Okay heres my deal, my sisters wedding is next weekend the 8th of September she lives 5 hours from me. I need to be there on Thursday. Do you all think I could bake on Tuesday and freeze layers and transport them on wednesday night. Do I let them thaw or refreeze til thursday night when I can work on them or will they hold that long til saturday night. I am covering them in Fondant, will they hold fresh that long if I let them thaw over night. Or will fondant hold them good from freeze Tuesday night, thaw wednesday cover wednsday night and then hall them 5 hours. Okay so sorry if this is confusing. The cakes will be sitting on individual pillars so that helps. Also I sometimes have a problem with my cakes bulging, i let them rest over night after filling and then frost and it seems like a couple hours later they start to bulge, am i filling them too much. Please all let me know what you think. Thanks NIkki

not sure i can help but here's a bump

if you are driving, is there anyway to go a day earlier and just bake there? I wouldn't freeze, thaw, and refreeze ever.

My suggestion is to keep the cakes fzn until you are ready to cover and decorate them. Keep them fzn until Thurs.
Yes, I know some decortors say they finish cakes as early as Wed for a Sat wed and yes the cake will still be good but......it won't have any 'leftover' time for keeping any leftover cake after the wedding (if there is any leftover).
I have always been told NOT to fz a cake that is covered w/fondant. The main reason, I'm told, is because there is no way for the moisture to evaporate as it thaws - the fondant will hold in all the moisture & the cake can become soggy.

There is absolutely no reason why you can't thaw and refreeze. RAW MEAT is the only thing that poses a danger if thawed and refrozen. Breads, cakes and other baked pastries harbor none of that harmful bacteria. In general, baked goods will lose a bit of freshness if refrozen, but since you're baking just days in advance, you should have no problem with freshness whatsoever.

I would bake and freeze and put them in a cooler (if possiable with dry Ice) and transport frozen. If you can't get the dry ice the just take then not frozen and place them in your sister fridge. I WOULD NEVER FREEZE AND RE-FREEZE. Everything has bacteria (Sorry DianeLM) I would be worryed to death.

Also the buldging is probally becasue you are putting the barrier to close to the edge (or you are not using one at all).

I personally would not refreeze the cake. I think it will greatly affect the taste of the cake. When you initially freeze the cake, the water molecules will freeze where ever they are located within the cake itself. However, once you thaw it, the water molecules move (through osmosis, hence condensation). If you refreeze the cake, the water molecules will freeze in their new location, not their natural position. I suspect that this would possibly change the fresh taste of the cake. I don't know any of this for a scientific fact, it's just my theory.

My plan of action would be to freeze the cake then "thaw" it by keeping it in a cooler with ice on the way to your sister's house. Then put it in the fridge at your sister's house until you're ready to decorate it.

If you are willing to take the time, why don't you bake a small practice cake, freeze it, thaw it, freeze it again, then thaw it again. You'll know if the taste is affected.

I would avoid re-freezing a second time if at all possible. But if it really works best with your schedule I think it would be okay. Everytime something is frozen and thawed it looses moisture so re-freezing a cake can make it dry.

While I don't necessarily think it poses a serious "risk" - I just think re-freezing a cake brings on freezer burn and dries it out. Period. I agree that maybe you could go a day earlier and bake there or just keep it frozen if you can until you need it. Avoid re-freezing if you can!! Good Luck!!

Tammi

WOW! I don't know what we are going to tell all our brides that RE freeze and serve on their first anniversary....... My granddaughter just took hers out and ate it on their anniversary a couple of days ago, and she said it tasted just and fresh and moist as it did on their wedding day....

I understand what you're saying but I think it's a lot different when the icing is acting as a barrier to the moisture inside the cake. But when it's an uniced cake, the moisture just evaporates out of it...Just my oppinion of course.

retail bakeries such as target, walmart etc, refreeze ALL THE TIME. Cake comes in frozen gets thawed, decorated and then frozen again as back-up. i would refreeze

Although I really don't see anything wrong with freezing and refreezing if you're at all worried about it (after reading these posts I'm beginning to wonder...) Why can't you bake them Tuesday, transport them Wednesday and freeze them when you get there? If you wrap the cakes tightly in plactic wrap and then a layer of foil (I like the plastic wrap that 'locks' to itself) there really shouldn't be any freshness lost in that one day - and even if a slight amount of moisture does escape it will be made up by the layer of buttercream you will hopefully be putting on before the fondant. I have, in the past, finished cakes late at night and not wanting to wait until they were cooled to wrap them I've stored them completely unwrapped in the oven (a second oven that wasn't hot) then wrapped them and put them in the freezer the next day.

As for your bulging problem I would guess (without being able to see what exactly is happening) that you probably are over filling. Press lightly all over the top layer before beginning to ice and see if you have any 'oozing' - that may help.

Good luck - and remember we do this because it's FUN.

Hope this helps
A few years ago I did a 7 tier cake for my daughters best friends wedding. I lived in NC and she lived in Michigan. this was the end of June. I baked, filled and crumb-coated the layers and then froze them in individual boxes. I put them in the back of my SUV and covered them with several layers of light blankets. I left on Wednesday morning, drove to Ky, stayed overnight, left Thursday morning and drove the rest of the way to Michigan, got there late Thursday evening, I left them in the car, and got them out Friday morning, they were still cold to the touch, I decorated all day Friday, set up Friday evening duiring the rehersal and Saturday the cake was perfect. From the time I put them in the car until I got them out Friday morning I did not touch or disturb them. I hope this helps you. also I have learned that less filling is better -no bulges.
Let us know how things go.
Jibbies

i had to do that once..i took them frozen to FL (7 hour trip)..then refroze them. I was not happy with the taste of the cake. Of course, they were not iced. So maybe icing with buttercream then refreezing would keep moisture in until ready to cover with fondant.

Just to clarify--
I only froze the cakes once.
Jibbies

I just googled "refreezing cakes" out of curiosity. Almost all of the sites that came up stated that a cake that was frozen twice lost appearance, texture and mostly taste. There were several bakery sites that stated that the larger layers were frozen in order to handle them easier but the top tier was made fresh in order for the couple to freeze it for later use.

One site said that quality always changes with re-freezing and that is why many packaged foods state not to re-freeze.

If I had to make a decision based on what I found, I would not re-freeze the cakes.

fondex fondant you are able to freeze or refrigerate. I hope this helps. Like the others, I would not re-freeze.

I would wrap well and freeze, transport with ice packs. and the next day, frost with buttercream and keep it in the fridge. It should be fine until ready for fondant.
Too much filling, yes but we all like too much filling... one way to get a little extra in there is to trench out a thin layer of cake about 1/2" inside the edge... (cakeball material) that gives the filling somewhere to go so it doesn't ooze out.
hth cp

I guess it depends on your recipe and your wrapping skills. I have refrozen cakes many times witih no ill effects. I wouldn't hesitate for a moment to freeze, thaw, refreeze over the course of a couple of days. I've refrozen cakes that had been frozen for over a week and they're just as moist as the day they were baked.

I just remembered something very important.... I have a commercial freezer that is NOT frost free. I would venture to guess that freshness is far more likely to be compromised in a frost-free freezer. If your freezer is frost-free, I would NOT recommend freezing, thawing and refreezing.