Cake! magazine by Australian Cake Decorating Network May 2015 | Page 65

One of the first commercial jobs I was
asked to include a banner with ‘happy
birthday’. I tried for a few hours to
pipe the letters and it just wasn’t
working, so I decided to try painting
it on. It worked brilliantly and the
very next day I made some cookies
covered them and started painting
flowers. I haven’t looked back since!
As my littlest child was still at home
I took it very slowly, only becoming
a full time cake decorator once she
started school.
Tell us a little bit about your new book
“The Painted Cake”. Why did you
decide to write it and what will people
get out of it?

Written by Marianna Saran
As the owner of Nevie-Pie Cakes in
the UK, Natasha Collins has a niche
market in the caking industry, as her
business is based on specialising in
hand-painted cakes.
Art and baking runs in Natasha
Collins’ family, so it’s without surprise
that her hand-painted cakes are just
gorgeous to look at.
Tell us a little bit about yourself and
how it came about that you’re in the
cake decorating industry.
I’ve always enjoyed baking, I can
remember making my first cake when
I was around 7 years old. It was a
sponge cake made in a loaf tin. The
top was very cracked and I poured
green water icing over it. It looked
terrible and probably didn’t taste
that great either (although I can’t
remember that bit!) I just kept at it
though and practiced every week. I
have a picture of myself at about 12
with a cake I made for my brother. It
was decorated with a marzipan figure
fishing in a pond.
I started baking and cake decorating
as a business after I had my two
children. I trained as an illustrator
and then worked as a textile designer
for nearly 10 years. I needed to do
something creative though after
having my girls and I tried various
different crafty enterprises. I started
making cakes for their birthday parties
and after a few years decided that
they would be good enough to sell.

After training as an illustrator I always
had an ambition to write a book,
although I thought that it would be
a children’s book rather that one for
cake decorating.

Most of the projects have templates,
so if you are nervous about painting
free-hand you can trace the design
first.
My biggest hope is that readers of
‘The Painted Cake’ is that they will be
inspired to try something new and that
they have lots of fun while doing it.
What has been your favourite painted
cake that you have created to date?
Probably my favourite cake has been
my Owl and The Pussy Cat cake. It
brought together all my careers so far,
illustration, textile design and cake
decorating. I really enjoyed creating
the story around the cake and coming
up with the cute figures.

As my career as a cake painter and
teacher progressed I started to get
a lot of emails from people all over
the world asking me if I had a book
they could buy. So I wrote a proposal
(that alone took me six months!) and
I was very fortunate that Murdoch
Books liked it enough to commission
the book. Writing ‘The Painted Cake’
was a great experience, one that I
hope I get the chance to do again. I
was also really pleased that I had the
opportunity to create illustrations that
were used in the book too.
The book is great for beginners up
to more advanced painters. It goes
through all the techniques you will
need, how to apply the paint, how to
rectify mistakes, how to create tones
and detailed instructions on how to
paint flowers.

What should people consider before
attempting a painted cake?
You need to think about the equipment
they are using. Some food colours
aren’t suitable for painting with, they
dry with a plastic finish which makes
it impossible to layer with tones. Also
some fondants are easier to paint
onto, one with a high fat content will
tend to repel the paint giving it a
strange texture.
If you are very nervous about painting
then roll out a sheet of fondant and
practise on that first before you
attempt to paint a cake.