Easy cake decorating ideas

I am a time poor and slightly lazy mama thus it has taken me weeks to finish this post. I actually wrote that months ago so the time has come to finally finish this post.

 

So often on line we see all these amazing cakes that people have made and just think 'who the hell has time?' So here are three easy and of course cheap ideas of decorating cakes.

Idea One
Choc Orange Cup Cakes

I used my beloved orange cake recipe. I make the mixture, before baking I split it into two, one I left and the other I added 2 tablespoon of cocoa powder and a couple of tablespoons of milk. Then in each patty pan I put a bit of each mixture and did a little swirl with a skewer. I then baked at 180 degree for about 15min.

To decorate I made a simple icing;

 


Basic Chocolate Icing:
2 cups pure icing sugar
1/2 cup cocoa powder
50gr melted butter
enough milk to make the desired thickness

Then Simply ice the cakes and add smarties, really easy and very festive looking cakes.

 

Idea Two
Orange Cake with Chocolate Ganache and rice paper transfer

Yep you guessed it I used the same orange cake just didn't do the syrup. Then covered the cake in chocolate ganache . Then the bit that looks really impressive is totally easy. I get the transfers from ebay  for not a lot of money in a whole lot of diffrent designs.

So after the ganache is on you peel the transfer off and put it on the cake. I then went around the edge with smarties. Super easy but your kids will think your amazing.

Idea Three
Egg Free Chocolate Cake with marshmallow flowers

This cake is based on my childhood favorite cake from the Woman's Weekly Birthday Cake Book. I always have loved the marshmallow flowers, even now when my mum makes me a special cake she will put the on. So egg free cake easy! I have found that this cake isn't a great riser so I put it in a ring tin and get a nicer looking cake that cooks a bit quicker. Then I made a batch of the basic chocolate icing as in Idea One. The flowers are really easy and the pictures explain it best but in case your stuck hers what to do;

Marshmallow flowers:
Step 1: cut marshmallows in half.
Step 2: pinch each end to make petal shapes.
Step 3: Place petals on the cake, five petals to a flower with a smarty in the center. 

It can be so easy to get carried away with kids birthdays and forget that often the simplest things in life are often the best. Most kids really just want to feel special on their big day and it doesn't need to be an uber fancy cake for that.