Cream and Blue Hydrangea Wedding Cake

I wrapped up my summer wedding season this year in South Port, NC with a wedding for some very dear friends of mine, Hannah and John. Their gorgeous and laid back wedding perfectly reflected their relationship, especially taking place in such a charming town as South Port, where the bride grew up going on beach vacations. We wanted to carry those vibes through to her cake and settled on a simple but classic three tiered cake adorned with cream and blue hydrangea blossoms and delicate cream filagree on the middle tier. 

The cake was a different flavor for each tier beginning with vanilla bean pound cake on the bottom filled with fresh berries and sweetened whipped cream. The middle tier was lemon chiffon cake filled with almond cream cheese filling and it was topped off by a white chocolate almond cake with milk chocolate ganache filling. Choosing a variety of flavors was definitely the way to go; Hannah and John's guests appreciated having so many options and from what I heard, had no problem returning for seconds and thirds to try all of the flavors.

The cake is sitting on a beaded glass cake plate from my personal collection that I offer for clients to "rent" free of charge to display their cakes.

The hydrangea blossoms are all handmade out of gum paste to custom match the blooms used to make Hannah's bouquet. They can be kept indefinitely after the wedding as a unique keepsake of the day!

I wish so much happiness to these two and I was so honored to be a part of their big day!

Summer Wedding Cake Tasting

Last week I did a cake tasting with a sweet couple who I am SO excited to be making their wedding cake this August, Hannah and John. Their wedding is going to be an intimate affair and will take place in Oak Island, NC. I will be delivering the cake to their venue personally and so far we have a great start on their flavors and concept. I had fun coming up with the flavors for this one and they really challenged me with some of their new ideas. What we ended up with were four stellar combinations we all loved!

John is a self-proclaimed 'vanilla guy' so we started out with a vanilla bean cake filled with the same Italian buttercream that I frost the outside of a wedding cake with. A summer wedding calls for fresh berries somewhere on the list so I did a vanilla bean pound cake filled with sweetened whipped cream and fresh berries as well for them. Hannah's request was some combination of lemon and almond, which I re-created into a lemon pound cake with almond cream cheese filling. For their last taste, they let John's sugar loving mom choose a white chocolate cake filled with creamy milk chocolate ganache.

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All of the cakes were a hit and we ended up going with a tier of each to make up their three tier wedding cake. As for design, Hannah knew she wanted to go for a traditional white cake with pearl beading border. With a plain white cake, we talked about a few different options they had to make it interesting but keep it white. I covered one of their taste cakes in fondant and did a textured design on another one so they could see both elements. We ended up adding a delicate filagree band on the middle tier for embellishment and we're going to use fresh flowers leftover from their centerpieces to accent. It should be a classy and elegant centerpiece to their reception which I would expect no less from these two. Stay tuned for more details as their cake comes together.

How to make a Wedding Cake Part I: The Planning

A lot goes into making a wedding cake. When I say a lot, I mean mostly butter, but there are a few other ingredients too. As I've gotten more experienced, I've found that the hardest part is the preparation and if I do a lot of that then the actual production day is a breeze. To give an inside look into how I create a wedding cake from design to delivery, I'm using a few of my favorites to break it down step by step. But before I even step foot in the kitchen, I've already been working for months on the planning process:

Step 1: The contact
Usually I get cake inquiries via email through a friend or someone who's seen my blog or eaten my cake at a wedding. I still get really excited every time. I'll exchange a few emails with the bride and groom or their wedding planner asking questions like when, where, and how many guests. My goal with this initial exchange is always just to get to know their wedding and their expectations. I believe that the cake is a focus point of a reception. I know that everyone is going to take pictures and the cake will most likely serve as a backdrop, so I want to make sure that it fits in with the wedding and looks good doing it. Generally this means matching the theme, season and formality of the event. By the time I've sent a few emails back and forth, I probably already have about ten different sketches in the works and have already started a pinterest board in your honor.

Michele and Dustin had their beach wedding last May, and Alia and John ordered a Bali inspired rehearsal dinner cake to match the location where they honeymooned last August.

