Sunday

Let them have cake...

A few months back my friend Chantal asked me to make the cake for her wedding.

Now I realize that it comes as a surprise to many of you that I actually know how to bake -- but I do, dammit. Had I ever worked with fondant icing before? No... and I had never made a tiered cake, either.

But I wasn't about to let such minor details get in the way.

I ordered the CakeLove cookbook, did some online research, watched a cake decorating video on YouTube, then gave it my best shot.

(Originally I told myself I'd do a few dry practice runs, but those never happened.)

Yes, there were a few anxious moments but after the smoke cleared (note: there was no actual smoke) the legions of doubters were ultimately silenced.

It wasn't perfect by any stretch of the imagination but have to admit the cake turned out pretty good: It was tasty as heck and didn't look like it had been hit by a bus or dropped from a third floor window, either.

In fact, my handiwork was even declared "best wedding cake ever" by a large and independent collection of unsolicited wedding-goers -- which made the whole process totally worth it.

If I was a cake inspector, I'd give it a 90%, or 4.5 stars out of a possible five, depending on the grading system.

Bill McConnell told me in 8th grade home ec that I'll "make a good woman some day." Well, if cake-baking is a requirement of said status, it appears that, at the ripe old age of 26, I may finally be on my way.

At any rate, here's the example that I modeled my design after (top left), the final product (bottom left), and plan B (the obvious right) which was ultimately deemed unnecessary:








No comments: