How to make a wedding cake

Carol, my college roommate, got married this past weekend.
Her wedding was very beautiful and had lots of personal touches all through out it.
I was one of those personal touches. I made her cake.
She called and asked me a while ago, and said she didn’t care what it looked like and that it could even be just a single cake layer.
Well I have never made a wedding cake before – but I also know that a single cake layer wouldn’t do.
I found a picture that I liked and decided I would use that as my inspiration.
Carol wanted a pumpkin roll as her wedding cake. So I took the flavors of it, and made it into a wedding cake.
Here I will show you pictures of the process – I will post the recipes in a separate post. Click here for recipes
 
Divide the cake batter into the cake pans. (One batch made one of each size cake – a 6”, 8” and 10”)

Make the largest bowl of butter cream icing ever. (I took the recipe – doubled it and then made it 3 times. I used all but a little bit – and that little bit is still in the mini fridge in my hotel room)


Slice and fill the cakes with the cinnamon cream cheese filling.

Slice and fill the large sheet cakes – even if they crumble – they will look ok after they get iced

Crumb coat the cakes.


Ice the cakes

I did all the icing at my parents house – we were staying there the night before we left because it was closer and we could leave later. It was a good thing. I didn’t have this kind of room at my apartment.
I put them in their cake boxes and put them in the trunk of the car overnight – thank goodness for mid 30 degree temps. The next am – I smoothed the icing more and re-packed them for the drive.

Put the cake boxes in boxes and buckle them in for the 4.5 hour drive to New Jersey. Hold your breath and cross your fingers they make it
 
Have a heart attack when the road to deliver the cakes to the reception site is cobble stone and bumpy as heck!
Go to hotel, rehearsal, dinner, sleep and wedding – then drive like something is chasing you to the reception site to assemble the wedding cake before everyone gets there.



I was in the wedding – and I didn’t want to get white icing on my navy dress – so I tossed the shirt I wore to the church that AM on over my dress and got to work as fast as I could.

I used straws to make sure the cakes wouldn’t crush each other.

Stacking the cakes was more difficult that I thought it would be.

Now it is time to fix all the finger prints and parts of the icing that didn’t want to come off the cake boards when I to stack them.

Pipe the boarder around where the cakes meet.
  
Try very hard to ignore the fact that people are coming and and walking right past you to go to the cocktail hour. (it was very hard for me- I was slightly freaking out about this.)
   
Add flowers (make sure you hide the spots that are a little thin!)

Rosemary made the centerpieces and helped me by arranging the flowers on the cake – she is a true artist!

Give Rosemary the biggest hug and take a deep breath because it is finished (then hit the bar for a well earned drink!!)
   
Take lots of pictures of the cake.
Eat, dance and have fun for the rest of the day.
Drive back to VA

Clean up the disaster you made in your kitchen.

And that my friends is how you make a wedding cake. :-D

I am sure there are easier methods, this is just the one I used.

Special thanks to:
My mom – for believing I could actually do this from day one! (and for giving me all those cake pans you had in the attic!!)
Matt – for not driving like a jerk and ruining the cakes on the way to NJ – and for tolerating the mess I made all over the kitchen and dinning room.
Meg – for being the best photographer/cheerleader/people blocker ever. I seriously would have panicked while putting it together without you!
Rosemary- for making the cake look amazing with your floral arrangements.
Mom’s Group Playgroup – for taste testing the recipe before I made this cake. :-D
Carol and Tim- for trusting my ability enough to allow me to make the cake for your special day. I love that I was a part of it.

I had a lot of fun making this cake. I was very stressed, but only because I was afraid it wouldn’t make it to NJ and that I wouldn’t have time in between the wedding and the reception to make it look beautiful. (I had to be at the church at 7:30 am – for the wedding and couldn’t get to the reception until about 12:45 because of travel times. I knew I wouldn’t be able to put it all together before the wedding so I just had to hope I was fast and there were no disasters. It all worked out of course!) I am not sure I will make another wedding cake again for a little bit – I just didn’t have enough space in the apartment to work!