Step 2: The Tasting
If I were a bride, I know the cake tasting would be my favorite part of planning the entire wedding (am I right?) so I like to do this up right. I let the couple select up to three cake and filling combinations that can be from my tasting menu or anything they can think up. If I think I have a really good idea for a flavor that they don't pick, I might also bring some additional cupcakes as a surprise! I make mini 4" cakes out of the flavors they chose and frost them with fluffy, Italian buttercream so they can get an idea of what the finished product will taste like. And then, I will personally deliver a box full 'o cake wherever you'd like so we can chat more about your cake:

Mark and Cassie 

Recently celebrated their first year anniversary of eating my lemon and lime inspired cake for their June wedding

 

Kevin and Susanne

Tasted five flavors in total: Vanilla on vanilla, gingerbread spice with cinnamon cream cheese frosting, dark chocolate cake with both bourbon caramel mousse filling and espresso buttercream filling, and confetti cake with champagne buttercream filling. 

 

Molly and Michael

Are brand newlyweds, and tasted three Spring inspired flavors with me last fall: Raspberry lemonade cake with citrus cream cheese filling, lemon lavender cake with raspberry mousse filling, and dark chocolate cake with raspberry mousse filling.

The best part of a tasting with me is that I don't charge a cent for it, provided that you end up booking your cake. It's a pretty sweet deal if you ask me.

Step 3: The Grocery List

I operate out of a home kitchen and don't have a high enough volume to quite reap all the benefits of buying in bulk on a regular basis. There aren't many ingredients I can save from one cake to the next because of shelf life, so usually I buy almost everything fresh for every cake the week of - even flour and sugar. Part of my prep tasks is sitting down with all of the recipes I"ll need, writing a grocery list and estimating how much of everything I'll need. The bigger the cake, the longer the list, and the more crazy looks I get hauling butter and eggs into my grocery cart. Here's a peek of what my list looked like for Molly's cake:

I don't mean to scare anyone but I ended up getting 13 pounds of butter...and used all but four sticks...However this cake fed over 200 people, minus the top tier that bride and groom kept for their first anniversary. Inevitably, I'll need more of something or have to re-do something and have to make an emergency grocery run on the day of production. With Molly's cake I paid special attention to the grocery list and planning ahead, and didn't need a single thing the day of. I also stayed within budget and didn't have much left over = winning all around for a small business like mine. 

Stay tuned for part II in the kitchen, plus a whole lotta cake coming down the pipeline soon. I start in Basic and Classical Cakes class at the CIA this week!

Here'a a link to Part II of this post for easy access: Baking and Decorating. 

Beach Wedding Cupcake Tower: Michele + Dustin

First things first...May/June has been a really exciting time for my little business. Starting last weekend I began the first of FOUR wedding cakes in a row, which is the busiest I have ever been. Thank you for continually visiting my site and passing on the word to your friends and family- it is seriously paying off and I couldn't have done it with out you!

To start off the summer wedding season I packed my little car full of custom cupcakes and headed down to Va Beach to celebrate the marriage of Michele and Dustin. The wedding cake for this very sweet couple fell into my lap via close family friends, and I couldn't have been more happy to do it. The beach holds a special place in both Michele and Dustin's hearts - so much in fact that they said their vows with sand between their toes. To reflect their shared appreciation and venue of choice, I created a very beach-y cupcake tower for their reception. We bounced more than a few ideas back and forth before settling on the final design, and you can check out their inspiration board here. The final sketch looked like this:

The cupcakes were two different flavors. Michele's favorite- vanilla poundcake filled with chocolate-almond ganache and topped with dark chocolate frosting, and Dustin's favorite- chocolate chiffon cake filled with chocolate peanut butter ganache and topped with peanut butter frosting. Each cupcake was dipped in graham cracker 'sand' and decorated with a handmade sea creature.

Gumpaste sand dollars, fondant starfish, and pink sugar coral.

The Adirondack chair topper was ordered off of Etsy, and is the only non-edible element of this cake. The driftwood fences are also gumpaste.

Congrats Michele and Dustin!