How to Cover a Sponge Cake with Fondant...

Basic as this may be, once you can grasp this technique succesfully - your cakes will look really professional and have a brilliant finish.

To cover an 8" cake, you'll need:

• Two Cake Sponges (you're choice of flavour - I've used a basic Madeira)
• 200g of very,very soft Unsalted Butter
• 400g of Icing Sugar and extra for dusting
• Vanilla Bean Paste
• 1 kg of Icing Fondant
• Optional filling of your choice - I've used Strawberry Jam

Begin by making up a batch of buttercream, this is really simple - just cream together the butter, adding a spoonful of icing sugar at a time and a dash of Vanilla Bean Paste, then pop this to the side. 

Then inspect your sponges, if one has risen in the centre, it'll make the cake unbalanced, so using a serrated knife - level the cake. You want to keep both sponges bottom side down, as these will be the flattest sides - it'll make sense in a minute!

Smother one of the sponges in the jam, but don't go right up to the edges, remember when you put the sponges together, the jam will be pushed out. 

Then using about a third of the butter icing, cover the other sponge. 

Carefully position one sponge onto the other, look directly over the top, to make sure they are aligned.

With the second third of your butter icing, you need to form a 'crumbcoat' this will lock in any crumbs on the edge of the cake -ensuring you don't end up with scattered crumbs on the fondant. 

This crumbcoat, should be scarce but effective, using a palate knife, carefully cover the edges of the cake and spread the buttercream down the edges of the cake.

Then pop the cake in the fridge for about an hour - this will harden the buttercream edges!

Once your crumbcoat is slightly harder, use the remainding butter cream to create a final buttercream coat - this will be your cake glue!

On a surface lightly dusted with icing sugar, knead the fondant for a couple of minutes and when soft, use a rolling pin to roll out. When the fondant is about an inch thick, and is long enough to cover the edges of your cake tins, fold it over the rolling pin and drape over the cake. (See How to Ice a Marzipanned Cake for photos if you're stuck! )

Using your hands smooth the fondant down the sides of your cake.

Trim the excess away from the cake and use a fondant smoother to create a shine on the fondant and smooth down any air bubbles.

Make a final trim close to the edges of the cake and smooth over once more.

And there you have it - an Iced Sponge Cake!

It's best to leave the cake for about a day before decorating, just to make sure the fondant has firmed up, after that - happy decorating!

Troubleshooting..

• If you're fondant keeps splitting, you're probably rolling out the fondant too thinly, start again and roll out carefully.
• Any small cracks in the fondant can be solved by smoothing it over with your thumb.
• If the fondant keeps sticking to your surface, you need a little more icing sugar!