The Candy Cook Book/Chapter 15
CHAPTER XV
DECORATED CANDIES AND CAKES
The appearance of many candies, as well as cake, is improved by flower decorations. Ornamental frosting, either cooked or uncooked, color pastes, a few sheets of stiff paper, and a pair of scissors, are all the outfit required. With a pastry bag and a tin rose tube, wedding and anniversary cakes may be decorated in conventional patterns with white frosting, and candies, like cream mints, can be shaped. Other decorations may be made with fondant, almond paste, and tiny candies. Practice is required to secure artistic results, but any one with ordinary ability and patience can do excellent work. Pictures of cakes, and those seen in the windows of first-class caterers, or designs drawn on paper before putting on the decorations, will help to secure good results.
Holidays, birthdays, and other anniversaries may well be remembered with appropriate candies or cakes.
- Whites 2 eggs
- 2 teaspoons lemon juice
- Sifted confectioners' sugar
Put eggs in a large bowl, add two tablespoons sugar, and beat three minutes, using a perforated wooden spoon. Repeat until one cup of sugar is used. Add lemon juice gradually, as mixture thickens. Continue adding sugar by spoonfuls, and beat until frosting is stiff enough to keep in shape after being forced through a pastry bag and tube. Color as desired.
With a pastry bag and variety of tin tubes, or with paper tubes, candies or cakes may be ornamented as desired.
- 1 cup sugar
- ½ cup water
- ¼ teaspoon cream of tartar
- Whites 2 eggs
- Lemon juice
Put sugar and water in saucepan, stir until dissolved, bring to boiling point, wash down sides of saucepan with a piece of cheesecloth or a pastry brush dipped in cold water, add cream of tartar, cover, and boil three minutes, uncover, and let boil without stirring.
Beat whites of eggs in a large shallow pan with wire whisk until light but not stiff, and slowly add a spoonful of the boiling syrup, continuing the beating. Then add another spoonful of syrup in the same way, and a third spoonful. Continue beating the eggs until the boiling syrup spins a long thread, remove from fire, and add syrup in a fine steady stream to the egg mixture, beating constantly.
Set the dish containing the frosting in a dish of boiling water; the upper pan should fit tightly over the pan of hot water in order that steam may not escape. Gently fold the mixture over and over until it is stiff enough to hold its shape. Remove from the water, and very gently and slowly fold the frosting over and over until it is cool. Cover with a piece of damp cheesecloth. Frosting may be used at once, or will keep until the next day. With a variety of tubes and colors, beautiful and artistic decorations may be made on candies and cakes.
A pastry bag of heavy drilling with a hole in the end through which can be inserted tin tubes with different kinds of openings, may be used for ornamental frosting, but sheets of linen foolscap paper, or strong thin typewriter paper, are quite as satisfactory. Cut the paper diagonally across, making two pieces measuring 8 × 11 × 14 inches. Shape the tube by taking one corner of the paper (1) in the right hand and the other corner (2) in the left hand, and rolling the paper around, making a cornucopia with a very sharp point at (3). The point of the funnel should be the center of the longest side. It may take some practice to learn how to hold and roll the paper, but it is really very easy to do when once understood. Turn in the edges of the paper at the open end of the cornucopia to hold it in shape, and cut an opening at the point.
For stems, dots, and writing, clip off the end of the paper funnel with a pair of scissors. For leaves, press the point of the funnel flat, clip off one fourth inch from the end, clip off corners, making another point, and make a slit one eighth inch long in each point. For some flower petals, clip off the point of the funnel, and cut the end in the shape of the letter W. For fine decorating, cut a small opening; for large full roses, or heavy flutings, cut a deeper slit. Have a paper tube for each color of frosting. With these tubes, almost any kind of ornamental frosting work may be done on candies or cakes.
