Fourth of July Flag Cake

The making of a Fourth of July Cake has to be one of the easiest cake designs to build. Included in this recipe design will be the easy quick route by using store-bought materials for your cake and the Wilton Cake way, which is a bit difficult.

Fourth of July Cake #1: Easy as Pie... Er, Cake

Purchase a rectangular cake pan

4 to 5 jars of white icing

4 to 5 jars of red icing

1 jar of blue icing

Pack of Candy stars in white with 50 total stars

Box of yellow cake mix

Cake decorating Spatula

Plastic decorating bags w/ flat wide tip and star tip if white candy stars are unavailable

1. Gather your ingredients. Bake your cake first. Take care grease and flour the pan thoroughly so the cake does not stick when it comes times to remove it from the pan. Do Not open the oven once preheating reaches the perfect level and it is time to add the cake batter with pan. Opening an oven early prevent your cake from rising properly.

2. Locate a piece of stiff cardboard even if it means pleading for some from the nearest bakery or grocer. Cut the rectangle larger than the cake pan and cover with aluminum foil. Use a beautiful saran wrap overlay in stars and stripes of you want over the foil but make certain to tape it down well on the underside. This will be difficult to move without breaking the cake due to the weight and awkward size.

3. Once the cake bakes until a toothpick comes out clean, carefully turn your cake over onto the newly formed base of cardboard, aluminum foil, and possible decorated wrap. Allow cake to cool completely before adding icing or else it will become one mush mess.

4. After cooling is completely, use the cake-decorating spatula with a cup of water to spread over the top of the cake so it will pick up any cake crumbs that might mix with the icing. Once all the crumbs are gone or flattened into the cake again, start with the next step.

5. Ice the entire cake in a thin but covering layer of white icing. This is your base. It prevents cake crumbs from mixing with the icing, serves as a base, and covers any areas that might be bare from formation of the stripes.

6. Mark off 13 stripes and the upper corner square for the stars using toothpicks to make small etches in the base layer of icing. If you make a mistake, simply use the cake spatula to smooth over the area and begin again.

7. Add 13 alternating red and white stripes across the wide edge of the rectangle measuring each strip to the exact size as the others. This is where a steady hand in using a decorating bag is handy. If possible, alternate stripes using cheap icing weeks in advance with the rectangular pan as a template before attempting the real deal.

8. In the upper corner, add blue icing for the location of the stars. Make certain your measurements are equal. Keep a picture of a real flag handy for this purpose.

9. If located white stars, add the candy white stars in rows identically to the stars in the flag picture. If unable to locate stars, use some white icing with a star tip on the decorating bag to add stars one at a time in equal proportions as are on the original flag of the United States.

10. Once the major work is complete, use any decorative tip with your kit or even the star tip to line the bottom of the cake around the edges closest to the base. Keep the stars or rows as equal as possible to create and air of perfection. Now you are ready to head out to the Fourth of July Party with Flag Cake in hand!

The Wilton Cake Way - READ ALL DIRECTIONS FIRST!

The Wilton cake way is similar to above except the decorator makes the icing from scratch using the Wilton Icing Recipe, which calls for a heavy-duty mixer. This writer burned up numerous hand mixers through the years from making Wilton Icing. When purchasing the colors, I highly recommend purchasing the No-Taste Red food coloring dye for the icing. In order to make the icing as red as possible it requires a considerable amount of red food coloring. Even the No-Taste red will have a slight taste to it.

It is important to make more than enough icing in case it takes a bit more since one needs to separate the icing into sections to color it properly. Once coloring icing, it is almost impossible to duplicate the same color again should one run short of a color.

Purchase a decorating bag set with a wide stripe tip, flower tip, and any other decorative tip to design the baseline. Again, it is possible to use the star tip to create stars or other long designs along the base at the bottom of the cake.

Apply the slightly dampened cake spatula to remove crumbs and then add a base layer of white icing to prevent any bare spots between the lines. Measure off the 13 stripes matching the photo or image of the flag matching the stripes with the red and white icing. Remember to note that Wilton Icing is much thicker than store-bought icing so it will require a bit more pressure for the icing to come through the tips. This is where practice prior to cake day is extremely important to bring about perfection when using Wilton Recipe Icing.

Using the spatula, apply the blue square flatly on the upper corner of the cake that will be the backdrop for the white stars. Take extra care not to allow the red and white stripes to mix with the blue icing.

Finally, using the star tip with white icing in the decorating bag, add 50 stars all in the same order as in your image of the United States Flag.

Last, using the star tip, add single stars or a waving stripe lifting and lowering to develop a pattern at the base of the cake where the cake with icing meets the covered cardboard with possible decorative saran wrap.

****It is extremely important when decorating a cake using Wilton Icing to make certain the cardboard you will cover has reinforcement. Again, this icing is heavy, much heavier than any icing found in a grocery store. If possible, add two or three layers of equal sizes of cardboard taking time to glue each together before covering with aluminum foil and the possible decorative saran wrap before turning the cake over on the base cardboard carrier.

Either method you use will require someone to hold the ends as well as the middle of the bottom of the cake so it does not bend or break while in transport. It helps to bring extra icing in capped decorating bags of various icing colors to repair any damages during transport. It is difficult to repair a stars and stripes cake but it is possible.

The decorating tips for the Wilton Way and others are compliments of my late aunt and her first husband who worked on the military base in Georgia as chefs for the officers, particularly those of high rank. These two worked together creating some of the most beautiful pieces I ever saw in my life. They passed their secrets down to my mother when I was a child and I paid attention. Later, when my mother began decorating Wilton-Style Cakes, I paid attention again.

A few of my cakes have made their way into class yearbooks, college newsletters, and a few magazines; however out of all the cakes I made and I did many, I had one rule to live by. I will make the cakes, I will decorate the cakes, but I will not destroy a cake by cutting into the first piece. This became a major ordeal especially during my oldest child's elementary years since none of her teachers had any desire to cut into such a masterpiece either. Usually, they would find another teacher down the hall or pressure the principal into doing the job of cutting the cakes, a job he hated but did to prevent tears in the eyes of those wonderful teachers.