Becca's Bakes: My very first Wedding Cake

The time has come. The moment has arrived. The day is here.

I 'm going to tell you all about my foray into the world of wedding cakes.
Firstly though,I'd just like to say a missive Congratulations to my cousin and his new wife on tying the knot last weekend!! It was a beautiful day and I was so honored to play even my small part.

I was asked by my cousin and his fiancée to make them a three tier fruit cake to go with the cheese rounds they were also having (Nic is from Yorkshire where apparently it's traditional to have your cheese on your fruit cake as opposed to on a cracker. As a Southerner I had never heard of this tradition, but I have to say it does work). Their theme was Autumn with orange chair sashes and orange flowers with lots of greenery so I went looking for ribbons and food colourings to match.

The equipment you'll need for a professional cake:
Electric hand whisk
large mixing bowls
long, non-stick rolling pin
cake smoothers
tape measure
cake tins (5, 8 and 11 inch)
cake boards (5, 8, 13 inch - the cake will look better and be easier to carry on a board bigger than the bottom tier)
dowling rods
cocktail sticks
cake boxes (to transport)

I made the cakes themselves about 5 weeks before the wedding to give me lots of time to 'feed' the cake with brandy, make the decorations and worry about the fondant icing.

So for my three tiers I did an 11 inch, an 8 inch and a 5 inch. I made the 11 inch cake one day and then the 8 and 5 inch cakes the day after as otherwise the oven would probably have gone into meltdown after being on for 7 hours.

Another important thing is to mix the cakes separately. There is no point whacking all three cakes worth of mixture into one bowl, partly because there is no bowl in the world big enough to hold that amount of mixture, but also because you'll more than likely end up with un-even cakes which will lead to never ending faff. So, measuring your ingredients. Luckily for you, I have already done the difficult dividing and multiplying. However, if you decide to do different sized tins to me, you're on your own.

So, for the 5 inch cake you'll need:

150g currants

60g sultanas

60g raisins

20g glace cherries

20g mixed candied peel

1 tbs brandy (I decided that since the top tier was specifically for the bride and groom that I upped this to a full shot of brandy. Cheeky!)

75g plain flour

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp mixed spice

20g whole almonds

75g soft brown sugar

1 tsp black treacle

75g butter

1 egg

1/4 of a lemon, zested

1/4 of an orange, zested

For the 8 inch cake:

450g currants

175g sultanas

175g raisins

50g glace cherries

50g mixed candied peel

3 tablespoons brandy

225g plain flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon mixed spice

50g whole almonds

225g butter

225g soft brown sugar

4 eggs

1 desp black treacle

Zest of 1 lemon

Zest of 1 orange

And for the 11 inch cake:

900g currants

350g sultanas

350g raisins

110g glace cherries

110g mixed candied peel

6 tablespoons brandy

450g plain flour

3/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon mixed spice

110g whole almonds

450g butter

450g soft brown sugar

8 eggs

1 1/2 tbs black treacle

Zest of 2 lemons

Zest of 2 oranges

Also, you'll need:
3kg white fondant icing
food colouring of for choice
2kg marzipan
1 jar apricot glaze
3 metres ribbon (matched to food colouring)
edible gold luster dust

You can follow the same instructions for all three cakes, just adjust your mixing times as the bigger cakes need longer mixing to ensure even distribution.

You need to start the cake the day before so make sure you have the full weekend available, if not longer.

Weigh out the dried fruits, cherries and mixed peel into three large mixing bowls, one for each cake's ingredients, and pour over the brandy and mix together. Cover the bowls with a tea towel and leave at room temperature over night, or until you're ready to make the cake.

You need to line your cake tins using a double strip of silicone paper (baking parchment), cut slightly longer than the circumference of the tin. Fold back 1 inch (2.5 cm) along its length and snip this at intervals, cutting at a slight angle to the fold.

Grease the tin then press the paper around the sides – it should sit comfortably around the sides of the tin. Finally, cut a double circle of paper – using the tin as a template – to fit the base and press into place

Brown paper is then tied around the outside of the tin, to protect the cake during the long, slow cooking. Pre-heat the oven to 140oC.

To make the large cake weigh out all the remaining ingredients. Chop the almonds and put everything into the biggest bowl you have (I used my mum's preserving pan for this as it's so huge) and use an electric hand mixed to whip everything together. Add the fruit and mix well for a good five-ten minutes to make sure all the fruit is well mixed in.

Pour the mix into the prepared tin. Finally, cover the top of the cake with a double sheet of silicone paper with a 50p-sized hole in the centre. It is now ready for the oven – bake on the lowest shelf of the oven for 5 - 5 1/2 hours. Sometimes it can take up to half an hour longer than this, but don't look until at least 4 1/2 hours have passed.

The 8 inch cake will take 4 - 4 1/2 hours and the 5 inch will need 2 3/4 - 3 hours.

You'll know when the cake is cooked because it will spring back when lightly pressed with your finger and the edged of the cake are slightly shrinking from the sides of the tin.

Leave to cool for an hour in the tin before turning them out onto a wire rack. When they're completely cold, take a metal skewer and, working from the outside in, prick the cake all the way through and then spoon over between ten to fifteen tablespoons of brandy. Adjust this amount for each cake and to your preference. You don't even need to feed the cake at all but I feel the flavour of all the fruits with the brandy is sublime.

