Silver & Blue Wedding Cake

When I made my first wedding cake, I said I never wanted to make one that big ever again. It was difficult and stressful. So what do I do? I make one that's bigger and more difficult. Julie wanted something completely different from the first one I made. She wanted a square cake with no flowers. Square corners are harder to cover in fondant and flowers are really nice for covering up flaws. However, it wasn't as stressful (probably because it wasn't my first) and it turned out beautiful.


Layer 1 (top) is 5" Banana Walnut with a cream cheese filling
Layer 2 is 8" chocolate with a chocolate ganache filling
Layer 3 is 12" Carrot cake with a cream cheese filling
Layer 4 (bottom) is 16" white with raspberries and pastry cream

This cake weighs a whopping 65 pounds. One of the reasons why this cake weighs so much is because the first and 3rd layers are quite dense.

Some of the ingredients in this cake:
10 cake mixes (only in 2 of the layers and are easier to work with in large cakes)
25 carrots
4 dozen eggs
8 cups of oil
20 pounds of powdered sugar
half a gallon of half and half and cream
2 pounds of cream cheese
5 1/2 cups of nuts (makes the cakes lumpy and hard to tort but sure are tasty)

I take 3 days when I make a cake this size. Here's my game plan:
Day 1: Make fondant, cut and cover cake boards, make fillings.
Day 2: Bake (My oven was on for 10 hours straight to make this cake)
Day 3: Fill, frost, cover in fondant, decorate and add dowels for structure.
Day 4: deliver and stack, add ribbons and topper.

Ok, I know that's 4 days, but I don't count the 4th day because it doesn't take very long to set the cake up when all the work is already done. Here's a closer picture



These pictures aren't the best. Pretend the scroll work is visible and all those dots are really shiny. I wish I had Jamie take the picture. She does some amazing work.

Before I take all the credit for this cake, I had help. My cakes always turn out bigger and better when I have help. Ana came by and helped with a lot of the grunt work in assembling these cakes. Plus it is her exquisite sense of style that encouraged the scroll work on the 2nd and 4th layers and the little bows in front. And on top of all that, I don't think I could get a 26 inch slab of fondant onto the bottom layer by myself without it tearing. By the end of the day we were both covered in powdered sugar. She better be careful though, I think she caught a slight hint of the cake decorating fever.