Serve up a visual feast

Whenever a group of people get together to celebrate an important occasion, a cake is usually the focal point. Whether it is a birthday, wedding or a major festival such as Christmas or Lunar New Year, cakes provide a special moment for family and friends to share.

Cake decorating classes are a good way for people to develop skills that will enable them to create the right type of cake for every occasion.

The Wilton Method is known around the world. Based on techniques developed in the United States by its founder Dewey McKinley Wilton in 1929, it is based on the use of fondants (icing made with gelatin that has a pliable, dough-like consistency) and gum pastes (sweet edible sugar dough usually made from sugar and glucose that can be coloured to choice) to create sculptured designs on almost any theme imaginable.

'The Wilton Method courses focus on decorating skills and techniques,' says Jacinta Yu, the founder and creative director of Complete Deelite (www.completedeelite.com).

'Each course is taught in the same systematic way no matter where you take it. All of our workshops and classes are hands-on.

Complete Deelite offers a range of courses including the Wilton Method. Wilton Course 1 and all other courses are suitable for beginners.

Wilton Course 1 focuses on how to bake a good cake, making and colouring icing, as well as how to cover a cake with a smooth layer of icing.

Three fundamental ideas for decorating are taught and participants will learn how to create icing drop flowers, rosettes, shells, pompom flowers, leaves, shaggy mums and the ribbon rose while decorating cakes, cupcakes and cookies.

The course consists of four two-hour classes and costs HK$1,550, including a starter kit and certificate.

Other courses and workshops offered by Complete Deelite include We Luv Cupcakes, We Luv Brownies and the popular We Luv Cake Pops. All workshops include the Wilton Method style of decorating.

The We Luv Brownies and We Luv Cupcakes workshops each involve a five-hour class that costs HK$850, including a decorating kit. 'To be good at cake decorating, people need to be patient and passionate,' says Yu. 'They need to have an open mind about seeing cake decorating as an art form and have a desire to always improve and learn more.'

COUP Kitchen (www.coup.com.hk) offers single recipe courses that teach the techniques required for making European-style pastries, tortes and cakes, creams and special pieces of chocolate. They also introduce participants to artistic sugar work.

All courses are taught by Alfred Cheung, formerly head chef at the Excelsior Hotel in Causeway Bay. Tuition costs range from HK$300 to HK$400 (non-members pay an additional HK$30) and all classes run for two hours and 30 minutes.