Now it's time to wrap for cakes in a double layer of grease proof paper, then a double layer of foil and keep them stored in an air tight container, feeding them with more brandy once a week.
A week before you want to fondant ice the cakes, you'll need to marzipan them. To do this, you'll need to either make or buy enough marzipan (almond paste) to cover all three cakes. I bought mine as from past experience the shop bought stuff tastes just as good as homemade and involves much less stress. So a 454g pack of Sainsbury's white marzipan will cover the 8 inch cake and 2 packets will cover the 11 inch with enough off cuts from both to cover the 5 inch but I'd still buy 4 packs just to be on the safe side.
Marzipan is more difficult to work with than the fondant itself. You'll need to knead the paste for a good ten minutes until it becomes pliable and then roll it out between two sheets of grease proof paper.
Elevate the cakes so that you can get at the bottom edges to create smooth joins. I propped the large cake on an upturned tea tray, which not only raised it two inches off the table but also made it easier to pivot the gargantuan cake.
You need to brush the cake all over with apricot glaze (also available in Sainsbury's) or some sieved apricot jam to adhere the marzipan to the cake.
Once its rolled out evenly to the size you want it, peel off one side of the grease proof paper and lift the marzipan over the cake. Peel off the rest of the paper and smooth the marzipan over the top and sides of the cake. Smooth it all the way down and trim off the excess, cutting as close to the cake as possible. At this stage you need to adhere the cakes to the cake boards using royal icing. The marzipan needs at least 3 days to dry out otherwise the oil will stain your white fondant.

Now we come to the fun part - decorations!!!

I've talked about making sugar roses before in a previous blog, and if you find it, you'll see for yourself how far my roses have come along from my first attempts.

What you do is take a lump of sugar paste and roll it into a sausage. The thicker the sausage (no comment necessary) the bigger the rose. Then cut this sausage into around 12 equal parts (don't worry if they aren't exact). Roll each piece into a ball. Take a plastic wallet and cut off the side and the bottom so that it flaps open like a book. Put your little paste balls onto one side of the folder and bring over the other side. Using the side of your thumb, gently press down on the first ball about half way down, stretching the paste until it looks like a petal - don't make it too thin on the edges though. As you can see, my first attempts were a smidge wonky.
So flatten out all your petals. To begin, take the smallest of your petals and roll it into a tight scroll which will resemble the very middle of a rose. Now to build the rose. Take a petal and hold it half way up the scroll. Wrap it around and cone and admire the beginnings of a rose bud. Put the next petal over the join on the first petal, and the third petal over the join of the second, leaving one side of the petal open. Slide the fourth petal into the third, the fifth into the fourth and so on. After six or so petals have been added, start to fold back the tips of the petals so it looks like it's opening up as once you've completed the rose it's difficult to get at the inner petals. Keep adding more petals, folding out and pinching as you go to create little folds in the flower. The more petals you add the more open it will become.

Once the roses are dry you can brush them with edible gold luster dust which adds a lovely shimmer to the flowers.

First attempts

Getting better .....

So, we've reached the moment of truth. It's fondant time. Try not to panic.

Clear a big space in your kitchen and make sure it's spotlessly clean. Any markings or crumbs will be picked up by the fondant, leading to discolouration and an emotional breakdown.

For the big cake, use a full kilo of fondant. You won't need this much and there'll be lots of trimmings (which you can colour and use for decorations) but better to have too much than not enough). The 8 inch needs 3/4 a kilo and the small one around 1/2 a kilo.

Knead your desired amount of icing on your surface WITHOUT icing sugar until it's really nice and smooth and pliable. Excess icing sugar will lead to the icing drying out and cracking (and another breakdown). When it comes to rolling, dust the work surface with a little icing sugar and roll out to the right size.

Brush the marzipan with apricot glaze melted with a tablespoon of brandy (this mix acts as both glue for the icing and also as a mould repellent).

Gently lift the disk of fondant onto your forearms and drape it over the cake. Smooth any creases, easing the fondant over the sides and down to the board where you can trim off the excess. If any air bubbles form under the icing, use a pin to burst them and then smooth over the hole. At this stage, grab your cake smoothers and smooth the top and sides of the cakes until you're happy with the finish. Now would be a good time to affix the ribbon too, again using royal icing.

Doweling rods are massively important in tiered cakes. They ensure the cakes don’t sink into each other. They also keep the cakes level. You need to measure them by inserting the rod into the center of the cake and making a mark on the rod to indicate the length. Using a hack saw (and a man capable of using one) cut them to size. Then use a measuring tape to work out where the upper tier will sit and then insert the cut rods into position.

I decided to travel to the wedding with the cakes separate to avoid any disasters. I packed the cakes into their individual boxes and put the roses into a tin lined with tinfoil moulded into cups to hold each rose.
On the morning of the wedding my parents helped me with the assembly. I used more royal icing to stick the stacked cakes together and then used cocktail sticks to position the roses.

My cousin, Tom, had been obsessed with lego as a child (and he turned out to be an engineer so it's served him well) hence the lego cake topper.
I was so honored to be asked to make this cake for Tom and Nic. I'd never made a wedding cake before and so for them to trust me to do it justice was really lovely. I felt like a proud mum standing next to it! I had a bit of a tear in my eye when they cut it, but I'm pretty sure it was tears of happiness as opposed to annoyance that they'd just sliced through a month of my life.