How To Choose Your Wedding Cake
How to choose your perfect wedding cake - Part 1
A wedding cake is one of the most personal expressions of style that you can have on a wedding day, almost as important as the dress! There are so many styles and shapes and sizes to choose from, it can get quite complicated - there is just so much choice!
To help you plan your dream wedding cake, I have created this quick guide to lead you through the process of designing a unique and individual wedding cake that will match your theme and your personality perfectly.
I call these “Bespoke” wedding cakes, but just because they are a design I haven’t made before doesn’t mean they will cost a fortune. I price my cakes solely on the amount of work involved to produce them, and in fact, I much prefer it when my customers have great imaginations, and a strong sense of what they want their cake to look like.
The first thing to do is to decide on an overall style. There are hundreds of styles out there and sometimes it can seem overwhelming but they usually are in one of 4 main categories:
Stacked Pyramid
The most common style these days is a stacked pyramid cake, where each tier is directly on top of the previous one. There is no limit to the number of tiers you can have and it is not necessary to have fruit cake on the bottom (despite popular belief).
Pillared pyramid
The most traditional style is a pillared pyramid cake where the tiers are separated from each other by either columns, a drum or cylinder.
As before, there is no limit to the height or flavour of cake but any more than 6 tiers can get a bit unstable.
Stands
Using a stand for your cake is yet another approach you can use that allows for much larger displays on each cake as the tiers are exposed.
Cupcake Towers
Cupcake towers are a modern alternative to traditional cakes where individual cupcakes are placed on a specially made stand which can be adapted to display between 20-120 cakes with a small cutting cake on top.
Your guests will have their own individually decorated cake, and you will still have an elegant and beautiful display, and have a cake to cut for photos.
How to choose your perfect wedding cake - Part 2
The next step in designing your perfect wedding cake is choosing what size it will be. It is completely up to you although the most common way is to decide how many portions you want to get from it. This can be based on the number of guests attending the wedding plus any you might want to save or any that you want to give to guests unable to attend.
These days people like their cake to make an impression on their guests sop usually (if budget allows) like a large extravagant cake. If you would like a large cake but only have a few guests you can have some of the cake made from polystyrene dummies decorated the same as the cake so that it really makes an impact (and no-one will ever know it’s not real).
And vice versa, if your budget is really tight or you are transporting it a long way, you can have a smaller or simpler cake.
Here is a quick guide for helping you work out how many portions each size tier of wedding cake can make. Remember though, it depends entirely on the size of the portion you intend to provide for your guests. Most wedding cake providers will tell quote you portion sizes based on a 1” square. I prefer to quote based on a 2” x 1” portion, so each of your guests get a reasonable sized piece of cake.
Tier/Cake sizeNo. of Portions
4”10
6”20
8”30
10”50
12”75
14”100
6”, 8”, & 10” (3 tier)100
8”, 10” & 12” (3 tier)155
6”, 8”, 10, & 12” (4 tier)175
How to choose your perfect wedding cake - Part 3
Just as important as how your wedding cake looks, is how it tastes! Traditionally, wedding cakes were only made from fruit cake, the only type of cake that was dense enough to support the complex tiered architecture.
However these days, fruit cake isn’t very popular, especially given the many delicious alternatives.
Thanks to some clever hidden engineering, a good wedding cake bakery can make any type of cake can be made into any structure.
Why not try a decadent chocolate fudge cake with velvety chocolate Ganache or a gorgeously light Genoese sponge with deliciously smooth Italian meringue buttercream?
Another nice idea is to match the outside with the inside. For example, if your wedding colour is lilac, how about using fresh blackberries in the filling to echo the theme inside and out?
How to choose your perfect wedding cake - Part 4
The final part of designing your wedding cake is the decoration. I’m sure for many of you, decoration would be first on the list, but I find that it helps to know what platform you are working with before you decide how it will be decorated
It also helps you make sure you stay within your budget while making sure all your guests get a piece of cake. Decoration can account for up to 75% of the cost of a heavily decorated cake, and decoration cost will increase rapidly with size, so make sure you have the right size of cake before you work out how much decoration your budget will allow you to afford.
When it comes to choosing a design for your wedding cake, I like to guide my clients, and I give as much help as they need, but I don’t like making decisions for them. Some couples opt for cakes they have seen on my website, but most like working with me to come up with a unique design.
Wedding cake bakeries differ on this policy, but I don’t charge any extra for making bespoke cakes, I price all my cakes entirely on the amount of work it would take to create the cake.
If you are designing your own cake, I find the best source of inspiration is your own wedding! I always recommend to my customers to bring pictures of their dress, flowers and invitations etc so that we can design a cake that fits perfectly with the rest of the wedding. A lot of brides also like to look on Google Image Search. There are hundreds of thousands of pictures of cakes on the internet, and Google allows you to narrow them down by colour, decoration type, even by the type of flowers in the decoration.
Once you have collected all your sources of inspiration, they can all be incorporated into one cake design. I hope that with the help of this guide, you can turn all of your ideas into the wedding cake you’ve always wanted. If you need more help, your wedding cake baker will be able to add their experience.
