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Sorry, I’m posting this again, I forgot to tick the ‘notification of replies’ after submitting the question the first time!

Hi, I have someone who wants a 4 tier choc wrap cake, but not in a cone and layers of thin chocolate stuck, overlapping and stuck flat on the sides of each tier.

Question 1 – The bottom tier is to be a fruit cake, is it OK to just ganache the fruit cake reading for wrapping, or do I have to put marzipan on first? The customer doesn’t actually like marzipan so would rather have it without.

Question 2 – I’ve made cone chocolate wrap cakes before and I’m wondering (presuming!) if it’s OK to use the same modelling chocolate for this other style of cake?

Thanks!

Hi loobianca

You’d have to have the ganache layer fairly thick so it doesn’t get absorbed into the cake. I’ve seen ganached fruit cakes and they look great. Can’t see any reason to use marzipan if the ganache is thick enough to conceal all the lumps and bumps. Search ‘Fruit cake’ I think that answer is precise. I should think the cocoform would be the same.

Hi MIWL,

Thanks for that, I’ve had a look at the Fruit Cake comments and it seems fine to use the ganache, I’ll be putting a couple of layers on so it should be fine.

Yes, I think the cocoform should be fine, I just wondered if anyone had actually used it for the style of cake I’m on about. The cake in the picture I was shown looks as if tempered chocolate was used (and I’m definately not going down the route of spreading that out on a marble slab etc. etc. – much too faffy if cocoform works just as well!!)

Thanks again.

Hi loobianca

You don’t have to mess around with a marble slab to temper chocolate. Just melt it in a bain marie on a low heat until the choc is melted, that’s all there is to it. I have one of those tempering bain maries which looks like a pudding basin with a handle. I just put that over a saucepan of barely simmering water and when the choc is melted I just use it. While at the NEC I went toTracy Mann’s chocolate workshop, she does exactly the same as I do. I temper chocolate to make ornaments in choc moulds, and for decorating gateaux like Sacher Torte, it works just fine.