My First Paid Wedding Cake...

[SweetSide]

I've just been asked to do my first paid wedding cake, for a friend, and it's for about 125 people. Don't have any other details yet other than simple and traditional, but I want to get a jump on gathering some information.

Now, I did a 3-tier wedding cake in school, but it was for myself, and if it wasn't perfect, no one but me cared. However, for school, I used the schools silver cake stand which was the size of my bottom tier. Cardboard rounds between the layers, each layer stacked upon the one beneath (on wooden dowels).

What I've learned since then is cardboard is flimsy and wooden dowels are not so great. Learned other things as well from all the helpful people in other threads.

My first questions are:

What are some alternatives for stands? I don't want to invest a ton of money in one because I don't see wedding cakes as a big future for me.

I've seen cakes on what looked like what in art class I called foam core board. Stuff that is about 3/8" thick. I'm thinking this would be something better to use to have an edge around each tier. Are these boards decorated? I've seen ribbons around the edge, but what about the surface? Or are plate systems better?

What are some good sites to check out for plastic dowels and boards or plates? My local craft stores which sell Wilton supplies don't ever seem to carry the plastic dowels or plate systems. I'm in a supply challenged area.

Also, as this will be for the middle of May, it will be getting warmer... I usually use SMBC or IMBC as icing on my cakes. But, I'm afraid if the cake will be in an area that is not air conditioned (this is a backyard event), I'm going to have a dripping mess. I also despise shortening, this will help the icing take the heat. If I normally use 1 part egg whites, 2 parts sugar, and 3 parts butter in an IMBC, can I sub out butter and use some shortening? If so, what ratio would I have to sub out? May be a non issue if they want fondant. Can fondant take the heat?

Any random advice anyone may have? Like, for heaven's sake, don't ______!

Thanks to everyone in advance!

[CanadianBakin']

I only have a suggestion for the plastic dowels. I'm not a professional and have only made one tiered cake so consider the source. On a cake I recently made with a friend we had planned to use wooden dowels as that's what the recipe called for. My friend's husband only had 1/2" dowel which was way too big so he cut up a plastic hanger for us. It was easy to cut and worked great!

[MightyD]

i've always used plastic straws - the giant ones they use for asian bubble tea. i've made a 4-tiered wedding cake for 240 people and it held up perfectly. much easier to cut as well.

[Dailey]

i used SMBC for my cakes and always sub half of the butter for trans-fat free shortening. works very well and people always rave over the "whipped cream" icing. also, fondant would work well since it hold up to the heat.

[MariaA]

http://www.culinar.ro/forum/index.php?showtopic=5101&st=1000

We do a lot of wedding cakes,actually we(my husband and I) start the bussines thinking of doing just wedding cakes,but turned to be differit.

I gave you a page where I posted my way of building the cake(starting with post#1010,actually,our cake is from #1017),the site is in romanian language,if you have a question,please ask me.I am not able to attach pictures on this site that's why I give you this site.

And I think is better to invest in at least 2 plastic boards then to go with cardboards.

Edited April 3, 2006 by MariaA (log)

[K8memphis]

Wow, MariaA, I like your cake, it's gorgeous!

Cheryl,

Wooden dowel can impart a musty flavor to the cake surrounding it. Some people compensate by wrapping them up in something. Some people dip them in wax. Some people use plastic.

I use graduated plastic. The bigger Wilton plastic dowel for bottom tiers, the Asian drink straws for middle tiers and drinking straws for baby tiers. Sometimes I put shishkabob skewers into drinking straws--nobody was ever sad that they had too many or too strong of supports. The shishkabob skewers also slide into the corrugated cardboards too. So two cardboards work fine if you make the corrugation cross y'know & not run the same way. But again, I use stronger stuff for the bigger tiers -- sometimes three cardboards, sometimes foamcore, whatever like that.

I like my bottom boards to be at least four inches larger than the bottom tier. If your bottom tier is 16" the board should be at least 20". This will only give you a 2" lip all the way around--so decide how much room you want there. For most cakes you want a graduated look where the bottom of the cake, the board, is the widest and then the cake narrows and narrows on the way up.

Some people use like 12x10x8 inch cakes. There's a time & a place for cakes like this, but generally speaking, you want to go with a 3 to 4 inch graduation between tiers, 14x10x6 or 12x9x6 stuff like that. It's more pleasing to the eye. When you center a 10 inch cake onto a 12 inch cake there's only a one inch ledge around the top there--not a lot of room. Some people really like that. Most people use 3-4 inches in between tiers unless something special is going on. Like Martha's tower of roses cakes, if the cakes are not centered on top of each other stuff like that.

