Welcome and congratulations. You're about to join in the excitement and fun of learning to decorate.
The creative people at Wilton have set the standard by devoting over 50 years to perfecting decorating ideas.
They design new products and produce publications just to make it easy to bake and decorate all kinds of delicious cakes, candies and cookies.
In this series, you'll benefit from techniques that are taught at the famous Wilton School and in many department and specialty stores throughout the country.
We'll also introduce you to our newest pans, specialty items, tools and accessories that make it easier than ever to create all types of unique cakes.
Now, no matter what the occasion, from birthdays to holidays, weddings, anniversaries, showers or special parties, your Wilton decorating skills will add a personal touch.
For all your celebrations, you can make cakes that are beautiful, whimsical, colorful, elegant or cute in every imaginable shape.
We're delighted to offer this series of Wilton programs on decorating that you may refer to time and again at your own pace.
You'll love all the compliments that come from family and friends.
Let's get started by joining Zella Junkin, director of the Wilton School of Cake Decorating.
Zella is ready to demonstrate many techniques from basic decorating to fanciful figure piping in this program, Cake Decorating Easy as 1-2-3.
Hello. Have you seen a cake like this? Perhaps one of your friends made it or even you saw it in a bakery and you thought,
oh, they must know some secret that I don't know.
I think when you are through watching this video, you're going to know all those secrets that's going to enable you to make a cake just like this.
Not only this one, but we're going to be doing five party cakes.
You'll find when we make the stars and the shells, simple drop flowers, writing, that all of the even complicated techniques are really just a combination of the simple ones.
A cake like this, which uses two techniques, a star and a zigzag made with the same tip,
is a type of decorating that you're going to be able to pick up.
The first time you pick up a bag and a tip, you're going to be able to do this cake.
Of course, when you start decorating, you're going to need some special equipment, some you may already have at home.
Before we really get into the decorating equipment that you're going to need, I want to talk a little bit about the type of thing that you already have in your kitchen
and about the icing that you're going to be using.
You'll need a mixer, not necessarily a large one. A handheld mixer is going to be fine.
Covered bowls for putting your icing in, spatulas, scissors, rubber scrapers, and the rest we're going to be covering in just a minute.
The other thing I think that's real important on getting that perfectly decorated cake is the type of icing you use.
Now, you may already have a recipe that you love that you ice your cakes with.
That might work for icing your cake, but when you start actually decorating, you're going to need a special buttercream, and this is real important.
In the bowl, we have a pound of confectioners' sugar, and of course, you have this icing as I'm going along.
To that, you're going to add one cup of shortening.
Now, I'm using half a cup of butter and a half a cup of a white vegetable shortening.
If you want a pure white icing, you can use one cup of vegetable shortening, but now I'm using half and half.
The butter or margarine should be just softened, not hard and not melted.
If you have melted shortening, if it's too soft, then your icing is actually going to be too soft when you finish with it.
So remember that butter or margarine is just softened.
Then to that, for the liquid, we're adding a couple tablespoons of water.
That can be milk if you want to use it.
I'm going to use a clear vanilla, a teaspoon.
This is particularly important to use the Wilton clear vanilla, especially if you're making a pure white icing.
When you're using the pastel colors or the bright colors, you may have noticed the colors on the cake that we saw in the opening.
Those come out much clearer and truer when you use the clear vanilla.
Now, the icing is mixed for five minutes on medium to low speed.
I'm going to cover the bowl up with a wet towel.
If you don't have a cover for your mixer, when you have confectioner's sugar in there, you might like to just cover it up when you get started so that it doesn't fly out.
Turn it on. Remember, this goes to low or medium speed.
It takes about five minutes to mix.
As soon as you get the confectioner's sugar mixed in with your other ingredients, you can take your towel away.
When you look at it, you think perhaps this won't mix to a real smooth, creamy consistency, but it will.
All it takes is five minutes at low to medium speed.
I think the icing is finished now.
Because I'm going to be using this icing for icing the cake, I've thinned this with about three tablespoons of corn syrup.
You can use water to thin if you'd like.
The recipe that you have makes a stiff consistency icing.
Then when we talk about the different types of techniques we're using, we'll be talking about whether you need stiff, medium, or thin icing.
Then it's thinned a little bit as we go along.
This, again, I've thinned with about three tablespoons.
When you're icing a cake, it's real important that the icing is thin enough when you start icing.
Before I ice the cake for you, I do want to just give you a few hints on greasing and flouring a pan and how to level the cake before you ice.
I'm going to cover this up, and we'll come back to it and use it later.
When we were talking before about those secrets of getting a beautiful cake,
I think sometimes you look at a cake maybe in an ad and you wonder how they got a real high cake.
You think it's something that you don't know how to do.
But really, there's only one secret, and that's a cake with the right height pan.
Wilton makes all their cake pans with a two-inch high side, so you get a full four-inch cake every time you bake.
It doesn't take any special talent on your part. All it takes is the right pan to put it in.
The other secret of getting that cake out so you don't have any crumbs on it because it makes icing easier is how you prepare the pan.
I'm using a solid vegetable shortening.
I think it's easiest to ice, or rather not to ice, but to grease the pan with a paper towel.
If you're using some of our shaped pans, which I'm going to show you in a second, I think a pastry brush works well.
But this is a paper towel, and you just grease just not heavily in the pan, but thoroughly.
You should have the whole pan greased with the solid vegetable shortening.
I think this is real important.
Even though it may be real simple just to use the wrapper maybe that you use from margarine or butter to grease the inside of your pan,
it does sometimes stick, and when you use a solid vegetable shortening to grease with,
you're always sure that that cake's going to come out every time.
Then add about two tablespoons of flour in the pan, and just around until you're sure that all surfaces are covered with the flour.
When you get this done, you can actually look in your pan, and if you see any little shiny spots, then you can go back and cover those up.
After you've floured, you're going to have a little bit of extra flour, so all you have to do is just tap the flour out,
and you have a pan that's all prepared and ready for your batter.
The other thing that you really should remember when you're making a cake is that all of the pans that Wilton makes come with instructions on how much batter to use,
and it is important that you follow those instructions.
For the three inch, or rather for the two inch high, eight inch cake, we're using three cups of batter.
So after we've greased and floured, we're going to add the cake batter.
We're using a cake mix. You can use, of course, any of your favorite cake recipes, although we find that really most of our students like using cake mix.
Then before you put just a few quick taps, it knocks the air bubbles out.
Then into the oven it goes, and about 30 minutes later, you come out with a baked cake.
Now some people, I've turned this cake out to cool just briefly on the rack, and it should cool on the rack before you turn it out 10 minutes,
and that's real important. If you take it out too soon, the cake is real fragile and it might break.
Leave it in the pan too long and it's going to stick.
Now I like to level my cake in the pan because it gives you something to guide the knife with.
This is already cooled, and if you can use a knife with it, serrated blade.
Now if you happen not to have a knife, you also can use just a heavy thread to take the top off of the cake.
I think you're going to want to have some cake boards around.
These make great, just kind of handy spatulas for picking cake tops up and flipping cakes out on.
So we're going to remove the top and then turn this out on an 8-inch round.
I think you'll see if you have taken the time to actually grease and flour the cake pan properly,
that you won't have any trouble with your cake coming out of the pan without any crumbs on it.
Now I want to show you how to ice the cake with the icing we already have.
I think one of the things, piece of equipment that you're going to want to get when you're starting to decorate is a turntable.
These, not only when you're icing the cake, but when you're starting to make your decorations, it makes decorating so much easier.
I like to add just a little dot of icing to the turntable to keep the cake from sliding around when we're icing it.
Remember before when we turned the cake out and so we had the bottom part up, now we flipped it over
because one of the secrets when we've been talking about keeping those crumbs on the inside of the cake and not on our icing
is to start with a smooth surface all around. So we have the bottom down.
Now you can fill a cake between the two layers just with buttercream icing that you're going to ice with,
or if you'd like to add a filling to it, you get a little extra flavor.
I'm going to add a filling. When you add a filling, you need just a little bead of buttercream icing around the outside edge.
This doesn't have to be perfect because it's going to be covered up with a cake.
What this does is keep, when you add the filling to the center, it keeps it from coming out and getting on the outside of your buttercream icing.
I'm going to be using just a vanilla pudding for a filling. You can use fresh fruit.
You might want to mix strawberries in with whipped cream and add to the center of the cake,
or any type of chocolate pudding, a chocolate mousse makes a great cake.
This is put inside the bead and should be down just slightly from the surface of the bead that you have around.
Now the top layer goes on, and this, when we talked about before, this is going to go on with the cut surface down.
So again, we have a perfectly smooth surface to start icing.
Just a little press so that you're sure you have your cake together.
If you have a few little crumbs around before you start, you might want to use just a soft pastry brush to get those off.
Then we've talked before, of course, about how important it is to have our icing the right consistency
and keep it covered up all the time when we're icing the cake.
Remember, we started out with a stiff consistency buttercream, and now we have it thinned.
And before when we talked about being sure that spatula glides through the icing,
I can't tell you how important that is.
To start icing, we're adding quite a bit of icing, actually, to the top of the cake.
And it's easier when you're icing a cake to take the icing off when you're through than it is to keep adding it.
So we have quite a bit on the top, and then to ice, we're going to just start pushing this down over the edge of the cake
and smooth it on the side as we go.
One of the reasons I think that you want your icing thinned down is it's easier when you're smoothing the cake over the edge.
Also, when you're putting the icing, I think sometimes, you know, when we're icing a cake,
you have the tendency to want to keep coming around with the icing spatula, and you'd want to pick it up this way.
You find if you watch my spatula, when you go back, if you're always going back over the icing and picking up the opposite way,
what you do is actually keep your spatula on top of the icing all the time.
You don't have it on the crumbs on the cake.
First, when you're using the turntable, you'll see when we get started, especially making shells and things around,
how important it is to have a turntable, because this way, you're able to keep the part of the cake that you're working on
at a convenient place for you to work, and you don't have to reach your arm over the cake.
Now, as soon as we get the sides all covered with the icing, I think I'm using to ice this.
This is an angled spatula. I think you can see, you know, what this does for you is to keep your knuckles up out of the icing.
Sometimes, when you have a spatula that you're down too close, you tend to drag your knuckles across the icing.
You have the cake all covered on the sides and the top.
Check that out.
Then, with the icing, the blade of the spatula, this is held just straight up and down on the cake,
and just a few turns with the turntable to smooth the icing around the side.
Remember, we talked about before that we can just keep wiping that extra icing off into the bowl when we go along.
