This week on The Discovery Channel was Shark Week. Since I have a wedding cake to do next Saturday, I have decided to make next week "Cake Week." Wedding cakes, you see, are not a one day event. They take planning, shopping, piping, mixing, and baking ahead of time all week- especially if you don't want a cake that was previously frozen.
Of course I learned a ton in pastry school, but there are a lot of things that can only be acquired by field experience. For example, the woes and triumphs of making a wedding cake for 100 people at home in my very non industrial kitchen. This includes baking 5 sheet cakes one (possibly 2) at a time, and many, many batches of buttercream icing in my 5 quart Kitchen Aid stand mixer.


Another thing I never learned at school was where to find one of these cake stands on which to place the finished product. They are bloody expensive and I don't want to have to buy one. I called the reception site, and they said they had a round one- a lot of good that did me since I need a square one. I think I can rent one somewhere.... I am also looking forward to the challenge of transporting all the elements of a three-tiered wedding cake from my house to the reception site without smashing it all into bits.
Needless to say my blogging next week will probably be insanely dramatic with all the bi-polar ups and downs, victories and failures, baking and baking again.....I will take lots of pictures, hopefully none of them consist of my crying and/or throwing my cake on the wall. Shark Week, step aside. This will have you gripping the edge of your seat!


And God bless the UK!