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Mother's Day Hat
by Diane Shavkin

The Hat in Cake

1. Bake a one-layer, 10" cake.
2. Bake the number of 6" cakes to give the desired height of the center of the hat.
3. Level the 10" single layer and crumb coat. Let set to dry.
4. Put the desired filling inbetween each of the 6" layers. Let set. Place in freezer to chill. Remove and carve into shape. Crumb coat and let dry to form a crust.
4. Frost the 10" layer cake in yellow buttercream or cover with rolled fondant.
5. Frost the 6" layers with yellow buttercream or cover with rolled fondant.
6. Pipe a beaded or shell border in the area where the two cakes touch (the 6" stacked and the 10" single layer). Note: A piece of fondant or gumpaste can be rolled out and cut to form the ribbn-band. Place on cake.
7. Add the flowers, stems with leaves and the single leaves.

The Hat in Gumpaste

1. Find something in the house that looks like the shape of a center of a hat or purchase a plastic ball mold. Roll out a piece of yellow gumpaste and place over the top and sides of the mold. Smooth with hands to fit the shape of the mold. Cut and trim the bottom section. Let dry thoroughly.
2. Roll out a piece of yellow gumpaste. Shape by placing pieces of cotton underneath the gumpaste.
3. Rmove the dried-curved, piece of yellow gumpaste from the mold and place this on top of the bottom section of the gumpaste hat. Glue into place with royal icing.
4. Make a band of yellow gumpaste or a contrasting color and glue with water to the section where the top part of the hat meets the bottom part of the hat.
5. Make the flowers, stems with leaves and the single leaves with royal icing or gumpaste.
6. Add the flowers to the hat with a dab of water or a dab of royal icing. Let dry thoroughly before using.

	Stems with Leaves Use a cloth-coated wire and pipe the leaves with green royal icing onto the stem starting at the top of the wire and working down toward the bottom portion of the wire. Gumpaste: Cover the wire with gumpaste. Make two thin leaves for each leaf that is to be attached to the wire stem. Glue the two leaves together leaving the bottom section unglued. Attached this section to the wire stem. Pinch to secure. Overlap the leaves and you work downward toward the bottom portion of the wire.
	Daisy & Toothpick Leaves Put a yellow dot of royal icing or buttercream icing in the center of a square piece of waxed paper that has been secured to a decorating nail with a dab of frosting. Add each daisy petal at a time using a petal flower tip such as a #103. When all the petals are added, put another yellow dot in the center for the stamen. (The first yellow dot is to secure the center of the flower for precision when adding the flower petals.) If buttercream, place each waxed paper square that has the completed daisy on a curve flower former or similar item using both the inside of the curve as well as the outside. (A cardboard cylinder from a roll of wrapping paper can be cut in half lengthwise to use as flower-curved formers). Then, place the formers in the freezer to freeze the flowers. Remove the flowers from the freezer and the former and place onto hat cake. If royal icing is used, just put the waxed paper squares that contain each flower on the inside and the inside of the curved former. Let dry thoroughly be fore removing from the waxed paper and putting into position on the cake hat or gum paste hat. Use a dab or sufficient amount of frosting underneath each flower to secure and give appropriate height to the floral arrangement. Pipe leaves onto tooth picks. Let dry if royal or freeze if buttercream and stick into the cake or dabs of frosting to make the flower arrangement.
	The Floral Arrangement Cake Hat: After the border is piped onto the hat, make the floral arrangement. Place the stems first to give "line" to the arrangement. Next, place the focal flowers which are the daisies in this case. Then, add any secondary flowers (not shown in sketch). Finally add the fillers which are, in this case, the leaves on toothpicks. Additional filler-leaves can be added to complete the arrangement. Gum Paste Hat: Roll out a piece of contrasting gum paste to make the ribbon band. Add the gum paste, flower arrangement using royal icing.

This page has been created by Diane Shavkin of NY
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