I would LOVE to make the perfect gateau but have always wondered - how on earth do you get the chocolate shavings on the sides???? They always look so lovely in the shops and I love a challenge so am wondering if any good bakers out there know the secret!! I did try once by holding a handful and quickly 'slapping' it on the icing/cream but it just did not look the goods!!!! If I tipped it on the side - with my history - I would probably end up with the cake on the floor!

It's the first part of the cake you decorate. Brush just the sides with a little syrup made with warmed apricot (or other suitable flavoured) jam, or simply sugar melted in hot water. Or whatever icing you are using, as long as it's good and sticky, like butter icing or fondant. Thickly spread your chocolate shavings, coconut or whatever you are using, onto some baking paper, tip the cake onto it's side on the shavings and roll slowly, steadying the cake from each side. Like a wheel, using your hands flat on each side of the cake. Gently place on the cake board or plate and continue decorating the top.

So thats when/how its done...It never occurred to me it was done first!! after all these years ...lol

Lorna, thats how I thought it would be done but how do you stop the cake 'splooping' everywhere when it is filled with cream/ganache etc??? I can just picture the cake separating and flying across the room!!!!

Cheers

Clare

I don't know how Lorna does hers but I put satay sticks through mine to hold it together. I also use these sticks to hold cakes together if I have to travel any distance with them. The holes they make are very small and are easy to cover.

Oh, come on ladies!! Decorate the sides BEFORE you fill it. But I can see Stephanie's idea working, especially if you use 3 or 4 skewers placed evenly spaced
to stop the two halves 'skewing' as you move it. You would only need to use the skewer method if your filling is a very thick layer.

I think I'd be having a "biffing" session with the shavings.

Put the filling in the cake, then the icing or whatever on the sides only (not the top) and place cake on its serving plate. If possible put a prop of some sort under one side of the plate so one side is elevated and is sitting on as much of a slant as you dare without the cake sliding or coming apart. Put some shavings onto a strip of greaseproof or baking paper, or a bowl or whatever you think you want to use, and biff or flick the shavings at the sides. Keep doing this turning and proping of the plate, section by section until the cake is nicely covered. Sweep fallen shavings from the plate with a fork and add them to the shavings on the strip of paper. When sides are completed, then put your icing/whatever on the top of the cake and finish the top of the cake with the shavings. Clean up the edges of the plate with a paper towel. Vaccuum the shavings from the kitchen floor and the walls too maybe!!

Sounds nuts doesn't it, and it could be fun too - but it just might be the easiest method and it just might work OK!
Regards,
Dawn.





Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/30/2007 10:35PM by Dawn.

Dawn - I love the idea of a 'biffing' session - but it might be somewhat of a mess by the time I had finished!!!!!!! When you said 'sweep up the shavings' I also had visions of having to sweep them up off the floor etc!! The image conjured up a good laugh - thankyou!!!
thankyou Lorna - I had never thought of rolling it like that. I can see now how the professionals would do it now that I can visualise the whole procedure. Will have a go at that soon when I get a special occasion for a gateau.

Hello Momma,
Glad you got a laugh!! I was being basically serious amongst the other silly stuff - although unlike some I certainly don't profess to be the world's expert on cake icing or anything else for that matter (tee hee)!! Biffing aside, I did wonder if a gengle sort of tossing from the strip of paper could get it to work with the cake on a slight slant. There would be bits of shavings around the plate, but they could be removed.
Anyway, I hope however you do it, it works out absolutely perfectly for you!
Regards,
Dawn.

HI Dawn. It was actually Maggie who sent that message, but the same goes for me, anyway - I had a laugh too at the 'biffing' image!
Cheers
Momma

The trouble with biffing is because your hands get sticky, you have to eat the chocolate that is stuck on your hands! This becomes an everlasting circle which results in the baker becoming more round than the cake.

THis is getting very serious!!!! Much as I like the idea of a 'biffing' match maybe I should stick to Lorna's and Stephanie's ideas - I can do without the extra bits on my hands that will need tasting!!! I get tempted enough with choccie without having the excuse to lick the fingers!!! I will really have no excuse now - not to make a perfect gateau ! I have a lovely chocolate cake recipe that makes heaps and last weekend made a Bob the bUilder cake - iced it with little blobs from a printed out picture and had made the cake a couple of days before to save time - put a couple of handfuls of choc chips in to make it more interesting. Put it in the freeezer for a couple of days and whenI took it out to thaw and ice - the chips had sort of melted a bit and made little holes in the texture!!!! of course I wanted it to be perfect so had to make another one, wait for the boiled bits to cool, then wait for the cake to cool and then ice it! it actually turned out really nice and the little 4 yr old boy whose birthday it was - thought it was so cool - and the cake itself turned out perfect!!! Not always easy with my oven!!

