A week of baking...Vintage floral wedding cake - Venue set-up - Day 6

As Friday was the big day, I spent Thursday afternoon and evening making sure I had everything ready to be transported to the wedding venue, packing it all into boxes to make sure everything was secure and sorted.

Once the figures had dried, I marked their position on the top tier so I would just be able to place them onto the cake once I was at the venue. I also had a play with the rose petals to make sure that they would compliment the design. Ideally I think I would have liked them to be smaller so they were in proportion with the figures, but I think they looked good and gave a lovely effect to the finished cake.

We managed to get everything to the venue in one piece with me cradling the roses in their polystyrene tin. It was a very careful drive with a small heart attack every time we had to go over any speed bumps, but luckily there were no casualties. 

We assembled the cake stand and also the cupcake wrappers, and then started to fill the tiers. Until you start to see your design and all of the different elements come together, it can be very difficult to visualise how it's going to look, but I was so pleased with the outcome.

Once we had filled the bottom two tiers to add a little stability, I stuck the figures to the top of the cake with some royal icing, then stuck the rose petals around their feet. Then using a cake lifter I carefully put the cake on top of the stand. I was so worried that it would wobble, collapse or any number of catastrophes would occur, but it all went smoothly. I then propped up the rose by using balls of sugar paste, one to attach the base of the cocktail stick to the stand and the other to prop up the petals so they didn't have to take the weight of the entire rose. I also use some more royal icing to make doubly sure that it wouldn't move and then we filled the rest of the tiers with a mixture of the different cupcakes.

Once everything was assembled, I also re-lustred the white parts of the figures to make sure that any finger marks were removed and they looked their very best.

Unfortunately when we had a play with some spare cupcakes on the stand on Wednesday, we realised that unfortunately all 80 cupcakes wouldn't fit. I spoke to the hotel and they said that they had some vintage stands that we could use to take the overflow. I added the second rose to one of the stands and secured it in the same way as the stand and then filled them up with the rest of the cupcakes and the remaining rose petals which were put on a separate table next to the main cake stand.

I am so pleased with the final outcome of the creation of my very first wedding cake. I have learnt so much and I will take these lessons and will apply them to all my creations in the future, but mostly I was so pleased that I was able to provide a small contribution to make a wedding as special as possible. I really hope the married couple enjoyed cutting it and the guests enjoyed eating it as much as I enjoyed making it. 

A week of baking...Vintage floral wedding cake - Cupcakes - Days 4 and 5

The last two days I have been baking and decorating the cupcakes for the wedding cake. The Bride requested 40 vanilla and 40 chocolate, so to start with I got set up with my trusty chocolate cupcake recipe! It always turns out well and it's always very tasty, so off I went.

Setting up ready for baking.

I always use an ice cream scoop to measure out my batter into the cupcake cases as it makes even cupcakes that rise well, are fairly level and taste good!

I was really pleased once they has baked and I removed them from the tin ready to cool. Then all of a sudden, disaster! The cupcake cases started to peel away and leave gaps all the way around the cakes! I was really disappointed and had to make another batch in the end as some of them were not able to be saved. However, I was hopeful that once they were iced, I would be able to save them. 

Lesson 1: You get what you pay for with cupcakes cases

My second batch of vanilla cupcakes was much better. I used cupcakes cases from Squires and they were fine. I used a recipe from Peggy Porschen (again!) and it worked very well with a delicious vanilla smell. 

Lesson 2: Use the sugar syrup glaze as directed, it will improve the finished result

This morning I was getting ready to ice and decorate the cupcakes, my favourite bit! I used The Hummingbird Bakery recipe for the buttercream, as it is always a hit. I bought new nozzles and piping bags from Lakeland which were a great buy. The bags have a nobbly silicone finish that let you grip the bag properly, even when you're covered in butter!

To colour the pink I added Rose gel colour to the buttercream bit by bit to build up the colour.

It may have been the yellow of the butter but it took a few drops more than I had anticipated to go from peach to pink. I was a little worried that I wouldn't get the best shade, as the cases were a little bright and any pink would clash. However, the one I arrived at I think worked well, and it is very difficult to go back a shade!

For some reason the pink buttercream looked a little warm when I piped it, but as it set, it stopped looking too wet. 

When I added the roses and the pearls, it all came together and I was really pleased with how pretty the finished result was.

I was even more pleased with the outcome of the lilac butterfly cupcakes. I have never been a big fan of lavender or lilac, however I was really pleased with the shade of the buttercream and the butterflies looked so pretty perched on top like they had just flown onto them and landed.

Lesson 3: Do more with lilac and lavender!

A close up of the lavender cupcakes with their sugar pearls and lavender hand painted butterflies with lustre.

The pink chocolate cupcakes with sugar pearls

The pink and lilac cupcakes together with the butterflies, roses and sugar pearls. 

I have to admit, 80 cupcakes all lined up did look like quite an achievement, and I'm looking forward to seeing them all stacked up on their cake stand tomorrow!

A week of baking...Vintage floral wedding cake - Top tier - Day 3

Of all the days that I had marked out on the timetable for the wedding cake, unfortunately today has been the one I was least looking forward to. Covering cakes with fondant seems to be my nemesis. I can always get it looking ok, and it tends to be passable, but it's the one thing that I just cannot seem to perfect, and it does fill me with dread and stress when I have to do it. However, I will not be deterred, and as you can see below the end result was actually quite pretty.

I set up all my equipment for baking this morning, using yet another Peggy Porschen recipe. Instead of whole vanilla beans I used Taylor & Colledge Organic Vanilla Bean Paste which I have to say was delicious! It contains the seeds of the vanilla pod so you get a pretty speckled look to your batter and I also added half a teaspoon to the vanilla buttercream which gave a delicious taste. You can find out more about Taylor & Colledge here. 

Once the cakes were baked and cooled, I levelled them all to make sure they they were all flat.

Next I spread a thin layer of buttercream onto the cake board to keep the bottom layer in place.

I then started to layer the cake. When making Victoria sponges before with jam, I have sometimes had an issue with the jam seeping out and staining the buttercream and sugar paste covering, so this time I made a dipped ridge all the way around the outside with the buttercream, and added the jam to the centre.

This meant that when I sandwiched the next layer on top, the jam stayed securely inside, meaning no leakages, yay!

I have never done this with a cake before, but I actually go a spirit level out and placed it on top of a cake lifter to check it was level, and to my amazement it was pretty spot on! I then put a wooden dowel through the centre of the cake to keep everything centred.

I invested in a side scraper for this cake, and it really does make a difference when putting on the crumb coat. Everything looked neat and precise and was perfect ready to go into the fridge for a chill.

Once the cake had chilled, I put the first layer of sugar paste on down to the bottom of the cake to make sure that the sides down to the board were straight. I was not happy with the bottom layer so I covered the icing with a thin coat of clear alcohol and added the second layer.

With some judicious smoothing I was fairly happy with the top layer so I cut my ribbons to length ready to be attached.

For the satin ribbon I used a thin layer of water added with a paintbrush to stick it to the sugar paste, however the lace was trickier. I made up a sugar glue from icing sugar and water, dotted a small amount on to each petal of the flower in the lace and then held it in place until it dried. Maybe it was because I was at the same level as the cake for a long time that I began to notice a few more flaws...!

Once the ribbon was attached I had a play with all of the sugar paste elements to check the colours. The rose petals are going to look lovely against the nude cream and the lace, and even through the butterflies and small roses will be on the cupcakes, it was just nice to see that the colours for the whole display will work well together.

A week of baking...Vintage floral wedding cake - Sugarcraft - Day 2

Yesterday and today I have continued with my sugarcraft preparations as I needed to finish off my roses and bring a bit more life to my hand moulded roses and butterflies.

The next stage of the roses was to use a larger cutter to cut out seven more petals to build up the layers around the central bud. The petals had to be left for a little while so they dried slightly but were still malleable when added to the rose. I used this dimpled foam tray to give them a little shape whilst they were drying and the shape gives the petals a chance to curl.

Once the next layer was added, the rose has to dry upside down. This is the bit I hate as I'm always terrified all my delicate petals are going to crack and break, but the stiffener kneaded into the sugar paste at the beginning really comes into its own here and keeps the flower strong. Gravity also helps the petals to stick to the bud before you start adding more layers.

Whilst the roses were drying, I started to add the coloured lustre to the small hand moulded roses. I use a small amount of 'Very berry' to add a light pink shimmer to the centre of the rose, then went over all of the petals in a light metallic to add shimmer and dimension.

The addition of a little colour really brings the flowers to life and gives them just a hint of sparkle.

Once the roses had had been drying for half an hour, I cut out anther nine large petals and left these to dry slightly. These are the biggest petals I have used so far, and the first attempt did not go very well as they all flopped off as I tried to add them to the rose! On the second attempt and by overlapping the petals more underneath each other as I went around I was really pleased with my rose! 

At this stage the rose needs to rest for another half an hour upside down so gravity can do its work again.

Once half an hour is up, I poked a hole in the bottom of a cupcake case and sat the rose into it. This allows the rose to open up again very slightly without the petals falling off. At this point I left the rose to dry completely overnight.

The next step was to decorate my plain white butterflies. I thought they looked a little dull just with a white and shimmer lustre, so I added a little lilac details to their wings with some food colouring.

They looked a little vibrant once painted as the scheme is more towards a lilac than a purple, however  I left them to dry overnight and decided to look at them again in the morning.

When I began to add the pearlised lustre to the butterflies, it muted the cover to a lovely shimmery lilac which I was really pleased with. The shimmer isn't so noticeable as it is on the roses, but when you catch it in the right light it is very pretty. 

The final step was to add a little shimmer to my large roses. They did look very pretty as they were, however with the addition of the lustre it brought them to life and made them look lovely and dewy. I now have a lovely rose for the top cake plus a spare in case anything should happen. I also made some extra rose petals to add around the rose once it is positioned on the top of the cake to fill any gaps. 

The next step, bake all of the cakes, eek!