Hi! I just got my first wedding cake order. I am so excited! She has been the best bride, so far. She is wanting a three tier round cake. There will only be 20 guests including wedding party at the wedding, but she wants it to look like they had a big wedding in her pictures. What size pans should I use? I can't remember if you are supposed to go 3 or 4 inch differences in the pan size? Any ideas?

I think that it may depend on the look of the cake...I have done a wedding cake for around 100, and used 12,10,8 and 6 inch pans, and the cakes were 4" high each....
From what I have read, dummy cakes are just as expensive as real cakes, so that isn't a great idea...
Maybe just two cakes, with pillars...like the wilton class 3 cake, looks elegant and less cake....

Congratulations on your first Wedding Cake order!

I dont know if you are going to like this idea... but I read somewhere that you can make a cake look twice as big as it really is and do it cheaply by making the bottom half of each tier styrofoam. Then decorate it as you would a regular cake with fondant or whatever. If you put the cake board between the cake and the styrofoam, there would be no worry about where to stop cutting. J -Christie

I would do a 6-8-10, which would be around 60 servings (6 for the anniversary). If they cut bigger pieces they won't have to terribly much left. I would never do a dummy cake. I always tell them it's the same price and they don't get anything for it.

Thanks for your suggestions. I thought about doing a dummy layer, but I figured I might as well do a cake when it's gonna be just as much money. If I do a 6-8-10, that will only make an inch "edge" on each side of the tiers, right? If I use pans with 3-inch intervals that would give inch and a half edges, right?

Whether it's 3" or 4" difference in tiers is a matter of preference. I would probably make the bottom tier from a dummy and the top two real cake. She could freeze the top tier for their anniversary (I know, yuck!) and serve the middle tier. I would charge her a deposit on the dummy, as well as the butter cream/fondant and time for the dummy and would refund the deposit if she returns the dummy in good shape (they can be wrapped in press and seal wrap before covering and that can be stripped off after using so it can easily be reused). Dummies are easy to work with and it'd save me from baking and them from wasting, but you still need to factor in it takes as much buttercream/fondant and time to decorate a dummy as it does to decorate real cake.

This is the cake she wants. Thanks for the design inspiration, Khalstead![/img]

I would do either a 6-8-10 or a 5-7-9, you will be perfectly fine with the 2" difference between tiers, just did one this weekend.

The cake you showed is 12/8/6.

Thanks, antgirl. I think I will do 11-8-6.