Hey, I've cracked it... Few gins on board and my brain goes whooo..
Okay...
Large large piece of plastic glad wrap stuff.
Now imagine waxing your legs...one leg okay..
Right. now you have your cake lying on top of a large round or squared circle of plastic.
YOU MUST KEEP REMEMBERING THE WAXING LEGS THING HERE.
Take a pair of scissors and cut strips around or a-square.
LEGS LEGS WAX WAX...
NOW. Lay your shavings on one of the strips right to the very end. I don't know how deep your cake is.. Right to the very end is just how deep your cake is..
NOW; Put your shaved bits of stuff on that strip.
NOW: Carefully, with one hand underneath to sort of guide errant beasts upwards..,,and with the other hand..for me this would be the right as I am right handed, guide the plastic strip coated with shavings up to the top and then...
TURN the cake around so you can do the next strip...
VOILLA!! Does anyone else except me have any idea what I'm on about???

Any bits not covered you now biff from the far end of the kitchen as per prev recommendations.

Oh sheesh Dear Kerry - I'm thinking we need to put the shavings (not worried now whether it's legs or chocky shavings) onto a piece of whatever and bloomin blow-it onto the cake with a straw as large as required - a piece of plastic water pipe if need be - as I think your method might strip the cake and Maggie their former and/or future glory.

For a pair of non-know-it-alls-I-reckon-between-us-we're-do'in-pretty-well. But I fear for Dear Maggie (and her cake), as maybe by now she doesn't know whether she's Maggie, Martha, Marshia or Pharshia, but I can only hope she's abreast of everything (as one should normally be).

StephanieD I wasn't intending for the hands to be touching the chocky shavings with biffing - that's why there is a strip of greaseproof or baking paper incorporated with my suggestion - the finger diggys are not touching the chocky shavings because you are using the paper as the leverage(biffign) medium for the shavings instead of you're digits. It's really a matter of just "firing away"! Never mind where the cake ends up.
(*d*)
P/ssssss sorry Momma and Maggie for getting you both muddled!




Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/31/2007 12:31PM by Dawn.

That's okay, Dawn - I'm quite flattered to be muddled with Maggie - or should that be maggled with Muddie? I've had a two or three (well, okay, it was three) very good reds tonight, so who knows? And who cares? Except ... maybe Maddie ... Muggie ... umm ....

(Sorry Maggie ... just kidding)

OH BOY - what HAVE I started!!!
I think I may have to revise my ideas of a gateau - sounds far too complicated if I follow Kerry and Dawn!!! I kinda feel I should be standing on my head to accomplish it! - maybe I should stick to fruit cakes without icing!
That's OK Momma - I was born into a family with wicked sense of humours ...or is it wicked senses of humour...whatever ! I don't mind that you don't mind - being maddled/muddled with me! Oh - it is getting late and my old brain is getting maddled/muddled too!!

PS - how long will it take to ice if I follow the single straw method dawn?????

Not long at all Maggie as I seriously think you should have a street party, or if you live rurally a barn or cowshed party - entry by drinking straw not a hay straw as it would take too long to blow a shaving through a hay straw. Hand out the shavings, turn on the music, put the cake in the middle of the prancing area and let them rip, dancy dancy rock'n'roll limbo boogey waltz trot-fox and shimmy all around the cake at the same time everyone blowing shavings directly at the cake while they're trot-foxing, boogying, limboing etc....
End result - nicely shavened cake?
*d*

Dawn - I think you and I would get on very well!!! I ahve all these odd ideas too but don't usually have the courage to carry them out!! maybe getting too old and stiff!!! We do have a shearing shed but don;t know that the atmosphere would be too conducive to cake decorating at the moment! Too much wool and sheep 'presents' around! I have 4 grand daughters - maybe I should get them on the end of a straw each? Naw! Think I might actually stick to Lorna's idea!! Sounds a whole lot easier and tidier. Trouble is -Hubby is on a dairy free diet at the moment so he wouldn't be eating the cake anyway so maybe I shouldn't tease him by making something so delectable!!! xox thanks anyway and keep up the fun!!

PS - after I pay for all the extra food/drink for the rural cake shaving party - wouldn't it be cheaper and easier to just buy one????

Not as much fun. I made one once..not a Gateau, think it was an Angel cake base. Anway, I applied the choc shavings with a cupped hand, pressing on gently to the sides. The cake was on the serving plate to be. I then wiped up the mess of fallen debris with a damp paper towel. It worked and looked rather good and providing your hands are bone dry it seemed to work okay.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/01/2007 09:05AM by Kerry.

That's the way I did the one and only attempt at this! Thought there was bound to be an easier way - that's why I asked all you clever girls out there!!