Cake Geek Magazine

Cake Tutorials, Trends, Design & Styling

  • Home Page
  • Cake Tutorials
  • Recipes
  • About
  • Contact
  • Policies

How To Make The Perfect Drip Cake – Tutorial by Mandy Merriman

Drip Cake Tutorial from Cake Confidence by Mandy Merriman on Cake-Geek.com

In this drip cake tutorial from Cake Confidence by Mandy Merriman, Mandy takes you through the decorating process step-by-step as well as how to finish your cake with piped buttercream rosettes or swirls. (Continued from our Cake Confidence feature, Part 1: How to Expertly Buttercream a Cake – The Easy Way (which shows you how to make a drip cake from scratch.)

A question we hear a lot at Cake Geek is how tall does a drip cake need to be? It can be as tall as you like but the taller the cake the more effective it is so ideally a drip cake should have three layers of cake.

Drip Cake Tutorial

First off, how do you make the drip for your drip cake? Can you just melt chocolate for a drip cake? Ideally, no. If you try to use just melted chocolate for the drip it will look really thick and clumpy.

Instead, the drip on drip cakes is made from chocolate ganache which is a mixture of chocolate and heavy cream (also known as double cream outside the US). You can use colored candy melts instead of chocolate if you want a specific color drip (or add a tiny amount of gel color to your white chocolate.)

For the ganache to make your chocolate drip, you just melt the candy melts or chocolate (see notes in FAQ’s below) with heavy cream in the microwave in 30 second increments. Stir after each 30 second increment to ensure the chocolate melts evenly and beware, chocolate burns way easier than you think! So don’t skip the stirring part!

You will know your ganache is done when you stir and when there are no lumps of chocolate left and it’s completely smooth when you stir it around.

Drip cake tutorial step 2

A lot of people wonder can you add a chocolate drip to a buttercream cake, afraid that it may melt the buttercream. The answer is yes you can -as long as your chocolate drip/ganache has come to room temperature and your buttercream cake has been chilled in the fridge for at least half an hour (or been in the freezer for 10 minutes).

(For fondant cakes, it’s best to use colored royal icing for your drip cake. Made of icing sugar and egg white, it has the right consistency and isn’t too liquid. Therefore will not adversely impact the quality of the fondant.)

How do you make colored ganache for dripping cake?

The next step is to pour the ganache into your squeeze bottle and twist the lid on tight. Don’t worry if you don’t have a squeeze bottle, you can use a teaspoon instead. But you have more control using a squeeze bottle.

Alternatively, you can also use a plastic piping bag and just cut a hole at the pointed end when you’re ready to start on the drips. Again, the squeeze bottle is the easiest method.

Drip cake tutorial step 3

So, now for the good part – how do you get the chocolate ganache to drip? Gently squeeze a bit of ganache down the side of the cake from the top edge. And the key is to stop when the ganache is about an inch down from the top.

Drip cake tutorial step 4

Still squeezing, move the squeeze bottle over a bit for the next drip.

Drip cake tutorial step 5The more you squeeze, the deeper the drip.

Drip cake tutorial step 6Add more ganache on top—just enough to spread to the edges.

Drip cake tutorial step 7Using an offset icing spatula, spread the center pool of ganache to the edges. Then add a swirl on top. Let set for 5 minutes in the freezer.

Using a Wilton 1M piping tip, pipe on a swirl, going around three times, press down slightly, then lift up.

Drip cake tutorial step 9Repeat so there are 8 swirls on top of the cake. I do swirls at 12, 3, 6, and 9 o’clock.

Drip cake tutorial step 10Finish the final swirls by adding one between each of the previous ones.

Drip cake tutorial step 11

Place on final decorations. Chill the cake to set.

Drip cake tutorial step 12Slide a cake lifter between the small cardboard round and the large one (cutting through the tape – see Cake Confidence extract, Part 1 for why you need two cardboard rounds taped together).

Transferring a cake how to pic 1

Lift cake under the small cardboard round with the cake lifter.

Transferring a cake how to pic 2

Carefully place the cake on the cake stand and slowly slide out the cake lifter.

Transferring a cake how to pic 1

Drip cake tutorial from Mandy Merriman’s Cake Confidence (Springville, Utah: Cedar Fort, 2019). Courtesy of Cedar Fort, Inc. Used by permission.

See Part 1 of our Cake Confidence feature here: How To Expertly Buttercream A Cake – The Easy Way

Related Posts

  • How to Perfectly Buttercream a Cake the Easy Way from Cake Confidence by Mandy Merriman
    How to Expertly Buttercream a Cake - the Easy Way: From Cake Confidence by Mandy Merriman

    When Mandy Merriman's debut book, Cake Confidence went straight to the top of the cookbook bestseller charts it was no…

  • Ferrero Rocher Chocolate Hazelnut Cake on Cake-Geek.com by Ana Zelic
    Ferrero Rocher Cake

    The word showstopper doesn't even begin to describe this exquisite tasting and looking Ferrero Rocher cake from The Cake Chronicles…

  • Caramel Peaches and Cream Cake on Cake-Geek.com by Bernice Baran
    Caramel Peaches & Cream Cake

    Our caramel peaches and cream cake recipe this week is the perfect sweet treat for the transition from summer to…

  • S'Mores Cake Recipe on Cake-Geek.com from Dana's Bakery by Dana Pollack
    S'Mores Cake Recipe from Dana's Bakery

    Our S'mores cake recipe this week is from baking innovator, Dana Pollack's brand new book, Dana's Bakery. Dana’s Bakery was…

  • Caramel drip apple walnut spice layer cake on Cake-Geek.com from The Farmer's Daughter Bakes, Kelsey Siemens
    Caramel Drip Apple Walnut Spice Layer Cake

    Caramel Drip Apple Walnut Spice Layer Cake - it's a mouthful but what a delicious mouthful indeed! And it's just…

  • Vegan Oreo Cake on Cake-Geek.com from Va Va Voom Vegan Cakes
    Vegan Oreo Cake from Va Va Voom Vegan Cakes!

    This delectable vegan Oreo cake is one you can have a debate with your vegan friends over! Although the ingredients…

  • Chocolate Salted Caramel Dream Cake recipe from the Cutter & Squidge Bakery on Cake-Geek.com
    Chocolate Salted Caramel Dream Cake

    Our fabulous recipe this week is the exquisite Chocolate Salted Caramel Dream Cake from the famed Cutter & Squidge Bakery…

  • Drippy wedding cakes by The Cocoa Cakery left, Cake Ink right
    Drip Wedding Cakes

    Drippy, drizzle cakes are the rockstar cake of the moment for birthdays and special occasions and their influence is crossing…


Filed Under: Cake Designs for All Occasions Tagged: cake decorating tutorials

Disclosure:

Posts on this site may contain affiliate links, which means we may earn a small commission, at no cost to you, if you make a purchase through one of these links.

Theme Design By Studio Mommy · Copyright © 2023

Copyright © 2023 · Beyond Madison Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in