I thank all of you for the invaluable lessons you’ve taught me through my many months of lurking. From measuring ingredients to preparing my baking pans, frosting, covering with fondant, stacking and transporting…you guys have bolstered everything i know and taught me wonderful tips and tricks!
This is my first wedding cake and I made this for my favorite cousin who got married last month. We live on different countries and I really agonized over the logistics; where and when to bake, being the biggest concern. In the end this is what I did:
2 days before departure (a week before wedding): Baked all 3 tiers of Rose’s All Occasion Downy Yellow Butter Cake 12”, 9” & 6”. Froze well-wrapped in clingwrap, foil and ziplock. I had already pre-made fondant for covering layers as well as gumpaste decorations about a week ago.
Packed 6” layers in hardsided plastic boxes in my luggage. Handcarried the rest of the frozen cakes on board plane. 6 hours flying time, 1 layover, 12 hours traveling time, 3 cake boxes and 1 thankfully well behaved 6-year-old equals one tired woman!
As soon as I arrived, I stuck the cakes in the freezer (would you believe that except for the 6” they hadn’t completely thawed through!)
2 days before wedding: With the help of my aunt (not the groom’s mum), made Rose’s vanilla flavored mousseline. Thawed cakes, torted, syruped, filled, crumb coated, kept in refrigerator
1 day before wedding: covered with fondant, partial decoration and assembly (9” was stacked on 12”). Finished in time for the celebratory dinner for the bride. After dinner, I delivered the cake to bride’s hotel suite. Completed assembly there including gumpaste bow topper.
Day of the wedding - I was able to relax and enjoy my role as the matron of honor and mom of the cheeky ringbearer.
The cake looked great and tasted incredible. The bride and groom chose the design. Not exactly my favorite design but hey, I’m just the baker! The whole feel of their wedding was quiet, classic elegance so the cake fit in very well. In a nod to the bride and groom’s favorite midnight snack of oreos and cold glasses of milk, the cake had a cookies and cream filling (chopped oreos folded in the vanilla mousseline) and vanilla frosting. The cake stayed so moist and fresh you would never have known it was a week old and had traveled thousands of miles. Guests had seconds and thirds and the groom absolutely loved the fondant. Actually I was surprised the guests ate the fondant, I surveyed the room and only about 3 plates had discarded the fondant. I could overhear guests saying they had never tasted cake so good.
My take-away from this is that after torting and filling, I should give the cake time to settle at room temp before covering with fondant. I had torted, filled, crumb-coated and then chilled overnight before taking it out of the fridge and covering the cold cakes with fondant. Bad idea. My fondant sweated which was scary although the shine and stickiness disappeared as the moisture slowly evaporated. But the cake layers settled; as the cake came to room temp, the filling softened and started to bulge out a little so that you could see the “lines” where the cakes was torted through the fondant.
It wasn’t an absolutely perfect cake but it was an absolutely perfect labor of love.
When I was unexpectedly introduced and honored for making the cake, I wanted to say, “and thanks also to Hector and Patrincia and Julius and to everyone at Real Baking…and most especially to Rose” but I wasn’t given a chance to say anything! Thank you all! Could never have done it without you. Thank you Rose, I can only aspire to be like you! This cake is dedicated to all of you…
Bravo for putting it all together so wonderfully!