Fliss designs and makes wedding cakes in Altrincham in Cheshire. You can see more of her work at her Website: www.flissycakes.com read her blog: www.flissycakes.com/blog and connect on Facebook:
www.facebook.com/flissycakes and Twitter: www.twitter.com/flissycakes
A wedding cake is one of the most personal expressions of style that you can have on a wedding day, almost as important as the dress! There are so many styles and shapes and sizes to choose from, it can get quite complicated - there is just so much choice!
To help you plan your dream wedding cake, I have created this quick guide to lead you through the process of designing a unique and individual wedding cake that will match your theme and your personality perfectly.
I call these “Bespoke” wedding cakes, but just because they are a design I haven’t made before doesn’t mean they will cost a fortune. I price my cakes solely on the amount of work involved to produce them, and in fact, I much prefer it when my customers have great imaginations, and a strong sense of what they want their cake to look like.
The first thing to do is to decide on an overall style. There are hundreds of styles out there and sometimes it can seem overwhelming but they usually are in one of 4 main categories:
Stacked Pyramid
The most common style these days is a stacked pyramid cake, where each tier is directly on top of the previous one. There is no limit to the number of tiers you can have and it is not necessary to have fruit cake on the bottom (despite popular belief).
Pillared pyramid
The most traditional style is a pillared pyramid cake where the tiers are separated from each other by either columns, a drum or cylinder.
As before, there is no limit to the height or flavour of cake but any more than 6 tiers can get a bit unstable.
Stands
Using a stand for your cake is yet another approach you can use that allows for much larger displays on each cake as the tiers are exposed.
Cupcake Towers
Cupcake towers are a modern alternative to traditional cakes where individual cupcakes are placed on a specially made stand which can be adapted to display between 20-120 cakes with a small cutting cake on top.
Your guests will have their own individually decorated cake, and you will still have an elegant and beautiful display, and have a cake to cut for photos.
How to choose your perfect wedding cake - Part 2
The next step in designing your perfect wedding cake is choosing what size it will be. It is completely up to you although the most common way is to decide how many portions you want to get from it. This can be based on the number of guests attending the wedding plus any you might want to save or any that you want to give to guests unable to attend.
These days people like their cake to make an impression on their guests sop usually (if budget allows) like a large extravagant cake. If you would like a large cake but only have a few guests you can have some of the cake made from polystyrene dummies decorated the same as the cake so that it really makes an impact (and no-one will ever know it’s not real).
And vice versa, if your budget is really tight or you are transporting it a long way, you can have a smaller or simpler cake.
Here is a quick guide for helping you work out how many portions each size tier of wedding cake can make. Remember though, it depends entirely on the size of the portion you intend to provide for your guests. Most wedding cake providers will tell quote you portion sizes based on a 1” square. I prefer to quote based on a 2” x 1” portion, so each of your guests get a reasonable sized piece of cake.
Tier/Cake sizeNo. of Portions
4”10
6”20
8”30
10”50
12”75
14”100
6”, 8”, & 10” (3 tier)100
8”, 10” & 12” (3 tier)155
6”, 8”, 10, & 12” (4 tier)175
How to choose your perfect wedding cake - Part 3
Just as important as how your wedding cake looks, is how it tastes! Traditionally, wedding cakes were only made from fruit cake, the only type of cake that was dense enough to support the complex tiered architecture.
However these days, fruit cake isn’t very popular, especially given the many delicious alternatives.
Thanks to some clever hidden engineering, a good wedding cake bakery can make any type of cake can be made into any structure.
Why not try a decadent chocolate fudge cake with velvety chocolate Ganache or a gorgeously light Genoese sponge with deliciously smooth Italian meringue buttercream?
Another nice idea is to match the outside with the inside. For example, if your wedding colour is lilac, how about using fresh blackberries in the filling to echo the theme inside and out?
How to choose your perfect wedding cake - Part 4
The final part of designing your wedding cake is the decoration. I’m sure for many of you, decoration would be first on the list, but I find that it helps to know what platform you are working with before you decide how it will be decorated
It also helps you make sure you stay within your budget while making sure all your guests get a piece of cake. Decoration can account for up to 75% of the cost of a heavily decorated cake, and decoration cost will increase rapidly with size, so make sure you have the right size of cake before you work out how much decoration your budget will allow you to afford.
When it comes to choosing a design for your wedding cake, I like to guide my clients, and I give as much help as they need, but I don’t like making decisions for them. Some couples opt for cakes they have seen on my website, but most like working with me to come up with a unique design.
Wedding cake bakeries differ on this policy, but I don’t charge any extra for making bespoke cakes, I price all my cakes entirely on the amount of work it would take to create the cake.
If you are designing your own cake, I find the best source of inspiration is your own wedding! I always recommend to my customers to bring pictures of their dress, flowers and invitations etc so that we can design a cake that fits perfectly with the rest of the wedding. A lot of brides also like to look on Google Image Search. There are hundreds of thousands of pictures of cakes on the internet, and Google allows you to narrow them down by colour, decoration type, even by the type of flowers in the decoration.
Once you have collected all your sources of inspiration, they can all be incorporated into one cake design. I hope that with the help of this guide, you can turn all of your ideas into the wedding cake you’ve always wanted. If you need more help, your wedding cake baker will be able to add their experience.
Fliss designs and makes wedding cakes in Altrincham in Cheshire. You can see more of her work at her Website: www.flissycakes.com read her blog: www.flissycakes.com/blog and connect on Facebook:
www.facebook.com/flissycakes and Twitter: www.twitter.com/flissycakes
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