I am making a cake for someone who requested strawberry and custard filling with yellow cake. I made her a sample cake with 2 layers of filling made from frozen strawberries and and 1 layer of traditional scratch pastry cream. I tried the combo and thought it was excellent, but she sent me an email saying that no one really liked the strawberry cheese-cake.

First, I am confused because there was absolutely no cheese in that cake. I asked her what she didn't like about it and she wouldn't say. Only to ask if I used real strawberries or gelled strawberry filling, which I didn't. I usually make everything from scratch.

At this point I am not quite sure what she is looking for. I can't use fresh strawberries because the cake is heavily decorated and I will have to work on it for at least two days. Also, I pretty sure at this point we both have different definitions of custard.

So help! I have never had any complaints before about my cakes so this threw me for a loop. Any suggestions regarding what this women might be looking for or any goto recipes that might work would be appreciated.

It seems her issue was with the strawberries. How did you prepare the frozen berries for the filling? I would really try to get a definite answer from the client as to what she didn't like.