-Buttercream Palette Knife Flower Technique for Cakes! _ Georgia's Cakes

Hi guys, welcome back to my channel. So today's tutorial is all about palette knife flowers. It's a new and upcoming trend in the cake design world and for those who follow me on Instagram you may have already seen that I tried it out already so I'm ready to give you the tutorial. This technique is really fun, you can completely make it your own and because it's so abstract it doesn't have to be totally precise either. You just need to know what to do of course and you have to have the right tools which are palette knives. So I've got a few different palette knives, some plastic, some wooden and metal. It doesn't matter which ones you use. So these are actually artist palette knives so you can get them in art shops. I'll put a link in my Amazon shop for you guys and we're essentially going to be painting with buttercream but to start off I want to coat my ready crumb coated six inch cake with a generous layer of buttercream and get that super cold before I add the flowers. So I've got a piping bag of my Swiss meringue buttercream here, so usually I go on the second layer with a palette knife but I'm going to show you a different technique and going on with the second layer with a piping bag. It is easier to maintain the same thickness throughout the cake and then you have to do less spreading and redistributing the buttercream when it comes to smoothing so I thought to show you this technique today. So what I'm going to do is start right at the bottom and pipe quite a thick layer all the way around the cake and then do the exact same thing on top of it and I'm basically going to do the same thing all the way up the cake. Now if you've seen my other videos you may have seen me do stripes with two different colours or a rainbow. It's the same technique but this time I'm just using the white. Now I also find when you're using white buttercream it is more transparent than coloured buttercream so it's actually better to pipe on a thick layer of white because you're less likely to start seeing the cake through. I'm going to continue all the way up the cake and keep the pressure the same when I pipe to maintain that even layer of buttercream going around the outside. So you do use a little bit more buttercream this way so you may want to make more than you usually would and I'm going to go around the top to make sure I can pack in those corners and into the centre. The centre doesn't need such a thick amount, just enough to cover it and then like I usually would I'm going to smooth out the top using the turntable and my palette knife to achieve a nice flat top and then scrape any excess in a bowl and I want to be saving as much excess as possible because this will just add to the decoration after this layer is chilled. I'm going to be leaving the corners rough on this cake so I want to make sure the top of this cake is super flat because I'm not going to go back over it afterwards. So now I'm going to start scraping round and smoothing out the outside. So I've actually changed the name of this, it is no longer a scraper, it is a smoother because you don't actually want to take off too much especially because I know that this layer of buttercream is even, I just want to smooth it out so remember that when you're going round the cake and you'll apply less pressure, trust me. So holding the scraper at a 45 degree angle to the cake and only slightly pressing against the cake and I'm going to go round and round and round until the buttercream smooths out and usually when you go around with a piping bag this happens a lot quicker than if you would have gone around with a palette knife. I've only gone around a couple of times, I've taken off a little bit of excess and you can already see that the overall covering is pretty much done, I just need to go over a few more times to get rid of those air bubbles. So I do get a lot of questions about air bubbles, the air bubbles go when you glide the scraper over very very lightly. You may need to do it 10 even 20 times until you're happy with the finish. There that looks good and of course if there is a pesky air bubble that's not going away you've got the decoration to cover it. So I'm happy with that, like I said I'm going to leave the corners rough like this, I think it complements the palette knife effect that I'm going to do afterwards so I'm going to put this in the fridge to firm up while I prepare the colours of buttercream. So I've chosen to go with a pink and purpley theme so I've got a bowl of purple buttercream, pink buttercream, a more peachy buttercream, so this is just a little bit of the pink and a little bit of yellow mixed in with each other. I've also got a small amount of yellow for the inside of the flowers and what I've done here is I've actually created two shades of green and having two shades of colour really adds depth and gives a more realistic finish to the flowers. So I would recommend if this is your first time to practice before you go on to the I did and the best way of doing this is actually with a non-stick mat. So the mat also acts like a palette for all your colours as if you were painting a picture. So what I'll do is place the mat down, put some of the colours on top and as well as showing you how to use the palette knife I'm also going to start mixing the colours and create really nice blends. So because the yellow and green of the inside of the flowers and the leaves I'm going to leave that to the side and concentrate on the pinks and then show