Half fill a paper funnel with frosting, bring edges of open end together, and fold over twice, that frosting may not come out at the top. Hold the funnel in the right hand with the little finger toward the point of the tube and the thumb and forefinger closed tightly above the frosting. Force the frosting gently through the hole in the end of the tube by squeezing with the right hand and guiding with the left hand. Allow the tube point to rest lightly on the surface to be decorated. Conventional designs may be attempted at first, and soon it will be possible to make flowers and leaves. Colors should always be very delicate, and designs on candy should be small and dainty. Do not use a tube after it has become soft and out of shape at the point.
Divide frosting into several portions, putting each portion on a saucer. Remove a bit of color paste from jar with a toothpick or steel skewer, and place on one side of saucer. Mix with a very small portion of frosting, then gently fold, not stir, into remaining frosting. Color each portion.
Dilute a bit of blue or rose color paste with two or three drops of water or frosting, and gently fold it (do not beat it) into a small portion of ornamental frosting. In the same way color a small portion with leaf green, adding a tiny bit of blue if the color is not good. Color another portion with yellow. Make two stem tubes and one leaf tube of tough thin paper. Put blue or pink frosting into a stem tube, and force five tiny spots in a circle on the object to be decorated. Put green frosting into the two remaining tubes, and with the stem tube make a stem to the flower, and with the leaf tube, two forget-me-not leaves. Put a bit of yellow in the center of the flower with the point of a toothpick. It is well to have a blossom or a picture as a guide in making the design.
Color portions of ornamental frosting rose and green. Put rose colored frosting in a leaf tube, and make four or five broad petals radiating from a center. Make stem and leaves with green frosting, and put a bit of yellow frosting in the center of the flower. For a double rose make a smaller group of petals inside the first group.
Large roses may be fashioned two inches in diameter, dried slowly in a cool oven, and used for decorating a dish of candies.
Color portions of ornamental frosting pink, red, lavender, and green, and put in leaf tubes. Make one broad petal by forcing frosting through a leaf tube, then force two upright petals on center of first petal. The petals may be shaded by putting white frosting on each side of a tube and a colored frosting in the center, and forcing them out together. Add stem and leaves.
Color portions of ornamental frosting violet, green, and yellow. Make three broad violet or white petals that meet in the center, put a bit of yellow where they join, and add stems and leaves.
Color a portion of ornamental frosting green. Make with stem tubes a curved stem of green ornamental frosting, with five or six tiny blossoms of white frosting depending from it. Add one or two long narrow green leaves made with leaf tube.
With stem tubes make three tiny petals of yellow ornamental frosting, add a green stem, and two or three long slender leaves.
Make After Dinner Mints, page 123, shaping the candy, when pulled, in bars four inches long and one inch wide. Let stand in powdered sugar until sugary, then decorate with a spray of roses or sweet peas made of ornamental frosting.
Make Plain White Mints, page 79, one and one half inches in diameter, and decorate with a single violet, forget-me-not, tiny rose, or holly berries and leaves made of ornamental frosting.
Dip marshmallows in melted fondant, and decorate with tiny flowers made of ornamental frosting in different colors.
Make Wintergreen Wafer mixture, page 163, roll thin, and cut in pieces two by three inches. Put ornamental frosting in stem tube, and write the name of each guest in the center of a card.
Use at a children's party.
Dip marshmallows in fondant, and when firm insert a piece of fine wire to make a handle. Fill stem tubes with ornamental frosting of different colors. Make a lattice work of frosting on the sides of the marshmallow, and cover the handle with frosting. Decorate with tiny stems and blossoms of contrasting colors, to make it look like a basket of flowers.
- ⅓ cup butter
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 4 tablespoons orange juice
- 1 teaspoon grated orange rind
Mix orange juice and rind, let stand half an hour, and strain through cheesecloth. Cream butter in a warm but not hot bowl. Add sugar gradually, and beat until light. Let orange juice get slightly warm, and add drop by drop to first mixture. This may be used for frosting candies or large or small cakes. Portions may be colored, and used through paper frosting bags for decorations. Keep in a cool place until needed.
