There is nothing more festive than a decorated Christmas cake. A table laid with all the food that everyone loves at Christmas is always extra special if there is a beautifully decorated cake as the centerpiece.
Here are twenty Christmas cakes decorated with gumpaste sugar flowers, or fondant flowers, and fondant models to give you some ideas when it comes to decorating your own Christmas cake that will be the centerpiece of your Christmas celebrations.
Read on…
Christmas Cake Recipe
Before you can decorate your Christmas cake, you will need to either bake or buy one. The cake can be any cake according to your preference. However, I always bake a traditional rich fruit cake for my Christmas celebrations.
Apart from the fact that my family and I like a fruit Christmas cake, I must admit decorating a solid, stable, rich fruit cake is always a pleasure.
If you would like a recipe, then I am sure you will love this one that you can find in my article called My Rich Fruit Christmas Cake Recipe That Really Works
Once you have made the cake, you then need to decide how you will decorate it.
A rich fruit cake is usually covered first with a thin coat of marzipan.
If you would like to know how to make it, then see my How to Make Your Own Marzipan to Cover Your Rich Fruit Cake article.
Once you have covered your cake with marzipan, the next stage is to decide what icing to use.
You could choose Royal icing, and if you would like to know how to make it, then look at my article How to Choose the Best Royal Icing Recipe for Cakes or Projects.
However, you may like to work with regular rolling fondant, and you can find a recipe in my article called The Easiest Rolled Fondant Icing Recipe.
If you would like to use a rolling fondant that is a little different, then try marshmallow fondant. You can find out how to make it in my article called How to Make Fondant with Marshmallows.
Traditionally, it’s usual to use white icing for Christmas cakes, but recently bakers have been experimenting with color, and this year I’ve seen Christmas cakes decorated with blue icing.
Once you have marzipanned and iced it, the next stage will be deciding how you will decorate your cake.
Christmas cake decorating ideas
I must admit that I run out of Christmas cake decorating ideas each year, but fortunately, there are some general guidelines to follow.
Usually, the colors used to decorate Christmas cakes are red, green, and white with some yellow added, but nothing stops you from experimenting with any colors you like.
There are certain flowers associated with Christmas that are used to decorate cakes. The main ones are red poinsettia, white hellebore (Christmas rose), green holly with red berries, green ivy, white snowflakes, and brown pine cones.
However, I often use red and yellow roses and yellow, white, and red filler flowers. Also, poinsettias come in pink, cream, and white, so you could have some fun experimenting with those colors.
Fondant models often depict a Christmas theme on the cake, especially if children are present at the celebration.
Fondant models of Father Christmas, snowmen, elves, snowflakes, candles, reindeer, penguins, holly, ivy, Christmas trees, and Christmas gnomes made by hand or using molds are used to decorate Christmas cakes.
If you want more information on decorating your Christmas cake, from putting on the marzipan to adding the decorations, see my Decorating a Christmas Cake article.
Christmas Cakes
After sorting through the photographs of Christmas cakes to post in this article, I realized that I’m a traditionalist at heart. I’ve covered all my cakes with white icing, and the majority of the decorations are white, red, green, and yellow.
Apart from the fact that they are the most requested Christmas colors, perhaps this year, I may be a bit more adventurous and try some blue icing on a cake.
Gumpaste flowers on the cakes are not edible and removed before cutting the cake, but children are usually delighted to eat the fondant models.
I made the following three cakes for large Christmas parties where there were both adults and children.
The Gumpaste flowers on one tier are for the adults, and the other has fondant Christmas models, especially for the children.
The next two cakes were made for smaller Christmas parties held for children and adults, so they are decorated with gumpaste flowers and fondant figures on the same tier.
It wasn’t intentional, but I thought it was strange how the penguins on the first cake seemed to look up at the camera.
Gumpaste flowers
The following cakes decorated with gumpaste flowers were made mainly for adult Christmas parties and made the Christmas cake the centerpiece of the table.
Fondant Christmas cake decorations
Some people prefer to have the decorations on Christmas cakes made of fondant to be cut and eaten with the cake.
For the decorations, add a small amount of gum tragacanth or CMC to fondant, so the three-dimensional flowers keep their shape but are still soft enough to eat.
I hope these Christmas cake decorating ideas have given you some inspiration when it comes to decorating your cakes.
You may wish to decorate your cakes with gumpaste flowers or decorate them very simply with fondant decorations, or even buy ready-made decorations from your cake supplier. Whatever way you choose, I am sure everyone will enjoy your Christmas cake.
