Okay, I think I've over-extended myself a bit! I am a beginning baker. I do cakes and cookies for family celebrations, church functions, bake sales and the like. NOT professional! My best frind's wedding shower is this Saturday and I volunteered to do the cake and the cookies! My main concern is how to plan my time so that everything is still fresh and delicious on Saturday? I work full time. (Maybe more, I'm an attorney in a small practice with my fiance.) Can anybody suggest how soon I can bake the cookies? The cake? How about decorating? The plan is to make heart shaped cookies and cake, designed to llok like wedding gown and tux. Sorry such a long post!! Thanks in advance for any advice!!!

I forgot to mention, the shower is a "Couple's" shower. We expect around 20 people. I plan to make NFSC and chocolate/vanilla marble cake with butter cream.

You should be able to go ahead and bake your cake and wrap well and put in the freezer till ready to decorate. I'm not sure what your timeline is for decorating, but if you are going to decorate in the evening, just take the cake out of the freezer on the morning that you plan to decorate.

You could probably go ahead and bake the cookies and stick them in the freezer till ready to decorate also. I would decorate them a few days ahead and they should be fine.

Cindy

I volunteered to do a wedding cake and a groom's cake on a short-notice. You can definitely bake your cake now and freeze it if you wrap it well. I put mine in a box and wrapped the box and it was still very moist the day of the wedding. I added a touch of extra pudding to mix to ensure it would be moist.

I decorated the wedding cakes 2 days prior and froze them again. They will be just fine frozen if decorated - I mean, think of couples who save their top tier right? It's frozen for a year, so one or two days is not a problem at all.

As for the cookies, I would think you could do them the same way. They are the easier of the two in my opinion, so I would do the cakes first then the cookies the night before or morning of. Hope that helps!

THANKS! I've never frozen a cake, so I'm a little nervous! I think I'll make it tonight and freeze it. Thanks again for the help!

I agree with Cindy 6250 to go ahead and bake the cake, then freeze. Just wrap it up good with plastic wrap and then aluminum foil.

I would also go ahead and make the icing. If you make it with water, you can leave out on the counter or you can refrigerate.

If you plan to decorate the cake on Friday evening, just pull the cake and icing (if refrigerated) out before leaving for work or if you plan to decorate on Saturday morning, just pull the cake and icing out the night before.

I'm sorry but I can't answer your question about the cookies.

I also work full-time so I do as much ahead as I can-bake & freeze, make icing and color if needed, prepare boards, place couplers in bags, etc.

Good luck and be sure to post pictures!

I think you can do the cookies now. They should taste great even if they are a week old. With the cake, I would bake Thursday night after work, make icing while cake is baking. Decorate cake on Friday night after work. Specifically, do a crumb coat as soon as you come in, sit down have dinner, relax and then decorate. Gives crumb coat time to crust and you time to shed off that work day. This is what I've done in the past and it really worked for me, since I do have a 9 to 5er or more sometimes. I don't have the luxury of freezing because I don't have the space in my side-by-side frig. But if you do that is an option as well.

Hi,
You can make the cookies, decorate them, package them and then freeze them..They taste and look great when I do it this way. I just froze the one's in my gallery for a birthday party, and everyone always says how great they taste.( I even froze them with the tag, and it stayed fine!!) Just take them out the night before, and don't open the container or ziplock bag until they are all defrosted..That way they are out of the way..Also I always bake and freeze my cakes, then just take them out and you can crumb coat them still a little frozen.I would really do the cookies and freeze them they are so time consuming!! ( I usually bake and decorate them and them bag them in a day or two, when they are really dry..) Then freeze them.. Good luck!!
JoAnn