Mother’s Day never used to be a big deal in our house. This year however, Holly is really into it and keeps secretly making things for me that I’m not allowed to see until the day itself. So far all I know is that there’s at least 3 cards for me and some chocolates which she’s had Mr R buy on her behalf. I think she’s waaaaayyyy more excited about it than I am though!
Anyways, I thought I’d put together this mini tutorial on how to decorate a naked cake with some fresh flowers – perfect for a Mother’s Day treat. I bought these flowers from the local florist – there’s something so nice about pottering about the village, visiting the individual shops as opposed to just the supermarket. Shop local everyone! I’ve got some gorgeous carnations in a dusky pink, some pom pom chrysanthemums and a few filler flowers including wax flower. The pinks all work well together and are a perfect colour scheme for Mother’s Day 🙂
To make this I first baked some 7″ round madeira cakes. I’ll pop the recipe on for this when I get chance as it’s a great base for a celebration cake. I use it for my White Rose Cake Design cakes as it’s sturdy, stays moist and keeps for up to a week after baking (not that it ever lasts that long – it’s usually eaten way before then!). I baked two cakes and sliced them in half, filled them with vanilla buttercream and strawberry jam then wrapped them in clingfilm to set for a bit. You could always pop them in the fridge for 10 minutes to set the buttercream firm, or just skip this step. It’s up to you.
I prepared my flowers by cutting the stems short and wrapping the end in florist tape. This seals in the juices (not sure if this is the right word but I’ll go with it!) from the stem and stops them leaching into the cake itself.
I then melted my Safety Seal in a saucepan of boiling water as we don’t have a microwave – I know, we must be the only household in the world who doesn’t actually own a microwave! They freak me out a bit, and we don’t really have the worktop space to put one on.
When all the Safety Seal had melted I dipped the stems into this. It forms a completely food safe barrier between the cake and the flower which is amazing and enables us to create cakes like this! Click here to buy.
I then started with the chrysanthemums and placed these on the cake as my focal flowers. I left the stem of one of them a little longer to add some height to the “arrangement” (if you can call it that!).
I added the carnations next as these were the next biggest flowers and they filled in some of the space around the chrysanthemums.
Then it was a case of adding in the filler flowers and some leaves where there were gaps between the bigger flowers, and finally I added some home made French macarons in and amongst, using cocktail sticks to secure them, but these are totally optional. There’s no right or wrong with this, it’s a case of doing whatever you think looks good.
And there you go! If you have any questions, just ask 🙂 I’d love to see your makes so why not tag @whiterosecakedesign and @life_with_holly on Instagram? x
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