Flag Cake

I'm planning to make a flag cake for 4th July and wanted to know what sort of icing/topping would be best to use.  A lot of recipes use ingredients that I'm not sure I can get here easily - anyone got a reasonably authentic topping recipe?  (PS I'm a Brit so I'm not sure what is appropriate anyway!)

When you say Flag Cake, do you mean a cake with sliced berries on top to make the flag design?

If that's what you're going for, I've usually seen them topped with a soft/sticky topping, such as Cool Whip (which I think is fairly comparable to Dream Whip?  Maybe someone else can jump in there?)

If you can't get something like that, then I think a good alternative would be boiled/7-minute frosting: http://allrecipes.com//Recipe/fluffy-boiled-icing/Detail.aspx   It's got a texture kind of like soft meringue, so once it's set up it should hold the berries in place quite well.

When I make a flag cake, I cover it in a buttercream or cream cheese frosting.  This is just icing sugar, butter or equal parts butter and cream cheese and a dash of vanilla.  I make a sheet cake and slather it generously in the frosting.  Then, depending on what looks best at the market, I make the red stripes out of raspberries or strawberries and the blue part is made out of putting blueberries fairly close together, but allowing enough white to show through to simulate the "stars."

But really, there are no hard and fast rules for a flag cake.  Some people take the frosting and colour it, and then pipe it on the cake for the stars and stripes.  Just have fun with it!

I also use Cool Whip. Like woadgrrl said, Dream Whip is the closest approximation. Some people have reported better results by adding a bit of powdered sugar and a dash of vanilla to it.

If you're making the flag cake made popular in the US - the berry, pound cake, and whipped topping layered one - this recipe is hands-down the best for pound cake: http://www.joyofbaking.com/PoundCake.html. Use evaporated milk for the best results.

Thanks everyone.  The pound cake recipe looks good so I think I'll try that.  As for the topping I'll either go with buttercream (which I use a lot) or dream whip.

Mmmmm, Flag Cake!  I want one!