The top is smoothed by just a few sweeping strokes across the top of the cake.
Keep getting just a little added part of my cake there.
This is the way, when you sweep across the top of the cake, is what gives you that nice square corner on the cake to start icing.
A few more sweeps on the top.
Some people like to take a straight blade, actually, and go straight across the top of the cake to level it off,
but I think you'll find that when you start adding the shells and the stars to your cake that you really don't need that,
that you cover a lot of that up on the top.
Another way to ice a cake that I'm going to just show you how to put the icing around the cake,
I'm going to add just a touch more icing here.
This I'm going to use a cake icer tip on. This is a real large tip that we've added our icing to.
And it has two sides to it. I'm going to cover my icing back up so this doesn't dry out.
It has a serrated side and a flat side.
And when you use this to ice the cake, instead of taking the spatula and putting the icing on the cake,
all you need to do with this is just to lay beads of icing.
You're holding it next to the cake and squeezing as you turn the turntable around,
and you're laying just a bead of icing out on the cake.
Squeeze as you turn.
Again, this is the same thin buttercream. I have this in a 16-inch bag.
You can either then with the top you can either just smooth your icing on like this with the tip,
or of course if you want to you can put this on with the spatula.
This is, you can just continue doing this, and then when you get the icing on the top,
you'll smooth the top off just the way you did with the spatula.
Those of us who love to cook and bake or have a favorite hobby know how important it is
to have the right equipment and then know how to use it.
So I know when you get started decorating you're going to want to add some decorating equipment.
We've talked a little bit about the icing and about the turntables,
but I want to go over some of the other equipment that you're going to want to use.
One thing is the paste food colors. When we were mixing icing before and looking at the cake,
we were talking about those clear bright colors.
The paste colors give your icing a clear color and they don't thin it down too much.
Then to put the icing in, of course, you're going to need bags.
There's two different types of bags you may be using.
This is a disposable bag, which is my favorite because you don't have to wash it.
Then we have the featherweight bags, and these are a polyester bag, and they're coated on the inside.
The great part about these bags is when you have icing in it,
the grease from the icing really stays inside the bag and it doesn't get on your hands.
Then you need tips. This is the large cake icer tip that we were using before.
You can see the serrated edge on this.
Then we have a series. We'll be using star and writing, leaf, and ribbon tips today.
This is a large star tip that we use for drop flowers. This is a 2D.
Then we have the smaller star tips, and these come in all different sizes.
The ribbon tip, we're going to be using this today to make sweet peas and ribbons and bows.
Later you'll be wanting to learn to make roses with it.
Then the round tips are used for writing or for figure piping.
These, again, all these tips come in graduated sizes.
Then we have two different types of leaf tip. This is a leaf tip with a little V-shaped opening.
It makes a little heart-shaped leaf.
Another leaf tip is a 67, and it has a ridge in it that makes a vein down the middle of the leaf.
Then a lot of the cakes that are real fun to do are covered with stars.
To make that easy for you, we put three stars in the same tip, so I think you're going to love to have this tip, too.
Then one tip that's kind of fun, we call a specialty tip. This has several little holes in the end of it,
and it makes grass or hair on some of the animal cakes that you might want to make.
Then to put the tips onto the bag, we have a coupler.
This is a two-part plastic device that has a little nut on it,
and I'll be showing you how to put these in the bags in a minute.
What that helps you to do is you're able to change the tips on the same bag,
so you can use the same bag of icing with several different tips.
This is a large coupler. It works the same way, but you can use the larger tips on it.
Then these are pattern presses, which are great because even though I know they're hard to read backwards,
these really say happy birthday when you put them in the cake.
So you just press these in your icing, and you have an outline to go by when you start writing on the cake.
We've been using the spatulas, and I think you can see, you know how important they are.
We have large and small angle spatulas, straight spatulas.
This happens to be one of my favorites. It has a real sharp point,
and it's nice for getting in small areas on a cake.
These are the cake boards that we used before that you know you can ice cakes on or use for handy spatulas.
We talked about the turntables. This is a smaller trim and turn stand
that works very much the same way with the larger one that we used before.
Then when you start decorating, you're going to want a surface to work on.
These are the practice boards, and they're called this because they are a great way to practice your techniques.
They come with a plastic overlay, and they have sheets in them,
and it gives you techniques that you can practice as you go along.
And put it on the top, and then you can just scrape it off.
Now, of course, if you don't want to use these, you can also practice on the back of a cookie sheet.
Because I think when you first get started, particularly,
it's nice to practice the designs you're going to be putting on your cake before you actually put them on.
Now to show you how to get that coupler into the featherweight bag.
Remember this? It's two parts. Take it apart,
and this goes in the bag just as far as you can push it down,
and you'll see the bottom rings on it in the bag.
Use a pencil to mark this, and mark at the bottom.
Now this is real important to mark at the bottom, because if you don't get enough cutoff,
you can always snip off a little bit more. But when you get too much cutoff,
you either have to use your bag with a large tip or a large coupler. So it's important to measure.
Then push it back down in the bag. You should be able just to see the bottom part.
On this, the tip slips over the end, and then you just screw the end of the ring over the tip.
And so what this does is that you can change the tips.
When you're doing it, just be sure that you're always holding on to the end of the coupler inside,
and this gives you a firm surface to hold on to.
You can also use the disposable bags the same way you can use a coupler with them.
