Bakers taught new decoration techniques

The College recently hosted a masterclass in wedding cake decoration for professionals from the baking industry.

The event was organised as part of our partnership with Barry Callebaut - the world's leading manufacturer of high-quality cocoa and chocolate products.

The eight bakers spent two days at the College, where they watched the experts from Barry Callebaut demonstrating various decoration techniques using chocolate, before putting what they had learned into practice on their own cakes.

Among those taking part was Julie Askew, editor of Cake Craft and Decoration Monthly magazine, who was taking the opportunity to learn some new techniques.

She said: "A lot of readers regularly contact us asking about chocolate decoration techniques, and this will help me to answer them."

Angela Sharp, from the Lasting Impressions store in Sutton Coldfield, said: "It's been great - we haven’t used this type of chocolate decoration on our cakes before, but it’s certainly something we’ll try in the future."

The partnership was agreed in February this year, between the College's school of bakery and Beverley Dunkley, head of the UK Academy at Barry Callebaut.

Beverley will return to the College in October, to launch a cake decoration competition for our NVQ Bakery students.