Sugar Shapers are tools designed for sculpting, shaping, blending, texturing and modelling with sugarpaste, marzipan and modelling chocolate. There is a Firm Tip set and a Soft Tip set, each containing six double-ended tools. Here’s our review of the product…
We tried out the tools with a bit modelling, inspired by the Jungle Party tutorial from the January 2015 issue of Cake Masters Magazine, and were really impressed. Sugar Shapers give you a lot of control when using them to shape or add detail; it is easy to accurately achieve the effect you are aiming for – especially if you have both sets.
The six tools each have a smaller and larger version of the same chisel at either end, and the chisels are colour coded so the Soft Tip tools match the Firm Tip tools. Red is the Trip-Tip Chisel, orange for the Bone Chisel, green for the Round Tip, yellow is Square Tip, indigo the Lip Chisel and light blue for the Pointed Chisel.
The textured side design on the tools is not just useful for the colour code, it also adds brilliant grip. Made of a flexible but durable, food grade TPE, the Sugar Shapers sit comfortably in your hand as you work with them and allow you to be efficient with your sculpting. When creating this little model of a lion’s head, we used several of the tools, some soft, some firm. We found it almost instinctive to know which to use when, but when unsure of the most suitable for a specific task, practising on a spare bit of fondant soon gave us the answer.
A particular favourite tool of ours is the Lip Chisel. The curved shape with a flat hook at the end was perfect for creating the lion’s mouth, making an intricate job very simple. We loved how working with the tools gives you a really light touch, but could also create deep, sharp impressions in the sugarpaste.
The chisels feel like tools that the more you use, the more you will discover that they are useful for. It would be great to try them out for making sugar flowers, or sculpting on large novelty cakes!
Sugar Shapers are a great addition to a cake decorator’s toolkit as they are a pleasure to work with. Once you’ve got some, you’ll wonder how you ever did without them!