OK....My older sister is getting married and I am her Matron of Honor. (YAY!) But I am also making the wedding cakes (hers and groom's cake). I'm trying to figure out how to fit in time to make the cakes as fresh as possible with everything that will be going on like getting my hair done, wedding rehearsals, etc.

Another issue I am having is the wedding cake filling flavors. My LOVING sister has given me FULL POWER on what cake flavors to have. Of course she told me what she and her soon-to -be husband did not like and I'm trying to figure out what would be good cake flavors/fillings for a cake that I may have to make a day in advance. The WHOLE cake may have to be assembled a day early (w/o fondant) so I'm worried about freshness and what possible fillings can sit all night, unless I wake up at 2 in the morning to assemble the cake with the refrigerated fillings. I DON'T KNOW!!!! This is frustrating!!! Please someone if you can read this and understand what I am asking PLEASE HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!

BUMP!!!!!!!! PLEASE SOMEBODY HELP ME!!!!!!

BUMP!!!!!!!! PLEASE SOMEBODY HELP ME!!!!!!

Deep breath, darlin', you're going to be fine.

First, I ALWAYS bake my cakes on Wed or Thurs for a Sat wedding. I usually crumbcoat and ice the same day. If I can decorate it the same day, also, I do. It sits on my counter for a couple of days.

Once the cake is iced, the icing "seals" the cake (like bread wrapper/bag seals the bread) and keeps it fresh.

You don't have to make the cake the day before to have a fresh cake.

Dont' you remember mom and gramma keeping cake on the counter for a few days until it was finally demolished? It works. You'll be fine.

You know you can refrigerate cakes, right? If you are filling your cakes with fillings that require refrigeration, either cover them with fondant and airbrush the cake with vodka, which will make the condensation on the cakes very fine and evaporate very quickly, or box and wrap your buttercream-covered cakes for a few days' nap in the chill chest. Refrigerating fondant cakes also keeps the fondant from hardening...bonus.

You'll be fine as long as you manage your time really well. That's half the battle right there! You must work sleep into your week or you will be miserable.

Sherri

Why don't you bake ahead and freeze them until Thursday, and decorate away ! It will be VERY fresh, and you will have the time you NEED for the wedding itself.........

Girl, relax.

I do 5-6 weddings a weekend. You don't seriously think that I'm up all night baking and decorating do you? I bake up to a week ahead, cool, level, torte, wrap and freeze. Bring the cakes out on Thursday for a Saturday wedding, fill, rewrap and let settle. Decorate on Friday. There would be no problem backing that schedule up by a day to have the cakes done and sitting all day on Friday. The key is to use fillings that don't have to be refrigerated. I mix my whipped bc with sleeved fillings. They come out a lot like mousse, but don't require refrigeration.

i've made my own wedding cake and my brothers, you can do it!

For my own i baked monday/tuesday and froze the cakes, defrosting friday night and decorating - until 2:30am

For my brothers I baked wed/thursday and refridgerated, decorated friday night again -until 1 am and finished up saturday.

For your own sanity - do not use refridgerated fillings. You might not have enough fridge space, and the biggest issue is setting up the cake - you may have to do it Saturday morning before you start to get ready.

Choose a very simple design (my preference is for a stacked cake for more stability especially if you are unable to transport and set up the cake because of time commitments (getting ready, photos etc). I was not in my brothers wedding party (although of course heavily involved in the wedding hence the 1 am, so I set it up between the ceremony and reception. For my own - I stacked it in back of our wagon, in the parking lot at the hall, in my wedding dress and the groomsmen carried it in and my bridemaid stuck the silk flowers in the top.

Flavor wise, depending on the size of the cake and whether you would like to do different flavors I would suggest a chocolate, a vanilla and a fruit flavor.

For example

Chocolate cake with mint or mocha buttercream
Vanilla cake with french vanilla or vanilla caramel buttercream
Lemon cake with lemoncurd or raspberry filling or both

Just ice each cake with the same vanilla buttercream.

If you want to do all one flavor a light flavored cake (almond, lemon, vanilla) are always popular, safe choices.

HTH and please ask all the questions you need to!!

ok I just took a look through your photos and noticed that you havent done any tiered cakes yet - please practice at least a couple times before the big day.

Or alternatively you could do a floating tiers cake with each cake on seperate stands, this would be easy for someone else (cousin, aunt) to set up.

If you do decide to do the stacked - look into getting a good support system. Leahs recommends the SPS system, search for threads relating to SPS.

Cakepro: you mentioned refrigerating a fondant covered cake. Should it be covered somehow? I'm assuming not with plasticwrap, so with what, if nec.

Leahs: you mentioned mixing the BC with sleeved fillings to not need refrigeration. Do you think the fruit spread from Smuckers would be a ok to mix with BC and not need refrigerating. Also, I thought that being "buttercream" automatically meant it needs refrigeration...
(can you tell I'm a newbie...)

thanks.

I make sure all my wedding cakes are decorated one day in advance. I even do a practice assemble to make sure the day of the wedding all will go smoothly.

I HAVE completely assembled the wedding and groom's cakes and wrapped them in Saran Wrap overnight and then just uwrap them on the day of the wedding. Had to, no choice since I was going to be busy the day of the wedding. Of course, this was at MY church and I had the permission of the brides to do so. Since it IS your sister....maybe you could get away with that too!

Beth in KY

No I think the Smuckers stuff is a)WAAAY to sweet and b) more expensive than the sleeved fillings.

Also, jams and jellies do have to be refrigerated after opening.

And if this is your first cake, then you really need to look into using SPS. See my signature.

Thanks so much! I knew the gang here would help a sista out!!! I can't remember who it was but they mentioned that I haven't done any stacked cakes. Well constructing it and doing it isn't the problem. I've done quite a few while working at a GROCERY STORE BAKERY (HINT - WHY THEY AREN'T POSTED ON HERE). So I'm not worried about doing a stacked cake at all. But I appreciate all of your responses.