Flowers Too Heavy For Buttercream Cake?
Decorating By tguegirl Updated 16 Oct 2018 , 12:04pm by Freckles0829
Hi all,
My friend asked me to make some peonies for her cake for her destination wedding. She handed them to her baker ahead of time to put on the cake. I made six large peonies out of fondant with tylose, as well as a smattering of small plumeria flowers. We got the flowers all the way to the wedding venue (on an 11-hour flight!) without breakage, which was a miracle. On the wedding day, however, the baker said that she could only use two of them because the flowers were too heavy for the cake to support them. The baker explained that with humidity so high, the buttercream and cake were too fragile. She placed one on the bottom tier, resting on the cake board, and one right on top.
A little background--it was an extremely humid day and the wedding was outdoors. I'd estimate humidity was near 100%, because it started to pour 2 hours into the wedding. The peonies were heavy, and I've never used them on a buttercream cake before. I made the same peonies for my own wedding cake and they adhered fine to a fondant cake. I made the peonies on a long, strong wire thinking that pushing the peonies into the cake at an angle would be sufficient to hold them (at least according to everything I read on the forums). The buttercream used by the baker was not crusting. It was sweating and looked pretty soft.
Do you the peonies actually would have ripped out of the cake and/or destroyed the buttercream? Was there anything we could have done to make it work? I'm sure the baker is more experienced than me, but I was so disappointed to make 6 flowers and only have 2 of them end up on the cake! Plus the cake looked a little empty.
Any advice is appreciated! (And yes, in hindsight, I would have made a lighter/smaller flower!)
I think inserting straws into the cake where you wanted the peonies placed and then inserting the wire into the straw would have definitely supported the peonies better then just the wire.
Was there a reason your friend just didn't have the baker handle the making of the flowers?
I guess in my mind a plastic straw would not cut through a cake as easily as wire when trying to hold up the weight of a heavy fondant flower. And if you use a longer straw then the flower wouldn't be so top heavy since a larger portion of the cake weight is pushing down on the straw. Then again I could be completely wrong (which wouldn't be the first time, LOL!) Plus I am not sure if floral tape is exactly food safe so the straw keeps the tape from touching the part of the cake that will be eaten.
Then again I am still trying to figure out why the baker thought these flowers would break apart the cake. Unless they were being stuck straight into the side of the cake I am envisioning that these flowers (especially the large peonies) were meant to sit on the tops of the tiers and I doubt that they were that heavy that just their heft alone sitting on the cake would cause the cake to collapse.
Personally even though I can see why you would be dissapointed I think you just need to let this go, you made 6, presumably had a few broken you would have only had a couple anyway, lucky for everyone involved they all made it and then the baker/decorator made the decision that she felt was right for her cake......end of story.
I am sure that the cake was beautiful and I am sure your flowers helped out with that.
Perhaps she doesn't work much with edible flowers and the like because of the reasons she stated as for why she didn't use many of yours.
Do you have a photo of the cake? Would love to see it :-)
Bubs, you're absolutely right. For some reason (probably because i don't have much free time to make cakes), I agonize over every one! Attached are pics of the packaged flowers and the finished cake.
Freckles, I think the ledges may have been too small to rest the flowers on, so they would have been mostly stuck to the sides of the cake. In the picture, you can see where she tried to place a flower along the edge of the top tier, and it distorted the buttercream. Perhaps that's what she was afraid of.
Oh those flowers do look big and heavy but....I don't see why they could not have used a few more. Oh well, it's their call and not much anyone could have do about it. As the others said, placing a b'cream filled straw w/a flower in it would have done fine I'm sure. I have done sooooo many b'crean cakes w/flowers I really can't agree w/that baker.
Wow, the flowers are gorgeous! I still think they could have added them without issue but the cake still looked very nice and I am sure your friend appreciated what you did even if only two were used.
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