I have made stacked cakes before, and used a cream cheese pound cake recipe, which worked fine. However, a client requested "plain" cake, so I tried an old family recipe that uses a pound of butter. After baking the layers for the top two tiers, cutting the crusty tops off to make them even, and letting them cool, it appears that a couple of the layers have some cracks in them, and seem to be tearing apart. I am afraid that once I start stacking tiers, the cake is going to completely fall apart. Is it the amount of butter causing the cracks? Should I have let it cool completely before trimming the tops off? Will freezing the layers give them more stability? Does anyone have any advice for a good recipe to use for stacking cakes? I always use my stand by cream cheese recipe which most people love, and it works perfectly.
Thanks for any advice!

I haven't made any wedding cakes myself, but the recipe that's been recommended (and I've used the cake for just regular round and square tiers without carving) is the WASC (white almond sour cream). It's very tasty and is supposed to work well for carving. So it's a sturdy cake, too.

HTH

I've used the WASC for a tiered cake and it held up great! To get a "plainer" cake, double the vanilla and nix the almond. I've done that and it's very tasty.

Ooo, I almost forgot....another cake that's highly recommended is a madeira cake, but the one and only time I tried that I thought it was dry, good, but dry. I never did try brushing it with a simple syrup solution though and looking back that probably would have 'done the trick'. That might also be an option for you. It really was good with coffee!

My guess is that part of the cracking might be due to trying to level before cool. Cakes seem so much more fragile when they are still warm. I generally bake mine then let them rest a day then I level them and start icing. I just wrap them in saran after they cool.

I use the durable cake recipe in the recipe section. There's a "regular" one called Durable Cake something or other and then another chocolate cake version. Both basically use a box mix, a box of dry pudding, 1 c sour cream, 1/2 c oil, 1/2 c water, & 4 eggs. Mix and bake at 325. I use these recipes all the time for stacking and regular cakes with no problems. And they taste great!