How far ahead of time can you make a cake before you assemble it? How do you store it? I noticed some of the cake recipes have heavy cream and/or sour cream, can you make a cake ahead of time and keep it in the fridge without it drying out? I'm going to make a cake with a filling and buttercream frosting that I'm going to cover in fondant. How far ahead of time can I assemble the cake and it still taste's fresh? Thanks for you help!

Hello, I do my cakes 2 days before in steps.. Fro example, If my cake is due on a Saturday, I'll bake the cake on Thursday night, and then on Friday night, I'll put the filling in it and decorate it..
I did bake the cake and decorate it in the same night once and it was a total mess.. I will never do that again, I was so tried and it seemed like nothing was working.

How do you store your cake?

After it cools, I take it out of the pan and wrap it in Saran Wrap very tight, so no air gets to it.. I usually store it on the counter of my kitchen or on the kitchen table...I'll use a large cutting baord to put the cake on.
Then when I do the filling & decorate the cake, I aways put it in the refrig even if it doesn't have a dairy / cream filling.

You can make your filling 1 or 2 days before and I have made my buttercream frosting 1 week before. What type of filling are you going to do?

I also always wonder - how far in advance can i bake cakes? how long can the cake be covered in fondant and it will stay fresh? how do i store it?

I was going to try a raspberry puree filling (found the recipe on here). I'm new to all of this and this is for my son's baptism on saturday. I was just going to do a chocolate cake (from a box ) with buttercream frosting but thought it would be fun to try a new filling! My in-laws are all coming friday night and it would be great to have it all, or nearly all done before they get here (and before my 2 year old eats all of my fondant figures)!

You could do that cake either thursday night or friday morning. Put it in a box and put in in a safe place. Ive done cakes on friday and they were fine for sunday. The icing is an insulator and will keep the cake fresh for a few days. Notice you can have leftovers for 3-4 days after a party, just by cutting off the harden cake.
You always want to give you cake at least 24 hour cool time. If you need to do them earlier, you can stick them in the freezer. I find that its easier to ice them frozen. I do all my baking on mon or tues and freeze them. They are fine. Just wrap them well. Good luck doing you sons cake.

I always complete my cakes 2 days before they will be served. This way if something happens I will have time to redo it.

I do my baking at different times . I wrapped each layer tightly in saran wrap. If I bake more than 1 day before my decorating I freeze the cakes.

My cakes are always still very fresh when they are served.