Adventures in Piping

I got a set of decorating tips and a piping bag for Christmas and thought it was finally time to give it a try. I have envisioned making gorgeous layered cakes with beautiful designs on them for a long time, but have always been thwarted by apprehension. Then I was inspired by an episode of Barefoot Contessa where Ina was celebrating her anniversary with her husband and just "whipped up" a three tiered cake with a simple, but elegant piping job on it. "I can do that!" I thought. Yes, I know, she is a professional and used to make all occasion cakes at her shop, but she made it look so easy, I was inspired.
I had an occasion to make a cake this weekend and I decided to go for it. The cake is a carrot cake recipe I got out of a "healthy" cookbook and it involves whipping egg whites until they are at "soft peak" stage and then folding in the ingredients one by one so as not to completely deflate the foam. It is a very "springy" cake in texture, pretty dense, and very flavorful. I love it and carrot cake is Erik's favorite. For the frosting, I have a relative who does not like confectioner's sugar, so I wanted to make the frosting without using it. I tried to find recipes on the internet without confectioner's sugar. Yikes. My new plan was to try Superfine sugar. I was worried even Superfine would be a bit grainy in the final product so I added just enough hot water to it to melt it before adding it to the cream cheese and butter I was beating up in the Kitchen Aid. This worked like a charm with the grainy issue, but sadly, left my frosting too soft. I tried switching out my paddle attachment for my whip attachment and that added some body to it. Then I put it in the fridge for a while to see what that would do, and that helped but not enough to hold the shape of the star tip piping. It could have maybe been chilled longer, but I think next time I will try the Superfine without mixing with water and see what that does.
Despite the "goopiness" of this frosting, I was not deterred from trying to decorate my cake. I think for a first attempt it's not too terrible. I need to work on the evenness of my strokes, and with this soft frosting I went too close to the edge on the top a couple times and it nearly fell right off.
Definitely a fun thing to try and I think there will be more elaborately decorated cakes in my future. Watch out, Ace of Cakes, I may be looking for a job soon ;)