If you don't want to do that, you can just snip about a half of an inch off the end of them,
and just drop the tip right down in the bag if you don't want to put a coupler on it.
Of course, you can use the featherweight bags in the same way. Just drop that down.
Both of the bags we fill the same way.
To fill the bag without getting the icing all around the top of the bag where you don't need it or want it,
cup the bag down over your hand, and then to fill, you're going to fill it and put the icing down in the bag,
and just use the side of your hand as a scraper to pull the icing off as you pull the spatula out.
Now, it's real important to put not really more than a half a cup of icing in the bag at a time.
I always think it's a little bit like when you're sewing.
If you've ever put a long string on a needle to sew a button on and think you're going to save time
and you end up breaking the thread, the same thing you're going to find true when you start decorating.
If you try to fill your bag too full, you really don't save time.
It's a lot easier to start out with a small amount of icing and then refill as you go along.
After you have the bag filled, I want to show you how you should be holding the bag.
We're going to twist it down.
You have a tight twist, and then just hold your hand out like this, and the bag goes in between your thumb and your hand.
So you have just a nice, comfortable grip.
This is important because as you're squeezing the icing, you always want to keep twisting down,
so you have something firm to grip on.
Then, as you're decorating, you're going to always be squeezing with your right hand,
and you're going to be just guiding with your left hand.
Now, this hand isn't pushing our tip along.
It's really just steadying it and guiding.
Now, if you happen to be a left-hander, the directions will go the opposite way.
Of course, you're going to be holding in your left hand and guiding then along with your right hand.
The only difference, of course, with left-handers is most decorations,
we're always going to be going to right-handers, we're going to be going left to right.
Left-hander is, of course, the opposite direction, but when you're riding, even if you're left-handed,
you still are going to be going in the same direction as the right-handers.
Now that we talked about the icing consistency before,
about when we were icing the cake, that that was a thin consistency,
you'll be using really three different consistencies,
a thin for icing a cake or for writing, making lines,
the medium consistency you'll be using when you're making stars and shells.
And most of the things that we'll be doing today actually will be using a medium consistency icing.
The other important, we have really three basics of decorating,
and that icing consistency is the first one.
The second one is really how you hold your bag, in other words, the angle of the bag, which is important.
Most of the, really the basic ones is a straight up and down position or a 90-degree angle.
That means the bag is straight up and down.
I have a star tip on and we just straight up and down, you're going to squeeze,
and if you're using a star tip, this is the way you make stars,
we'll be talking a lot more about these, but you have the bag straight up and down.
Then the other position that you'll be using a lot is a 45-degree angle.
If you're using the star tip, this is again the 45-degree angle,
and you use this one when you're making shells.
So we're basically, we're going to talk about the two positions,
the 90-degree angle or the straight up and down and the 45-degree angle.
So it's the position of your tip and of your bag.
The other one of those three things that we want to remember when we're decorating is the pressure control.
This just means how hard you're going to squeeze on the bag.
Just to give you an example of how the pressure can be different,
I have a number five tip, which is a round tip.
Now if you're using the same tip, and of course I have the same icing,
and you squeeze just with a light pressure, you get a small little ball.
If you squeeze just a little bit harder, it gets larger,
and of course when you squeeze real hard, it gets much larger.
So you can take the same tip, the same icing, and vary the amount of pressure and change it.
The other thing to keep in mind on the pressure control is it also enables you to make designs exactly the same way.
Now that we've covered the three basics of decorating, we're going to apply those into all the different families of tips.
The first group of tips that we're going to be using in this video are the star tips,
and these come in all different sizes from small to large.
We'll be using mainly the 16 and 18 or the 21.
As you get larger numbers, the tips start getting larger.
The 16 is very tiny and the 21 is a big star tip.
There's lots of different things we can do with the star tip, and one of the simplest is to make a star.
These are used for simple borders or to fill in a surface of the cake.
Make the stars. We're using a medium consistency icing.
The bag's straight up and down a 90-degree angle.
Remember how we're going to hold it in between our hand,
and almost touching the surface of the board, and then you just squeeze and stop and pull away.
You're going to squeeze, stop, and pull away.
Squeeze, stop, and pull away.
Now if you start making stars and you squeeze and forget to stop before you pull away,
you squeeze and you just keep going, you get a real tall, you get something that looks more like a Dairy Queen or a bunny's tail than you do a star.
The other, if you squeeze and have the tip too close to the surface, you get a real flat star and get a hole in the middle of it.
So in other words, when we make the stars, it's a real simple technique that you're just going to have it almost touching the surface,
and you're going to squeeze, stop, and pull away.
Another real easy technique with the star tip is just a tight zigzag, and this can be used for a border on a cake.
This is the 45 degree angle, starting with the tip over to your right.
Again, we're just lightly guiding with our left hand, and as we squeeze with a steady, even pressure,
just moving the bag up and down in a tight zigzag.
Steady pressure, guiding with the left, and squeezing with the right.
These are real simple things to use, and this makes a great border on a cake.
Another easy technique with the star tip is a rosette.
Again, this is the 90 degree angle. You're going to be starting very similar to the star.
You're going to squeeze, relax the pressure, and just wipe off.
Squeeze, start like a star, up and around to the right, stop the pressure, and wipe it off.
Squeeze like a star, up and around to the right, relax the pressure, and wipe it off.
Then the other technique that we make with the star tip that may take you just a little bit more practice
than the star, the zigzag, and the rosette is the shell.
