The DIY Trick To Help You Frost Baked Goods Like A Professional

For home bakers looking to elevate their cake decorating game, there is a simple trick that has taken the baking world by storm. With this ingenious method, you can achieve professional-looking frosting results right in your kitchen without any fancy equipment required.

Here's how it works: Start by lining a cake pan slightly larger than the cake itself with cling wrap. This clever step allows you to easily lift the cake out of the pan after it's been frosted and chilled, ensuring a seamless finish. Next, add an acetate collar to the pan, creating a barrier between the cake and the pan's edges. With the cake nestled securely in the center of the pan, use frosting warmed for a few seconds in the microwave and pipe it around the cake, filling in the gap between the acetate collar and the cake. This technique ensures the cake is completely covered in frosting, with no unsightly gaps or uneven patches.

After piping the frosting, chill the cake until the frosting sets, allowing it to firm up and hold its shape. Then you can easily remove the acetate collar to reveal a perfectly frosted cake that looks like it came straight from a professional bakery. No need to smooth the sides with a spatula. The cake is simply ready for additional decorating.

The trick is a great dupe of a Frost Form — a bundle of tools to accomplish the same results. While these tools can be more costly, home bakers can easily find rolls of acetate with a variety of widths for baked goods online for far less. This makes it simple to recreate the same great results at home. With a little creativity, you can use acetate to create any number of shapes and designs around your baked goods. How about elegant drips of chocolate ganache running down the sides of the perfectly smoothed exterior to intricate patterns? Or, use the acetate to create even layers of different colored icings.

This is also a helpful tip to use when attempting to create a stacked naked cake. Simply place the acetate collar inside the cake ring used to cut the cake from a sheet cake. This will ensure the cake is pressed right up to the sides of the acetate and prevent the frosting from moving down the sides of the cake. After covering with cling wrap and chilling, you'll reveal a cake that is perfectly neat and smooth with bare sides.