you how to create the petals. So what I found really effective is to just spread out the different shades of pinks or whatever colour you're using onto the mat and keep them quite close to one another and then I can take my selection of palette knife. So I am going to use a metal one but it does work just as well with the plastic, I may even use them when it comes to decorating the cake. So firstly I'm going to flatten these colours out so I get kind of strips of colour and it doesn't matter if the colours mix, like I said if anything it adds depth. So you can already kind of see that it really is just like painting a picture. Now when it comes to palette knife flowers it's all about how you take the buttercream up onto the palette knife. So for example you can't just pick some up and then put it on, well you kind of can but it's not really the look we're going for. What you want to do is actually kind of do this side to side action and build the buttercream on the sides of the palette knife. For example take a little bit of buttercream like this and shape it on the bottom of the palette knife so there's a nice build up in a kind of triangle shape and then when you go on to painting it on you press it down and off and you get more of a precise stroke. Now the great thing about this mat is that you can just clean things off and practice as many times as possible. So what I would recommend is playing around with the different pressures and of course the different shape palette knives. So if I don't squeeze as much I get a nicer leaf effect. I can introduce another colour too like so. So side to side picking the buttercream up on the underneath and then you just change the angle of how you're spreading it on. Now I always find when I create flowers whether I'm piping them or using a palette knife is that there's no real rule because flowers can kind of look like anything. So you can be as creative as you want and what's really nice is that you get this 3D effect and that comes from picking it up correctly. Let's try something else. So now I want to go with a different effect. So just to show you once again when you do it side to side it's more of a precise petal shape. So the more texture the better. Now to try something different is rather than going side to side I'm actually going to build the buttercream up on just one side of the palette knife. So here I'm going to introduce other colours too. So a bit of pink, a bit of the peach. So you've got a nice build up of texture on your palette knife and then you can start being creative in how you apply. So if you go with a little bit of a curved angle you get more of a fuller petal and if you do them side by side then you can create a different sort of flower. So once again just on one side and apply it with a curve and then apply the pressure and once again you get this really nice 3D effect and you can see what the different shading of buttercream does as well. So let's just clean this up and I want to show you a couple more using different shapes. This is why I love the mat so much because it cleans right off and you have room to practice as well as using it as a palette. So firstly I have a much smaller version of the first one that I was using so I can use this for smaller details. Let's try the side to side effect and get more precise shapes with it. So I'm pressing down in the centre and changing the angle of my hand each time and always concentrate on the top end of the palette knife so you get that nice petal effect. This small one also comes in handy when you want to do some leaves. So I've got two shades of the green here I'm just going to place them here and build it up how I did before side to side and then doing the same thing as I did before but because it's smaller and of course in green they look like leaves. And already that's a really cute pattern and that's just using one palette knife. So the last one I'm going to show you is actually this large palette knife that I've been cleaning the mat with. So firstly it's plastic so I'll show you that you can also use plastic palette knives and it's got a larger area so we're going to get some fatter petals but the idea is kind of the same. I prefer building up the layers of buttercream with this one only on one side and then apply it like so. You can see that the shape is different to the pointed palette knife. You get a much larger petal and for me it's easier to control the curve of the petal too. So once again the mat is excellent to practice on. To be honest I think the cake is a little bit easier because when you apply the buttercream to your cake it does chill so if you wanted to go on with another layer that first layer will already be set rather than blending into one another. But you can really have a lot of fun with this and build on multiple layers at a time. Add a little bit of yellow. So one last thing you can also use this mat for is to mix colours just like you would do on an artist's palette. So here I've taken some yellow and added some pink to get more of an orangey yellow which will look nice in the middle of flowers too, again to create that depth. And if you wanted to create a darker shade just to create even more contrast you can even add a little bit of food colouring and mix it on the mat instead of in the bowl. So some accents of darker colour will also work really well in the final design. I feel the more shades the better. So we've got some good practice and mixed some new colours I think I'm ready to start applying to the cake. So this cake had a