This is made again with the star tip, and we have the 45 degree angle.
We're going to have the end of the bag pointing over our shoulder, and you have to start with the tip
just almost resting on the surface. You're going to squeeze, let the icing fan out,
relax the pressure, and pull it down.
Squeeze, let the icing fan out, lift just barely.
It's almost a wiping motion as you get to the board. You're going to squeeze, let the icing fan out,
relax the pressure, and pull down.
Start on the tail of the one in front of you. Remember, you're going to squeeze,
let the icing fan out, relax the pressure, and pull down.
A couple things when you're making shells that you might look for,
that if your shells don't look as good as you think they should,
one thing you were tempted to do when you first start, you look at a shell,
and you think perhaps the way you make it is by moving your bag up and down.
I think these look a little bit like little snails when we go along.
You just let the icing actually do the work for you. You don't have to pick the bag up that much.
The other thing, of course, is if you have the bag real flat and you squeeze too hard,
you have the shells that have no definition to them.
Remember when the shells were just going to let the icing fan out and do the work for you,
relax the pressure, and just wipe it off on the board.
Another isn't really a star tip, but it's very similar to a star tip, are the drop flower tips.
These, of course, are called drop flowers because the flowers literally just drop out of them.
The one I want to show you is a 2D, and it makes a very large drop flower.
These come, again, in all the different sizes from very small to large.
The first flower is a very simple flower to make, and that, we're holding it again just like we made the star,
straight up and down, and the difference here is that we're actually going to rest the tip right on the surface.
You're going to squeeze, stop, and pull away.
Squeeze, stop, and pull away.
Squeeze, stop, and pull away.
Now, you're going to want to make these flowers in buttercream and put them in the refrigerator or the freezer
and let them dry and then put them on your cake.
I'll be putting the centers in in just a minute.
If you want to make a swirled leaf drop flower, all you have to do is start,
you're going to start with your knuckles pointing toward your chest,
and as you're squeezing this time, you're just going to swirl the bag around and stop and pull the tip away.
In other words, start with your wrist around, your knuckles pointing at your chest, tip on the surface,
squeeze, and as you're squeezing, turn the tip around.
Toward your chest, squeeze, and you have a furled flower.
And we're using a number three tip with yellow icing to put a center.
The next section we're going to do is on how to use the round tips.
We'll start a little bit more about how to make dots, but we're going to put a dot center,
and these were just letting the icing build up around the tip, and then a little short wiping motion.
So you have two different types of drop flowers, either with the plain petals or with swirled petals.
Now to show you how easy it is to make a cake using only two of these techniques,
I want to show you the happy birthday cake.
We're going to add, I have this started, we have three rows of the yellow, the orange, and the lavender stars.
To finish this cake, we just have four rows of stars, and then at the bottom, the border, just a tight zigzag border.
Now you are using a 21 star tip this time, and this is a little bit larger tip,
and you'll see the difference of the type of stars we're going to get.
You're going to just squeeze, stop, and pull away.
Squeeze, stop, and pull away, until you have an even row of stars.
Then to make the bottom border, we have this on a tuck and ruffle,
which is something fun to use as an accent piece on the bottom of your cake,
and the tuck and ruffles put on a board first, the cake on top of it.
We're going to add just a tight zigzag border on the bottom.
Again, we're using a number 21 star tip.
Again, this is straight up and down, just a real tight, even pressure as we go along, straight up and down,
until it makes a cake very easy to do.
Then to finish this cake off, all we have to do is we're going to add three large stars on the top,
and the aqua, and the yellow, orange.
That's another good use, I think, for the star tips, is it makes great candle holders,
because in these we're going to add our birthday candles.
You're going to have a perfect cake to serve for someone's birthday.
Now, the next group of tips that we're going to be showing you how to use are the round tips.
The first step, really, the cake that we just saw, you always start with writing on a cake first,
and then kind of work down.
I wanted to show you the first step of this cake, and we'll show you how to write on it later,
but these are the message stamps that we talked about before.
A lot of times when we first start out, we have trouble getting our writing spaced evenly,
so these do it all for you.
They have the name on the top, so you just put the stamp in the icing.
You can line them up, the top one says happy.
You press them down just lightly in the icing, and when you pull them off,
then you have happy birthday in your cake.
And so we're all set to learn how to print and follow our happy birthday lines.
The next group of tips we're going to be working with are the round tips,
and these are the ones we use to make dots and balls for stems on flowers and for writing.
I'm going to start out making dots, or you can build these up a little bit and make balls.
I'm using a number five tip and thin icing, and this is very much the same position as when we made stars.
You're going to have the tip almost touching the surface, straight up and down.
You squeeze and let the icing this time build up around the tip a little bit, stop your pressure,
and then just give it a little quick wipe on the top.
Remember, you're going to 90-degree angle, squeeze, let the icing build up around your tip,
stop the pressure, and wipe it off.
Squeeze, let it build up around the tip, stop the pressure, and then give it just a little quick wipe on the top.
Remember when we talked before about learning techniques and you can apply them to other tips,
when we talked about the shell technique, when we were making, using all of our shell tips,
this is again the number five tip, and to make a little bead border, you can use that same technique of the shell tip.
The 45-degree angle and the tip just almost on the surface, you're going to squeeze,
let the icing build up, ease the pressure, and bring it down.
