guys ever worked with fondant? Emphasis on the word worked!

Jen from Beantown Baker and I got together a couple weekends ago to work on some fondant-based projects. King Arthur Flour happily supplied us with the fondant. We decided to tackle a couple different projects, and we have some Halloween treats in store for you soon, but meanwhile I want to share the cake I decorated with you.

Jen made the cake layers, and I whipped up some buttercreams for us. I wanted to do a fall cake, so I chose the caramel-apple cake recipe in Baked Exporations for the cake layers and its accompanying caramel buttercream for the filling and crumb coat.

We each assembled our cakes and spread a thin layer of buttercream over them (the crumb coat), and then we dove right into covering them with fondant. I kneaded the fondant for a bit to make it more pliable and workable, and then I rolled it out into a large circle (using confectioners' sugar to keep it from sticking to the counter).

In order to move the fondant circle over the cake, I thought it would make sense to fold it in half like I would to move a pie crust. While the fondant didn't tear, this did leave a crease in it. (I probably should have done some research before taking out the fondant because I learned afterwards that a little shortening would have solved this problem.)

I carefully smoothed the fondant over the top of the cake and down the sides with my hands, and then I trimmed the excess fondant from the bottom of the cake and the excess that collected at the back of the cake and made a seam in the back.

With my cake decently covered, it was time to get to work on decorations. I thought it would be fitting to do a fall theme, so I broke out my fall cookie cutters and some food color pastes. I dyed some of the fondant red and some of it yellow, and then I twisted some of the red and yellow together to swirl the colors.

I rolled out the colorful fondant, cut out some leaves, and then kneaded the scraps of fondant into orange fondant.

Then I twisted orange, red, and yellow fondant together and rolled it out for even more color variation.

In addition to the leaves, I cut out a few pumpkins, acorns, and apples and made a band to wrap around the bottom of the cake.

To adhere my decorations to the cake, I just dabbed a little water on the back of each one. I was pretty happy with the final product, considering I'd never worked with fondant before, but I know it will take a lot more practice to get something close to perfect.

I love when Jen and I get together to do baking projects because we both challenge each other and teach each other. It's much easier to tackle something like this with a friend!

So I did mention a giveaway... I bet you can guess what it is. One of you can win your own tub of fondant from King Arthur Flour and try decorating a cake yourself, or maybe hold onto it until Jen and I post our Halloween treats, which also use fondant.

To enter to win, please like King Arthur Flour on Facebook and follow them on Twitter. Then leave a comment on this post telling me anything about fondant -- a time you saw it on a cake that really impressed you, something you made with it, something you would make with it...

You have until October 7, 2011, at 11:59 p.m. EST to enter. (You must live in the U.S. or Canada.)