So this week I am baking my first ever wedding cake. I have baked many celebration cakes, novelty cakes, large birthday cakes. Even a tiered cake or two (well one…) So how much harder could a wedding cake possibly be?
A lot. In short, an awful lot. For starters – a wedding cake is pretty central to what most people consider to be the most important day of their life. Then there are a lot of people there to look at it. And also to taste it – what is the point of a cake that looks good but doesn’t taste amazing?!
The particular design of the cake I am baking is stunning in its simplicity. Which means no room for error – the sides must be straight, the tops level, the sugarpaste satiny smooth and no holes, rough edges, cracks or tears.
So I started on Friday. When I say started – I actually started several weeks ago when I began looking for the perfect wedding cake recipe. This was my first “mistake” as with hindsight I wonder why, when I bake perfectly delicious cakes, I felt the need to use someone else’s recipe for this very special occasion.
After a lot of research I settled on a madeira cake recipe that used Self Raising Flour and Plain Flour – quite a lot of plain flour in fact. I used real butter, there was no additional raising agent, and the mixture felt quite heavy, but the writer assured us that it is a firm cake – as wedding cakes should be. And that it would keep for a week.
I felt a bit disappointed with the result but trusted the recipe author and ploughed on. The layers were thin but I made an extra one – no two – and thought that stacked up they would look fine!
The top tier was to be a chocolate cake and a similar process ensued – finding a recipe, feeling uncomfortable with the way it mixed and baked, but believing someone else knows best. By the time the Eurovision Song Contest had started last night (ie 36 hours later) I had four large vanilla layers, four slightly smaller chocolate layers. AND – another four inch deep cake that I baked using a recipe for a deep cake – just in case that baked up better.
All of these cakes taste good (we tried them). They look good too. But I wasn’t comfortable – they didn’t feel like “my” cakes. I woke up this morning absolutely shattered but with one thought on my mind. Start again.
WHAT?!
So I walked to the Co Op – bought another 36 large free range eggs, came home and started baking. What recipe did I use? You’ve probably guessed – I didn’t use a “recipe”. I simply baked cakes the way I always do – the traditional proportions of fat/ self raising flour/sugar to eggs, plenty of Ndali vanilla. Creaming the butter and sugar before adding the eggs and then folding in the flour. And the butter this time was the softened/spreadable variety – so no nightmares with the batter splitting either.
What a joy it was to bake these cakes! They rose, they smelt glorious, the crumb was close, the texture soft but with the addition of some extra flour firm enough to support the fondant and additional tiers.
The chocolate cakes I baked in sandwich tins – with baking parchment to support the sides. As the worktops filled with cake I knew I had made the right decision – these are “my” cakes 🙂
As I write they are sitting crumb coated and chilled in boxes in a cool room. Tomorrow they get their layer of sugar paste. I call this part of the process the “bingo wing workout” as it is physically hard work. I really hope the cake looks as good as it is going to taste and for anyone else struggling with how to bake large/celebration cakes I will post my “non recipe” here very soon!
filledwithlovecupcakes 
