Hi all! I've been making lots of birthday cakes over the years and so far my biggest stacked cakes are three tiered. There are several potential clients that are considering me as their baker for their weddings in the next year. I've only made about 2 small wedding cakes. I'd like to try my practice on 4+ tiered wedding cakes and practice transporting and assembling them. However, my regular ingredients are way too expensive to waste (real butter, imported cocoa, real vanilla, cake flour, etc) and am wondering if cheap box mix like Jiffy would make a good substitute for practice? Or is there better alternatives?

idk -- i mean on one hand yes you'll get the experience  but not with your real product -- y'know if you are convinced your product is good and will hold up well use the jiffy --

otherwise, be ready to donate the cake to your local police precinct for example or somewhere there are a lot of sugar loving folk, like emergency room personnel -- you could even cut and box up chunks and send them out that way --

these days there are more restrictions on being able to donate to a senior citizen home for example -- even our homeless shelters have more restrictions so find some places to bless with your wares -- i mean you'd have to about do that anyway huh -- even with the jiffy 

great thinking though! i applaud you for testing like this 

Thank you. Yeah I really don't want to test on an actual paying client. I admit I am inexperienced in transporting cakes that large and anything that can go wrong I need to have some experience in fixing it. I believe the total price of the box mix will be around $30, much cheaper than my regular recipe but I worry it might be too soft to stack.

I will try it out and post my results.

if I do succeed, donating a cake might not be allowed so I thought of plenty of ways to dispose of the cake- my kids and their friends (throw a little party), family reunion this month, and plenty of my backyard chickens would love a sweet treat. Lol. 

i used jiffy when i started doing cakes -- it was what i knew -- their chocolate icing cannot be beat -- i'd make their white icing and toss in a big blob of shortening -- beat the heck out of it -- this over 40 years ago and by now i'm sure the formulas have changed -- mom would buy me jiffy mixes to make cakes when i was little -- it's good!

consider extending it if you want it firmer

JUst remember - *ANYTHING* can be tiered - jello, whipped cream etc - with the proper doweling!  It's not the cake -  it won't be 'too soft' no matter who soft the cake is.  The MOST important thing is learning how to properly dowel to keep it up and safe while transporting. 

Cool, thank you for that info. I'm pretty good at doweling and learned by mistakes through the years. I was a bit nervous trying a different recipe than I am used to but thanks for that, I think I am more confident to try this out with box mix.