Colette uses foamcore without covering it. That's how I use it too. Usually you can conceal it with icing or a border--but it all depends on what kind of setup you are using--covering the edge with ribbon is certainly an option.

I have no patience with people who want to set their cakes up outside. Icing melts in the sun/heat even though they are getting married. Who knew? So I distance myself from that by saying I guarantee the cake to be delivered to the already decorated cake table at such & such a time and that it will be servable and not melted at that point and that's as far as my responsibility goes. If they wanna pay hundreds of dollars to melt their cake that's plastered with fly & bird drops as well as insects so be it. And I say it perhaps a bit more gently but not too much.

But some decorators make these real cool covers for their cakes & stuff to be set outdoors, but again, I'm not one of 'em. Memphis is hot and I ain't playing games & stressing with the weather when I'm trying to deliver a cake. Fondant would work for outdoors better than icing.

"For Heaven's sake don't________"

Wait till the last minute to do whatever you can do in advance. Like the delivery vehicle--what kinda car you got? What kinda box you gonna put it in? You can do that now. As soon as you determine the sizes for sure y'know. What will you level your car seats with? You can make all your cake boards now. You can make a lot of the decor now or within two weeks.

And I recommend that you allow yourself twice as much time as you think you need. When you start decorating, set a timer to go off every ten minutes for a while. It's easy to get off in that creative side of our brain where time does not exist and when we come out 2-3 hours have gone by and there's not 2-3 hours of work completed. kwim??

I love to talk cakes. Here's a demo of a cake made at home. There's some other ideas in there for yah.

Edited April 3, 2006 by K8memphis (log)

[SweetSide]

Beautiful cake Maria! And, even in Romanian, I can follow the pictures of the demo.

K8 -- I've read the demo that you linked to some time ago -- beautiful cake there as well. I love how you put so much emotion into what you do and how you write. It's obvious you love what you do!

Still haven't talked to the woman buying the cake (not the bride -- it's a reception for the son of a friend -- son was hastily married a year ago before shipping off to Iraq, is now home and mom is throwing a northern family reception. Bride's family is in the south with their own shindig...) so I don't know where I'm going yet, but I will absolutely NOT (knowingly) leave anything to the last minute.

Thanks for the help so far....

[HeatherM]

Having only ever made one wedding cake (that one a small one - 2 tiers - for a friend's brother's wedding), and just recently at that, I can't help much with internet sourcing or many of your other questions, so I only have a few points to add.

Get the cake & filling & shape & decorating style & all that stuff agreed upon well in advance. Less than a week before the wedding I was not happy to hear "We've changed our minds about the shape and the filling, and oh, the decoration style too." This causes undue stress. I have now learned that I don't handle stress well.

If fresh flowers are requested for the cake - get the person ordering the cake to handle them. Being rather naive (and stupid), I believed that I could do the nice swag of fresh roses cascading down the side of the cake as was requested. The morning of the wedding found me sitting on my floor next to the computer desk, trying to wire roses into a beautiful cascade as I looked up flower arranging techniques on the web. Um, yeah - the flowers weren't the only thing wired after that.

Fortunately, I was not involved in the wedding festivities at all, so I only had to deliver the cake in time for the reception.

In the end, the cake turned out to be very pretty, the fresh roses cascaded, and the bride & groom were happy.

I think that the best thing that I did was to set a schedule for myself that I knew was generous, and allowed lots of time appropriate to my own skill level (inexperienced).

Good luck and I'm sure it will work out wonderfully. It sounds like you're going into this much better armed than I was.

[StephMac]

I'd definitely echo what others have said about getting the design set and squared away as early as possible - that gives you enough time to find equipment and practice! K8's demo is awesome. Oh, and maybe this goes under the "For Heaven's sake, don't ____" category, but I've found that "simple and traditional" doesn't mean easy! Some people may consider a "traditional" wedding cake to be three tiers, stacked, with swiss dots; others think of a "traditional" wedding cake as pillars, ruffles, overpiping, and plastic bridesmaids on staircases. That'll make a big difference in your planning!

As for stands... you could try checking out eBay if you (or the bride) has their heart sent on a silver-type stand; some catering companies and linen/table rental companies will also rent those types of stands. I've made a cheap stand out of a ring of styrofoam wrapped in colored tulle, which came out kind of cute - it raised the cake up off the table a bit, and even if no one saw it, at least it matched the decor.

Oh, and here's my other "For Heaven's sake, don't ___" suggestion: if you're delivering the cake, map out the route ahead of time and try to drive it at least once before you have to do so with a cake in the car. It can help alert you to any rough roads, hairpin turns, or steep driveways that would be a rude surprise later on.

Good luck!