Squeeze, let the icing build up, ease the pressure off, just like the shells,
and start each one on the little tail before it.
Squeeze, let the icing build up, and bring the tip down.
The same round tip family are used for writing and for outlining.
This is a number three tip, which is just slightly smaller than the number five.
This is one that's used most often for outlining or for writing.
When you outline with a tip or you're making lines, making wavy lines,
this is the way we're going to learn to start writing too, is we have a 45-degree angle.
In fact, it's more than a 45-degree angle.
You have it laying flat to the surface, again squeezing with the right hand and just guiding with the left.
It's a good way to just start practice just to make a little series of wavy lines so you can control your bag.
Now, if you want to make straight lines or for outlining,
you're going to actually touch the tip to the surface, and you can bring it up and lay it down.
Now, this is easier to get a straight line than trying to just draw it on the board.
So, in other words, this is the way you start printing or outlining on cakes.
You're going to touch it to the surface, and then bring it up and lay it down.
Just touch it, bring it up, and lay it down.
I want to show you on a cake, a huggable bear cake that we have,
show you how the outlining techniques worked on the shaped pans, and then we'll come back to writing and printing.
This is a bear that we have baked before.
This is one of the shaped pans, and the pans, again, we greased and floured this like we do the other pans that we talked about earlier.
And the cake actually comes out of the pan with the lines just baked right in it.
So, this is what makes it so easy to outline.
This we're going to outline the paws and then fill in with the star technique that we learned earlier.
Later, we're going to put fluffy icing around it, a little bib and a ruffle, and it's going to be great for a baby shower.
But show you how easy the outlining technique works on the shaped pans.
You're going to touch the tip to the surface, and then you can see you can actually pick this icing up and just let it fall down.
And it's easier when you're picking it up like this to let it fall down than it is if you're actually trying to go around on the circle.
And then for the cakes to fill in, we're using a number 16 star.
Remember, you're going to hold it straight up and down and squeeze and stop and pull away.
This is a great way, I think, when you're first beginning to decorate, if you'll look at some of the shaped pans,
that it's really almost like a paint-by-number technique is that you outline areas and then fill in with stars.
And this is a time, too, when we talked earlier about making it easy to learn to decorate.
We had the triple star tip, and when you're doing large areas on a cake, you can use the triple star tip to fill in.
So we're going to finish filling it in with stars, and then we'll be completing this a little bit later with the bib and the ruffle.
I want to show you now how to print and write using the round tips.
Again, we're using the number three tip.
And when we made the series of lines before, the printing is, this is how we start.
You're going to start just a series of lines built together.
In other words, if you want to write happy, you start, lay the line down again and the cross mark.
And this is important when we were reviewing it first about the different basics of cake decorating, is to use a thin consistency icing.
If you have it too thick, it just doesn't come out of your tip as easily as when it's thin.
Remember, we're touching, stopping the pressure, putting it down, touching it down, picking it up, laying it around, stopping the pressure, and hooking it down.
If you keep the pressure up when you're actually laying it down, you tend to get little points on your letters.
But I'll show you how to take care of that in just a minute.
In fact, I have a wiggly wide on that one.
If you do get points on the letters, you either can take just a tiny bit of cornstarch and you tap those down.
And it gets the points off the letters.
Now to write, it's a slightly different position than it is when you're printing.
This way we were doing like we were doing the wavy lines.
You're going to be writing with your right hand and guiding with your left.
When you write with the bag and tip, this is a slightly different technique than when you're writing with a pencil.
Because when we write like this, we're actually writing with our whole arm instead of our wrist.
In other words, you have a nice even flow of icing coming out.
It's just kind of a smooth technique.
I think when you're first starting to learn to write, it's easier to kind of go fast and maybe you make a few mistakes at first than to try to go too slow.
You get a much smoother line.
Remember we have the bag, a flat angle pointing over to our right, and just a real smooth flowing motion.
We have one other thing before we get to our cake that we're going to write and print on for you that you can do with the round tips.
It makes lots of special effects on cakes, and that's the figure piping technique.
And it really is simple.
That if you can even draw a simple stick figure, you can learn to figure pipe.
When we talked before about using the practice board, I think it's a good idea to practice something on a different surface
before you start putting it on your cake because then you have a good idea how it's going to work out.
So this we've drawn just a simple stick figure, and I have it on paper with the practice board.
I'm using a number 12 tip.
Now these are many of the same techniques that we used before.
This is a medium consistency icing.
I have my bag at a 45 degree angle.
And this is just the same way when we started to make the dots, only we have our bag at a 45 degree angle.
And we're going to squeeze with a heavy pressure.
And as we're squeezing, just move the bag down, stop the pressure, and pull away.
The legs are made to hook it in the body again, pull down, stop the pressure, and pull away.
Hook it in, keep a steady pressure, stop, and pull away.
The arms are made the same way.
Steady pressure, pull away.
This arm is at a slight angle because the bear that we're going to be figure piping on our cake is reaching for the balloons.
Then the bear, this is straight up and down the way we made our dots.
Squeeze, let the icing build up around the tip, give it a little wipe off.
The ears are made the same way that we made the dots.
And the bear has a little nose.
And this is an added dot up on top.
Again, we're going to squeeze, let the icing build up, and just wipe it off.
He's also, we're going to add his face and some strings on the balloons.
But he's holding balloons, and this is made in the bead technique.