- ¼ cup butter
- Sifted confectioners' sugar
- Whites 2 eggs
- Flavoring
- Color paste
Cream butter, and add gradually half a cup of confectioners' sugar, beating constantly. Beat whites of eggs until stiff, and gradually beat in one cup of sugar. Combine mixtures, and add enough more sugar to make frosting stiff enough to hold its shape. Color and flavor as desired, and with paper tubes use to ornament candies or cakes. Keep in a cool place, that it may remain firm.
Bake a cake two inches deep in a dripping pan. When cool, cut out in the shape of a Christmas tree on a standard.
Cover cake with Japanese Frosting, colored green, and flavored with orange flower water. Sprinkle with long shredded cocoanut colored green. Decorate the cake with tiny candies put on to imitate toys and candles. Place at the base toys fashioned from almond paste. Serve on a lace paper doily on a large plate or tray. Individual trees may be made if preferred.
Color fondant or almond paste to match the flowers that are to be made, using enough confectioners' sugar to make the mixture stiff enough to hold its shape. Model each petal separately, and fasten directly to the soft frosting of a cake, or complete the flowers and buds before frosting the cake. They may be kept several days before being used. Tiny birthday candles may be set in the center of each bud and flower if desired.
Leaves and stems may be cut from the green outside portion of a piece of citron and used to connect the flowers, making a graceful design on top and side of the cake. Poinsettias and holly at Christmas, roses, apple blossoms, orange blossoms, pansies, violets, and daffodils are all easily fashioned and most attractive.
Small flowers attached with a bit of frosting to plain mints are beautiful for afternoon teas, or to top a box of bonbons.
Candied caraway seeds of different colors, and the very tiny candies known as "hundreds" and "thousands", may be used to make most attractive decorations on candies or cakes. First make foundations of angelica. Cut angelica with a penknife into thin shavings, work with the hands into small balls, then flatten in lozenge shape, about three eighths inch in diameter. This makes a sticky surface. On it arrange a center of yellow or brown caraway candies broken in pieces, or use the "hundreds" and "thousands", putting each candy in place with a small pair of tweezers, or the end of a toothpick dipped in water to make the candies stick to it. Around the center arrange white or yellow caraway candies like the petals of a daisy.
With the very tiny candies, a single yellow candy with five blue or pink candies around makes a forget-me-not. With yellow caraways, sprays of goldenrod or chrysanthemums may be fashioned. After the flowers are made, they may easily be arranged on the soft frosting of a cake, or fastened by means of sugar syrup to a large mint. Arrange leaves and stems to connect the flowers.
A basket may be made directly on the soft frosting of a cake in any color desired, having the candies go crosswise as a basket is woven. Leaves and stems may be made of fine strips of citron. The greenest citron that can be purchased and preferably the dark outside should be used.
Silver dragées may be used with the flower decoration for conventional designs.
Small red checkerberry candies may be purchased, the size and color of holly berries. Leaves may be fashioned from ornamental frosting, fondant, or almond paste colored green, or from angelica or citron. Halves of blanched pistachio nuts also make good leaves.
Arrange two or three leaves meeting at the center, place two or more red candies where they join, and a short stem of the same material as that used for the leaves. If the red candies are not obtainable, candied cherries may be cut the shape and size of holly berries, or fondant or almond paste may be colored with scarlet color paste, and shaped in small balls.
Large mints, and large and small cakes, decorated with holly make attractive Christmas gifts.
First lessons in drawing sometimes show the possibilities of straight lines in making figures. These can be reproduced on large mints or little cakes with the lines made with ornamental frosting or melted chocolate, or of narrow strips of angelica, with a round piece of angelica for the head. One line for the back, two for the arms and two for the legs, with a round head, may be put on at many different angles to show a boy walking, running, kneeling, or standing still. With a ball cut from a cherry, the figures can be arranged in the different attitudes of football or baseball players, and are appreciated during the ball playing season. Dancing and skating figures, and many others, can also be portrayed with a few characteristic lines.
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