Storing before function

It is best NOT to refrigerate the cake before use. The best place to store a completed cake is in a cooler or on a cool bench/table away from heat or direct sunlight in the CLOSED box it is picked up in. Cakes can usually last a more than a few days if stored correctly but humidity will mean the cake is less fresh if kept in storage. Humidity and heat can ruin icing, rendering it sticky, melted and making colours run so please store correctly especially on hot days.

Storing at the function

Set up out of direct sunlight and humidity, away from any heat source, and curious people who might touch, poke or topple the cake, or insects that might contaminate the cake.

Cake Structure

During warm weather or where cakes are being transported more than 10 kilometres to the venue, we use a circle or halo of fondant, chocolate paste, or marshmallow sugarpaste under the cake. The underside of the cake has a thin coating of butterscotch or similar Swiss buttercrème to give purchase of the cake to the halo and is then covered in its usual way. This is important to prevent any damaging movement during transportation and is even more important in warm weather where many cakes are damaged by slippage on the cake boards. EXTRA THICKNESS OF MARSHMALLOW FONDANT IS NEEDED DURING HOT WEATHER TO PREVENT HEAT CRACKS.

Structure within layered cakes is usually with American Boba straw construction instead of or as well as wood dowels. The straws are in various colours, are food safe, and are cut to size to give a good level strong surface. In particularly heavy cakes or where there is a long distance for transportation, or extra movement is anticipated such as on a boat, we sometimes use both wooden dowels and boba straws. Please remove these before eating.  Some large single layer cakes which are “double or triple barrelled” (more than one layer together) also have side boba straw construction to prevent side subsidence and cracking during transportation. Covered cakes are usually layered together using sugar glue or melted chocolate, as well as a long dowel going right through all the layers if the cakes are tiered or tall. Simply remove the top layer first using a thin knife under the board the cake is sitting on and continue lifting the layers apart until the whole cake is disassembled.

EXTERNAL CAKE BOARDS: we use MDF and polystyrene cake boards for the cake to rest upon, usually 2-3 boards glued together to give more support and to prevent bending of the boards during transportation with a heavy cake on. We always appreciate if you can return any boards, even badly cut ones, which we then strip, sterilise and reuse for charity cakes.

INTERNAL CAKE BOARDS: we use foiled 2mm or 4mm cake boards, or plastic foamboard cut to shape,  for our internal structures and boards – these cannot be reused so please dispose of them. All 2mm and 4mm boards have an “x” cut onto them for easy insertion of dowels. Foamboard used for structure will be noted at time of pickup so you can remove it when cutting. All icing attached to foamboard structure is edible.

Food Colouring

Our cakes with richly coloured icing are either airbrushed with a thin layer of airbrush colour (edible food colouring) or are coloured fondant icing which can be pre-coloured or we add gel or paste food colouring to get the right shade.

Airbrushing is a great way to get shading variants or shimmer on icing but not so good for even solid colour, so we choose the colouring depending on the shades and shimmers required. Some designs have a combination of coloured and airbrushed icing.  All shimmer is edible (Sugarflair edible shimmers).

The precoloured icings can contain a lot of food colouring, for those people who are sensitive to food colouring, the icing can be removed and not eaten.  When we handmake the icing we use Marshmallow to make the sugarpaste fondant. The buttercream icing under the fondant is usually not coloured and can be enjoyed by everyone who is sensitive to colourings.

If icing is thin it will be uneven and irregular, but most of all there is a very real danger that it could get stress and movement fractures during transportation. So, we don’t make apologies for having the icing fairly thick (approx ½ cm) and that doesn’t include the rich Swiss butter crème underneath – some effects require even thicker icing like 3D built up icing, we cant do anything about it if you want a beautifully shaped custom cake. If there are people at your party who don’t like icing – tell them to take it off, theres always someone who wants an extra bit!

Safe Travel with your cake

Your cake will be boxed, with non slip matting underneath the board. The cake box must be kept level (if your car seat slopes backwards you must put something under the box to level it while driving). Keep air conditioning on and make sure the cake box is out of direct sunlight that can melt the icing or accents, or fade the icing colours.

Freezing the cake

Everyone has different temperatures for their freezer so we do not have recommendations for the storage times. Storage conditions change from freezer to freezer, some smaller freezers may not keep a cake frozen at a low enough temperature to guarantee successful longevity, larger freezers may work well depending on their seals, where the cake is placed in the freezer is certainly a factor in preservation, whilst opening and closing the freezer door can change the temperature and drastically alter the storage life of a cake.

Basically we recommend when wanting to store a cake in the freezer, to wrap it well with a plastic wrap, excluding as much air as possible, then freeze quickly, at the lowest part of the freezer, surrounded by water bottles that will freeze also, and keep the cake totally frozen at all times. To defrost, three days before cake is required, remove the frozen cake and all wrappings while cake is still frozen, and leave at room temperature.

The cake should go very sticky and wet and then suddenly after a few days return to complete normality. We do not accept liability for cakes that have not stored well, once the cake has left our hands.

Freezing handmade figurines

Many people simply eat their figurines! Sugar attracts humidity so if you are planning to store your icing flowers and figurines you will need to coat them in clear spray varnish to prevent the moisture from getting to the icing.

Chocolate seashells and animals can be frozen until eaten. We do not give recommended times for storage as we simply do not know, much depends on where the figurines or chocolate is stored in the freezer, the temperature and how often the freezer is opened.