Phew! I'm so proud to have completed my very first wedding cake last Saturday!
I must thank my friend Michelle for having such confidence in me that she let me make her wedding cake! I mean it's not like a birthday cake, which one has annually... it's a once-in-a-lifetime wedding cake!!
Fortunately this was her second wedding dinner, which was held at our hometown. The main dinner was the more lavish affair and was held in KL. So that took a bit of pressure off me; at least she already had a nice professionally-made cake in the first event, so if mine didn't turn out too good, it wouldn't matter as much! Well, that was
my reasoning anyway...
When Hubby and I came back from our diving holiday to
Sipadan, I had only one week left to complete the huge (on my scale;
mammoth!) project.
Over the week, I baked many cakes and made plenty of chocolate buttercream. The cake baking was the most time consuming, because I only have one wee oven, and had to bake them one at a time. The 12" cake tray almost couldn't fit into my oven!
So anyway, the bottom tier was two 12" round American chocolate cakes. The second tier was a 10" round American chocolate cake. The third, extra-wide tier, was three 8" round orange madeira cakes. The final top tier was made of styrofoam because I did not want my nightmares of the wedding cake crashing down to come true! I seriously doubted my engineering skills, so even though I always prefer my whole creation to be edible, I had to compromise this time. There was too much at stake!
The two separators were also made from styrofoam and covered in yellow gumpaste. I cut all the styrofoam used by hand, with the aid of a craft knife. It was a lot of hard, messy work, and if I ever do this professionally, I am
definitely getting a styrofoam cutter machine thingy!!
So over the week, I cut the styrofoam parts and covered them in gumpaste first, then baked the cakes whenever I had some free time and lastly covered the cakes in fondant. I was doing the fondant decorating right up to a couple of hours before the wedding dinner. Then Hubby and I went early to set up the tiers and to put the finishing touches, i.e.: the real orchids.
I did try making a gumpaste orchid, but it was so much work and too time-consuming that I decided to use real ones. I figured mother nature was a better artist and since we have orchids in abundance here, it would actually be a shame to use fake ones!
During the dinner that night, I was still struggling to push thoughts of wedding cake avalanches out of my mind. Boy was I so totally relieved when the couple finally cut the cake without any untoward incidents!! The cake was then safely disassembled and served to guests.
I must also say here that I couldn't have done it without Hubby's help! He came back one night after a World Cup session to find me frantically fussing over the extra-wide tier! I had covered it in fondant and it cracked and tore at the edges! I was in despair! I did not have the energy nor the extra fondant to redo it and neither could I leave it as it was! Thank goodness Hubby came up with a solution which saved the cake and did not use up too much more fondant!
He also helped me lug the pieces to the car and to the banquet hall. They were quite big and surprisingly heavy! Also not forgetting the words of encouragement which helped prevent me from going insane! :)
*muaks* Thanks Darling!
This design was inspired by one done by
The Pink Cake Box. I
love the colours and the extra-wide tiers and the floating tiers effect caused by the styrofoam separators. I went through so many designs and in the end, even though this one was tougher to make due to the wide tier, I knew it was extra special. I checked with Michelle and sure enough, she loved it too.
So here it is, my very first (and also very likely my last!) wedding cake!!
In the end I don't think a lot of people even noticed the cake, because it was sitting on the side of the stage in the dim romantic lighting.
But I don't mind. I loved it and the bride loved it, so,
"Mission accomplished!!"
