Using a simple piping technique it’s remarkable how easy it is to achieve an impressionist masterpiece! Claude Monet’s famous waterlily painting series was our inspiration, and buttercream our medium. Even without much detail, it is still perfectly clear that the subject is delicate pink water lilies on a tranquil pond.
1. When piping the basic ‘impressionist dots’ with the grass nozzle 233, hold the piping bag straight on to the surface of the cake at a 90-degree angle before squeezing the piping bag.
2. Squeeze the piping bag gently until the buttercream builds up slightly, then stop squeezing the bag before pulling away.
If you accidentally squeeze the piping bag too much and the small dots became too fat and look like they are merging, just scrape them off with a palette knife or scraper, then pipe again.
3. Stack the cakes, carve the curved top edge (see Wedgewood Blue cake, steps 1–4), then crumb coat (see Buttercream Basics). Use any of the shades of blue buttercream in a piping bag with a small hole at the tip and mark the position for all the different blues.
4. Pipe all the shades of blue buttercream using the grass nozzle 233. When piping the details, make sure they are in clusters and not dotted about, so the colours will not get blended together.
5. Continue to pipe guide lines to mark out areas for the shades of green.
6. Repeat the process as for the blues, and add all the different shades of green except for the darkest shade.
7. Using a piping bag with a small hole at the tip, add some dark green accents by piping wavy rows of dots that are close to each other.
8. Repeat the same process using plain buttercream, light and dark pink, and dark purple to give the impression of some water lilies.
9. Add a few white dots randomly, again using a piping bag with a small hole at the tip, in order to create highlights.
10. Pipe some lily pads on top of the cake using petal nozzle 125. Hold the piping bag at a flattish angle with the surface of the cake, with the wide end at the centre. Continuously squeeze the piping bag as you turn your bag clockwise.
11. Pipe the lilies in the centre of the lily pads using light pink buttercream as if you were piping a sunflower (see Piping Flowers), making sure that the petals start with a steep angle of 30 to 40 degrees, increasing the angle as you pipe towards the centre of the flower.
12. Add centre spikes using yellow buttercream and a piping bag with a small hole at the tip. Pipe more pads and lilies at the base of the cake.
