How to Decorate an Ice Cream Cake

Ice cream cakes provide endless opportunities for decorating. Since you're working with ice cream, you'll need to stick the cake back in the freezer if it's starting to melt, which will make the decorating process take a little longer. By using a frosting that works with a frozen cake, such as whipped cream, and choosing fun toppings to complete your decorating theme, you can create an ice cream cake that tastes as yummy as it looks.

EditSteps

EditIcing the Cake

Freeze the cake for at least 3 hours before icing it. You want your ice cream cake to stay together while you're icing and decorating it, which is why keeping it as frozen as possible is important.^[1]
Pick out a frosting that complements a frozen cake. Most normal buttercream frostings will crack or break once they’re frozen. A whipped cream topping is the best choice — it will stay nice and smooth after being used.^[2]
- You can also use a chocolate fudge frosting, or opt for an ice cream flavor to use as the icing. If you use an ice cream flavor, let it soften for a few minutes to make spreading it easier.
- Buying whipped cream pre-made (including commercial whipped toppings) is perfectly fine, or you can whip up your own.
Mix food coloring with the frosting for a color other than white. If you don't want the base layer of your frosting to be white, add a few drops of your chosen color into the frosting. Mix the food coloring and the frosting together using a spoon until it's blended evenly and you're satisfied with the color.
- Start by only adding 3-4 drops of food coloring until you've mixed it into the frosting — you can always make the color darker.
- If you've made your own homemade whipped cream, add the food coloring in last.
Spread icing over the cake starting on the sides. Use a knife, spoon, or other utensil to apply frosting to the cake's sides first, creating an even layer.^[3]
Ice the top of the cake last. Once the sides are covered in icing, start layering the top of the cake. Try to get the frosting in an even layer on top to make decorating go much smoother.^[4]
- If you're worried the cake is beginning to melt during the icing process, stick it back in the freezer for 20-30 minutes before continuing.
- The cake may start to melt after 10-20 minutes of being left out.
Use an offset spatula to get rid of any lines and perfect the icing. Use the spatula to smooth out the sides and top of the cake, removing any lines left over from the initial icing process. This should give the cake a smooth, professional look.^[5]
- Hold the offset spatula at a slight angle to use the edge of the spatula for smoothing.
Place the cake back in the freezer for 20 minutes. Once the cake has a base layer of icing covering it, you’ll want to let it set. Once the 20 minutes are up, you’re ready to continue decorating.^[6]

EditAdding Decorations

Choose a decoration theme for the ice cream cake. The theme could revolve around a specific sport, movie, book, holiday, or color scheme, for example. Gather some inspiration and come up with a plan for how you'd like to decorate the cake.
- A simple birthday cake might be covered in balloons made of frosting and sprinkles.
- You could create a football-themed cake and turn the top of the cake into a football field using frosting.
- You could buy candy flowers to place on the cake for a floral theme.
- Try looking through food and dessert magazines, looking at Instagram pictures, or doing an online search to help decide on a theme or idea.
Dye the whipped cream frosting different colors, if desired. Separate whipped cream into different cups — 1 for each color that you’d like to create. Use a few drops of food coloring and mix it into the whipped cream using a spoon until you have the desired color.
- For a 4th of July ice cream cake, separate the frosting into 3 sections, dyeing 1 section red, dyeing 1 section blue, and keeping the last section white.
- Create a back-to-school cake using yellow frosting for the school bus or red frosting to draw an apple on the cake.
- Make sure you dye enough whipped cream to fill at least half of the piping bag.
- If you used a fudge frosting or flavor of ice cream, adding color to your frosting may not be possible.
Fill a piping bag with whipped cream to begin decorating. Scoop your whipped cream frosting into a piping bag, making sure to insert the shaped tip into the bottom of the bag first, if desired. Fill the bag at least half full so that you have plenty to decorate with.^[7]
- You’ll need different bags for each different color of frosting you’ll be using.
- If you don’t have piping bags or tips, you can fill a Ziploc bag with the whipped cream, cutting off the tip of 1 of the bottom edges of the bag.
- How much you cut off of the tip will depend on how big you want your piping. Start off by snipping off the very tip, or about .
Squeeze the piping bag slowly to start decorating the cake. Aim the tip of the piping bag onto the cake, creating wording, shapes, or borders by lightly squeezing the bag. Make sure you're doing the decorating in a relatively cool space to prevent the cake from melting too quickly.^[8]
- If you're creating a border with icing, start at the edge of the cake and slowly work your way around the corners.
- Add lettering to your cake before creating other elements such as flowers or pictures to make sure you space the wording evenly, if desired.
- Go slowly when squeezing out the frosting to prevent any mistakes.
Put the cake back in the freezer if it’s starting to melt. It’s unlikely that you’re going to be able to decorate the entire cake in 1 sitting. If you’re decorating and the cake is starting to melt a bit, put it back in the freezer for roughly 20 minutes to that it will solidify again.^[9]
- The cake may start to melt after 10-20 minutes — it will depend on the texture and stability of the ice cream cake.
Use other candies and treats to decorate the cake, if desired. Feel free to get creative with your toppings. Add sprinkles, chocolates, cherries, slices of fruit, or even little props to the cake.
- For example, if you’re creating an ice cream cake that looks like a castle, you could add ice cream cones to the cake that look like turrets.^[10]
- An under-the-sea ice cream cake could be covered in Swedish fish and other gummies with the whipped cream frosting dyed blue.
Freeze the ice cream cake until it’s time to eat it. Roughly 5-10 minutes before it’s time to eat, you can take the cake out of the freezer to soften it up. You can keep the cake in the freezer for up to 1 month.^[11]
- Using a knife that's been dipped in hot water will make the slicing process go much smoother.
- Cover the ice cream cake in wax paper when storing it in the freezer, if possible.