Cake Decorating Community - Cakes We Bake

I would like to create a nice organized chart to upload on the site indicating all the pluses and minuses of different store-bought fondant brands.

 

Anyone care to chime in? I'm going to wait until we have lots and lots of feedback on this before I put it together.

 

Please include details like:

 

taste

easy or difficult to work with

price per pound

does it dry out

and anything else you can think of

 

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I totally agree!! MMF tastes good but it's such a pain to make! There's a company online called "Fondarific" and they make lots of flavours and colours. I've never tried it, but I have heard good things about it. You can order online or some Winners and/or HomeSense stores carry it. They don't deliver to Canada right now and my HomeSense only had the lemon (yellow) colour, which wasn't what I needed.....

Leigh Ann Clem said:
The only store bought fondant I've ever worked with is Wilton. I was not a fan at all. The taste is terrible. It was fairly easy to work with but didn't hold up to adding color very well. To me taste is extremely important and thats what made me start using MMF. It tastes great as well as it's easy to work with and colors well. I would like to try some of the other store bought ones tho. If I could find one that tasted great as well as worked/looked great, I would most definitely use it because making MMF is a pain. lol!

love elite fondx. soft and easy to work with. $7.50 per lb. does not dry out and has a pleasant taste.

thats a hard one as we cant get a lot of the brands available in the US but i seem to have settled with Renshaw celebration even though its quite pricey at around £30  for a 10lb box but it tastes good and is easy to work with and doesnt try out too quickly.  I  tried a different brand recently and it was horrible to work with.

I did notice that my usual supplier here in the UK has tarted to stock satin ice which I know a lot of you are really keen on but guess what ...... it was out of stock!!!!! lol

 

Fondx Elite is my favorite.  It's easy to use, doesn't crack, and tastes good.  If it's not on sale,  I buy the regular Fondx which is still wonderful. Plus, I always keep their colors on hand so I don't have to make them.

It really does make the Wilton taste better too if you mix them, because I still use Wilton for figures,etc.  It just seems to hold it's shape best, but mixing with Fondx definitely helps the flavor.

I use Albert Uster Massa they have netrual, americana white, white chocolate, dark Chocolate.  It has a wonderful flavor & rolls very thin.

 

I have been using Satin Ice and love it.  It is very easy to work with and I love the colors I can't get.  Also buying it online is the cheapest way to get it.  I have used the Duff brand when in a pinch and have to go buy it at the store.  It looks as if Walmart pulled the line, but it is still the same price at Michaels.  I find Duff's brand to be very stick and hard to work with after it is rolled.  Satin ice is the best.  I love the colors and working it with it.  I think it both brands taste better then the Wilton.  I only buy Wilton when I need flesh color.  If Satin Ice had that color I would only use it.  But I haven't use anything but those.  Satin Ice does kind dry up before I want it sometimes, but I like the way it drys when I need it too.

I'm sorry Joann but you must not be doing the kind of cakes I do.  I found a website called swankcakesdesign that was full of both buttercream and fondant cakes.  And most of the buttercream ones were covered in fondant and gumpaste decorations. 

I have plenty of experience with buttercream.  And my lines and edges are clean and perfect, but there is a reason people use fondant.  If it was possible to do the same thing with buttercream, then no one would use fondant.  Look at some of my cakes in the first 2 albums and tell me how on earth you could duplicate them with buttercream.  FYI  I rarely update that site so I dont have much of my recent work.  Plus the bakery I worked at last wouldn't let me display my work from there.  But there is enough to get an idea of what I'm talking about.   For example:  for a grooms cake they wanted the top to look like ferrero rochet candy.  How would I have gotten the look of a wrinkled up gold wrapper with buttercream?

I still highly suggest, no matter how perfect your buttercream corners are you protect yourself by either only allowing them to bring pictures of fondant cakes or making them sign something saying they know and agree that the cake will not look exactly like the picture.