We made the bead border, but we're going to make just one balloon at a time.
A 45 degree angle, going to squeeze, let the icing build up, just ease the pressure off, and pull it down.
These are going to be balloons.
On the cake, we've done these in different colored icings, but it's a good way to practice.
Squeeze, let the icing build up, and just pull it down to a little tip.
And the bear's face, this is a number three tip with yellow icing.
And his eyes are made with a straight up and down, like we made the little dots.
A nose, and then a little smile.
And use the same number three tip to make the strings on the balloon.
Just hook in the balloon, and this is the same technique that we used when we're laying the lines down.
Remember, we're touching, picking up, touching down, picking up, stopping the pressure, as we want to lay the string down.
Hooking it, picking it up, and laying it down.
Now we're going to put this on the cake, and remember the stamps that we used before to make it easy to write, happy birthday.
We have this on the clown cake now.
We're going to be figure piping the clown, and writing happy birthday.
The same way that you can draw the stick figure under your practice board to practice, you also, you know, when you look at the top of a cake,
you don't have to think that you have to place everything on the cake just by your eye.
You certainly, when you get it ice smooth, you can mark it with a toothpick so you know where to pipe on it.
We've already added the balloons on the cake, and we're going to figure pipe the bear that's going on this cake.
And remember, when we talked before, this is a number 12 tip, and we're using a medium consistency icing with a heavy pressure.
We're squeezing and let the body of the bear build up, stop.
The legs again, build the legs up, stop the pressure.
Now you can use a little bit of cornstarch to fix up the bear on your finger, touch it down, touch the points down.
The arms, another arm holding the balloons.
And this face, which again is a large dot, letting the icing build up around the tip.
The ears, made the same technique, let the icing build up around your tip.
Just wipe it off, the nose.
Now if you want to just use it to, a little bit of cornstarch, you can shape the figure piping and pat the points down.
Then you need to just use a dry, dry artist's brush to brush the cornstarch away.
Then the mouth is made again with the eyes and the mouth with a number three tip.
Remember, straight up and down for the dots, stop the pressure and pull away.
Stop the pressure and pull away.
The nose, small mark, and the smile.
Then the same pattern presses that we used before, the happy birthday pattern presses,
we used in this same cake too to make lines to write with.
And it is easier after you've placed the writing when you have the lines.
Now these are in, so again when we were printing, remember you're going to touch down and just pick up,
lay the icing down, stop the pressure and pull away.
Touch down, lay the icing down and pull away.
Touch, lay it down and pull away.
And this cake happens to be finished on each letter with just a little tiny ball on each end of the letter
to give it a little added dimension.
You're going to just touch it, make a tiny ball, wipe it off on the top.
And this again we're going to use a little bit of cornstarch to pat these down.
I think one thing you'll find when you're printing and writing,
if you're, when you're laying the strings of icing down like that, if you happen to make a mistake,
it's real easy just to pick it off and start over again.
Then this cake is finished off with a border of the rosettes that we did before.
And then you have a perfect birthday cake to serve to your favorite little person.
Now we're going to be learning to make leaves with two different tips
and also some of the different uses for the ribbon tip.
The first two things we're going to do is two different types of leaves.
The first tip I'm using is a 67.
And when we make leaves, this is with a thin icing,
but you can make leaves several different ways.
You make a stand up leaf and then the tip will be straight up and down
and you squeeze, build up a little bit, and then pull the leaf to a point.
Squeeze, let it build up a little bit, and then pull to the point.
You can make a ruffle leaf by just increasing the pressure
and jiggling the tip back and forth a little and pulling it to the point.
You can also make a long curved leaf with the same tip.
Then the other type of leaf tip is a 352.
This makes a slightly different shaped leaf.
It makes a little heart shaped leaf.
And this again, the same thin icing.
You can make a stand up leaf.
You squeeze, let it build up a little, and then pull it to a point.
Also make this one slightly ruffled.
Pull to the point.
Or if you want to make a flatter leaf, ruffled,
or again you can make a long leaf with the leaf tips.
The other tip is the ribbon tip.
This has several different uses.
You can use it for ruffles or swags or bows.
One of the uses for a ribbon tip is a ruffle.
And this we're using with the wide end on the surface in the bag at a 45 degree angle.
And then it's just a series of close back and forth motions,
very similar to the way we made the zigzag.
Another use for the ribbon tip, and we're using a 104, this time is a ribbon swag.
Again we have the wide end of the tip on the surface,
and this is just a smooth even pressure that you're pulling up a swag of a ribbon.
The same tip again then is used to make bows.
This is the same wide end down, bag at a 45 degree angle,
and start in the center.
What we're going to do is just make a figure eight on its side.
You go up and around and down, up again, down, stop in the middle,
and then you have two streamers.
Remember this is the 104 tip.
You have it with the wide end on the surface,
start in the center and it's a figure eight, laying on its side,
squeezing with just an even pressure, up, down, back to the center,
and then two little ribbon swags.
The same tip is also used to make a sweet pea.
I'll show you how to make these on the practice board,
but also you can either let these dry without a buttercream or you can freeze them,
or it's just as easy also to make this flower right on the cake,
which we'll be doing in a few minutes.
This is a sweet pea, and we're holding,
this again is the 104 tip with the ribbon tip,
holding with the wide end down, 45 degree angle, and the center petal.