good half an hour in the fridge and then I popped it in the freezer for five minutes to make it quite cold because I like when the buttercream sets to this layer of buttercream and so the coldness from the freezer just helps that. So now it's time to start applying the flowers to the cake and what I'm going to begin with is actually like a leafy background first and let that set and then go on with the flowers. The last time I did it I ended up adding the leaves afterwards and it still looks nice but I want a slightly fuller effect this time and it's easier like in a painting to work on the background first. So I'm going to be using my smaller palette knife for this and I've already got some of the green on the palette but I will add a little bit of yellow and I'm also going to mix some green with some of the peach to just bring another shade of green to the cake and it will be interesting doing this backwards and showing you on camera but I will kind of do a one-sided spread out design so I'm going to start as this as my front. So doing the same thing as I practice, picking up some colour, I'll go for two colours this time and start applying. And this design is most definitely abstract so you really can't think too much about it and you can probably use one palette knife for everything. For me it's nice to get a variation of sizes. So now I'm going to start changing the direction to get more of a cluster and for me as well the more texture the better so I really love building up the buttercream on the palette knife before I go on the cake. And of course I can add the green later on but I think this is a good base. Now what you can do is actually put this in the freezer and let this set however I actually like it when the buttercream does blend. So this green will have set substantially but maybe not rock hard. I am going to go straight on with the flowers and if I do get a bit of green on there then I'm okay with it. And of course if you do feel that the buttercream is getting too soft then by all means put it back in the freezer whenever you want. So I'm actually going to go quite bold and go straight on with this larger palette knife to create some really bold colours. This technique is the one that's built up on the side and then a couple more smaller ones next to it. And then I'm going to change for the original palette knife that I showed you maybe concentrate more of the purple. And what I'm going to do is add really small amounts and just add them to the outside so they can almost look like little buds of flowers within the green. And then I want to start building on the flowers that I've already done. So they either look nice with a dark centre like I've done here however I can feel that buttercream is getting soft on the cake and so I'm going to put this in the freezer, give it five minutes to firm up then I can go on with more details without affecting what I've already done. So the flowers that I applied are firm which means I can go on with another layer and then build up more texture. This time I'm going to focus on slightly lighter shades and smaller details. So I can even add another layer to an existing flower because of course flowers have multiple layers of petals. And of course the most important thing with this cake is to have fun with it. If you think about it too much it will most likely not turn out the way you wanted it. So now I want to start adding the yellow and the yellow is really to do with the finishing touches. It's of course the centre of the flowers but it lifts the design. So for example at the moment it's just kind of a subtle blend of colours and then you kind of need that contrast of the yellow to make it really pop. So only really small amounts, I'm again using the very small palette knife. I'm just going to apply some tiny areas with the yellow and now you start getting the illusion of the flowers a lot more. Sometimes even just one stroke is enough. And I'm going to go on with just a few more shades of green and yellow to fill in any areas that I want to add more of a leafy effect. Okay so it's times like these someone has to come and say stop because I can just continue with this but I've taken a step back and looked at it from afar and I'm really happy with how it looks. So I think that's a good time to stop. So what I've got here is some edible gold powder mixed with a tiny bit of vodka. You can also use lemon juice if you want to keep it alcohol free but it's only a little bit. And I'm going to go over where the yellow is just to enhance the yellow and give it another dimension of colour. And if you know me I love when I add gold to cakes. So I was going to add a gold border but I actually think it will be overkill. I'm really loving how the cake looks just like this so I think I'm going to leave it. Just one last touch of course some edible glitter. So there we go, palette knife flowers. So of course it is an abstract effect and I do recommend practicing a few times before you go on to the cake but really don't overthink it and just go for it. Have fun with it, use any selection of colours. I've obviously used pink but I think blues and greens would also look gorgeous or multi-coloured, go crazy. If you do try it out and if you did find this tutorial helpful then tag me at georgiascakes on Instagram because I want to see your creations especially of this design. In the meantime please check out all my other tutorials, all my recipes are on my channel from my sponge cake to my buttercream and we'll see you soon with more videos on the way.