 

Misty's cakes

JoAnn Ramos said:


Sorry I disagree with the statement below,  as long as the person goes to a baker with experience in buttercream cakes, its far from a disappointment.  They will be getting exactly what they want, the cake design that they show the baker and a cake covered in buttercream.  Just check out the website for Swank cakes for example.  you can't put the following statement to any of his cakes, his lines are so clean with perfect edges, for more cleaner than any fondant cakes I have seen lately. 


Misty Miller Sciarabba said:

I used to be a buttercream snob years ago before I started doing high end cakes.  Now I refuse to do a multitiered cake without it.  I have a rule that if someone wants a cake without fondant, they cannot show me cakes with fondant on them as examples.  They will always be disappointed.  You cannot make a BC cake look like a fondant cake and that is what people want.  It's frustrating. 

Me too!  I just wish we could get it in smaller amounts. :( 

Penny Whitmer said:

I use Albert Uster Massa they have netrual, americana white, white chocolate, dark Chocolate.  It has a wonderful flavor & rolls very thin.

 

Misty  I agree with with you!  I just had this experience with a client.  they bought me a picture of a tree she wanted as her cake, and did not want fondant. I explained  I will never get the same design with buttercream.  Bride:  It's OK if it does not match picture!  how many times have we heard this!!  I made the tree stump, she hated it..... I had to refund money to make her happy,  that did not make me happy!
 
Misty Miller Sciarabba said:

I'm sorry Joann but you must not be doing the kind of cakes I do.  I found a website called swankcakesdesign that was full of both buttercream and fondant cakes.  And most of the buttercream ones were covered in fondant and gumpaste decorations. 

I have plenty of experience with buttercream.  And my lines and edges are clean and perfect, but there is a reason people use fondant.  If it was possible to do the same thing with buttercream, then no one would use fondant.  Look at some of my cakes in the first 2 albums and tell me how on earth you could duplicate them with buttercream.  FYI  I rarely update that site so I dont have much of my recent work.  Plus the bakery I worked at last wouldn't let me display my work from there.  But there is enough to get an idea of what I'm talking about.   For example:  for a grooms cake they wanted the top to look like ferrero rochet candy.  How would I have gotten the look of a wrinkled up gold wrapper with buttercream?

I still highly suggest, no matter how perfect your buttercream corners are you protect yourself by either only allowing them to bring pictures of fondant cakes or making them sign something saying they know and agree that the cake will not look exactly like the picture.

 

Misty's cakes

JoAnn Ramos said:


Sorry I disagree with the statement below,  as long as the person goes to a baker with experience in buttercream cakes, its far from a disappointment.  They will be getting exactly what they want, the cake design that they show the baker and a cake covered in buttercream.  Just check out the website for Swank cakes for example.  you can't put the following statement to any of his cakes, his lines are so clean with perfect edges, for more cleaner than any fondant cakes I have seen lately. 


Misty Miller Sciarabba said:

I used to be a buttercream snob years ago before I started doing high end cakes.  Now I refuse to do a multitiered cake without it.  I have a rule that if someone wants a cake without fondant, they cannot show me cakes with fondant on them as examples.  They will always be disappointed.  You cannot make a BC cake look like a fondant cake and that is what people want.  It's frustrating. 

Have you tried there new line of colors?  They come in 2 pound bags. 
 
Misty Miller Sciarabba said:

Me too!  I just wish we could get it in smaller amounts. :( 

Penny Whitmer said:

I use Albert Uster Massa they have netrual, americana white, white chocolate, dark Chocolate.  It has a wonderful flavor & rolls very thin.

 

I usually make my own MMf.  But if I buy I do like 1. Choco Pan...but here in Ont., Canada, it is terribly expensive.  I got the last batch on sale, about 2 yrs ago, haven't bought it since.

2. Satin Ice.... readily available at several cake supply stores, and relatively inexpensive

3. My go to fondant if I have to buy is McCalls.  Made here in Toronto Canada by the warehouse itself. Made with white chocolate, so it can be frozen.

Hey June,

How is McCalls brand of fondant? In terms of taste and working with it?  I have been there several times but never tried their fondant because I was not sure.  I usually buy Satin Ice, but I am always open to different options too!

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