Zebra Stripe Cake and Uniform Sized Fondant Ball Border

I made a cake yesterday. It was my first zebra stripe cake. I thought it would be pretty easy and fast, but it was very time consuming.

I planned out where to place the stripes before "gluing" it down to the cake. That's probably why it took so long. In addition to that, rolling the fondant ball border took a while also. I learned a neat trick though to get the balls to be all the same size.

To get uniform or same sized balls for your border, you roll out your fondant flat using spacers, or rolling bands to get it to the same width. Then, using any small cookie cutter, cut out several pieces. Then roll them into balls. Every ball will be the same size. Yay.

The stripes were pretty random, I just cut them out randomly, but carefully planned the placement of each stripe. On top of the cake, there is suppose to be the letter "G" in hot pink fondant. It was still drying when I took this photo. 

I learned another trick to get fondant to dry quicker and more sturdy. Add gumpaste. I made a 1/2 gumpaste 1/2 fondant mixture and formed the initial "G," it was the only one that defied gravity. The pure fondant ones broke. Sad =[ Gumpaste is my new love.

This is the letter "G" that will go on top of the cake.

Just imagine it on top. =]

I have been pretty busy this month making custom desserts for people. I'm having tons of fun and learning all these neat tricks that I get to share with you. I'm going to post some wedding sugar cookies I did this week next.