You have it, you're just, it's like the icing is actually just shooting out of the tip,
curling around, then one petal to the right, one to the left.
It's three petals, the wide end resting on the surface,
let the petal, center petal just curves around, slightly to the right, and then to the left.
Then the sweet pea has a little calyx on the bottom.
You know, we talked before about using the coupler to change tips,
I want to show you how easy it is to change.
This is the same bag of icing that I used before to make the green leaves,
and now I'm going to put a round tip on it to make the calyx of the sweet pea,
so you don't have to have two bags.
This, you start with the, this is the number three thinned icing,
and we have at a 45 degree angle, and you hook it right in the bottom of the sweet pea,
squeeze, let the icing build up, and then pull it down to make a little stem.
Okay, you have it tucked in the sweet pea, squeeze hard, heavy pressure at first,
then ease up and bring it down.
I want to show you a couple cakes that we use the ruffles and the bows on.
The first one is the bear cake that we started earlier.
This we're going to add with the ribbon tip, we're going to add just a ruffle around the bib,
and this is the cake that we started earlier, and fluff the icing on and then filled in with the stars.
Remember with the ribbon tip, we're going to start with the ruffle, with the wide end down,
and it's just a short zigzag back and forth.
This is where using a turntable, I think you're going to,
because you can always be working towards you on the turntable.
Remember the ruffle wide end down, a medium consistency icing, 104 tip,
and it's just a short series of zigzags.
With this same tip, remember always when you stop and pull your tip away from whatever you happen to be doing,
if you stop the pressure before you pull the wave in, you get it cut off clean.
The bow is made, remember we've got the wide end down, it's just a figure eight, laying on its side,
start up and around, down, up, back to the center, and then two little streamers.
And you have a cake that's perfect for a centerpiece for a baby shower.
The other cake that we're going to be adding the sweet peas to is a round, this is a 10 inch round two layer cake.
We already put the stems on, and this we're going to put the sweet peas on the end of the stems right on the cake,
and also going to build up just a mound of icing.
This I have icing that I'm going to build the sweet peas up around.
I think when you're doing, I'm going to add the sweet peas just to the ends of the stems and a few little leaves.
When you're doing flower arrangements on a cake, whether it's on a round cake or a sheet cake, square cake,
you always want to remember that you have kind of a center of interest on the cake.
Now that can be either more of the same color flower on the cake,
or if you have several different colors of flowers, you'd put the strongest color flower in the center,
so your eye always pulls to the center of the cake.
Add a few more sweet peas. Remember when we're making the sweet peas,
we have the 104 tip wide end down and 45 degree angle, squeezing, letting it build up, and then pulling down.
Remember some of the things we talked about before on holding the bag and the pressure control.
It's important to always keep twisting the bag down when you're decorating,
because then you have something firm to squeeze on.
We'll be adding a few more sweet peas here, and then you can also just add the sweet peas,
building them up on the mound of the icing.
These just build up, and you can add leaves in between to fill in.
Another thing to remember, those three consistencies when we talked about that goes with all the flowers,
is that you're always going to be using the right consistency icing for each flower.
We're using medium consistency when we're making the sweet peas and the bows.
For the leaves and the stems, we have the thin consistency icing.
I'm going to add a few more, some leaves in between.
Again, this is the same, I think before we put the leaves on, we'll still use the round tip and add,
just remember the calyxes that were in the sweet pea that we're going to put,
tuck it in the sweet pea, squeeze, ease the pressure off, and bring it down.
To change tips to the leaf tip, when you're making flowers and leaves on a cake,
it's important to remember, kind of look at it the way real flowers grow,
in that the leaves grow up on the stems.
Again, the leaf, remember we talked before, you have 45 degree angle,
squeeze, let the icing build up a little bit, and then just a little pull to pull the leaf to a point.
And this is finished up with a bow, like we made before, and you have a perfect cake to serve for any occasion.
The last tip that we're going to be using is the 233, which we use to make grass or hair on some of the shaped animal cakes,
and this is a real simple tip to use.
All you have to do is have the tip almost touching the surface, release the pressure, and pull away.
Just squeeze, let it build up a little bit, and pull up as you release the pressure.
I think this is a good example of one of the specialty tips that just practically does all the work for you.
I'm going to show you how to use this tip to finish a cake that's going to be perfect for a wedding shower.
In this we're going to add just a little bit more grass on the top of the cake.
After you've added the grass to the top, going to add some of the drop flowers.
When you're making a cake and you've iced it or you've been adding buttercream decorations,
you can just place the drop flowers that you've made ahead of time right on the buttercream icing.
If you let the drop flowers dry ahead and then want to place them on the cake that you've already iced,
you're going to need to put just a little tiny dot of icing on the back of the flower so that you can put it on the cake.
If you remember earlier when we were making drop flowers, we made them with a very large tip.
We were using a 2D, but drop flower tips come in different sizes too, and these are made with a 225.
We're going to finish the cake by adding some 352 leaves.
Remember when we're making leaves that you're using the thinned icing and just letting the icing build up a little
and then gradually drawing the tip to a point.
In this video, we've learned to make a lot of different types of flowers, leaves, shells, writing, and printing.
I think that you're able to see why we say that cake decorating really is easy as one, two, three.
Wilton has a companion publication to this program called Cake Decorating as Easy as One, Two, Three.
Wilton products and decorating classes are available in your favorite department, specialty, and craft stores.
Thank you.