A Three Tiered Cake: Adam Gets in on the Wedding Planning!

Adam and I had the nicest talk today.  I told Adam about hunt for a three tiered cake that would be the right size for our small wedding guest list.  He doesn’t act too excited about most of my wedding planning (but how many grooms do?) but the one thing that never fails to pique his interest is the cake. 

By this point I had tasted wedding cakes from a handful of places at various bridal shows.  One place I had checked out was Cakes for Occasions.  They were at the Danversport Bridal show in February.  People at work rave about their gourmet cakes.  So I inquired about if they could make a three tier cake for my small guest list; I figure when the time comes I want to price shop and make an informed decision.  Unfortunately they said the smallest three tier cake they could make for a wedding was for 150 people.  So unless I have each guest bring home 5 or so pieces of cake, that’s not happening.

But there was another place I really liked that was at two separate bridal shows I went to. So I mentioned to Adam about their wedding cake flavors.  At first he said he wants a white (on the inside) cake, but I told him it’s boring, hah.  But I let him know that the beauty of a three tier wedding cake (other than the visual beauty, heh) is that we can pick different flavors for each tier!  I told him I want to pick a tier and he can pick a tier (and he can even have the big bottom tier).  So he got more adventurous, and we perused their online menu.  Now he’s leaning toward red velvet cake with black cherry frosting.  I’m leaning toward a lemon cake with raspberry preserves.  I think they’re both going to be awesome!

Once his appetite was whetted, he even started to get into the LOOK of the cake.  He showed me one, let’s say “whimsical” tier cake and I said no.  He laughed that I just shut him down instantly and I told him sorry, he can have the flavor he likes for his tier, but I am going to be very picky about the look of the cake.  I want it white.  Just white.  And a very traditional three tier cake with some sort of filigree.  The purple stripes and flowers on the black and white cake was NOT going to cut it for me at all (as always, no offense if this sounds like your dream cake, it’s just not the style I’m going for).  So he admitted that when he thinks of wedding cake, he thinks white and traditional is preferable too, and was just teasing me.  So he linked me to another tier cake.  That was the one.  That’s it.  So long as the price is as good as the taste, I’ve got my baker and I won’t even need to go the custom route.  I can point to the three tier cake on their website and tell them “do that again, for us please.” 

Maybe we’ll collaborate on the top tier, but that’s a conversation (and post) for another day.  Plus if I can manage to get him to the place for a tasting, we might find we enjoy a different flavor than we expect.
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Photos courtesy of:
Afroswede          Cherry Pi           Frostnova     
Samdogs             Caribou               Daveynin
Soa2002              Donnaphoto     Amy the Nurse
Basykes              Phil_g                   Karla Cakes        

Sizing up a Traditional Three Tier Wedding Cake

Besides the hors d’ourves, the next best thing at the bridal shows are the wedding cakes.  I’m not sure exactly what sort of decorations or colors I want, but I AM sure I want a traditional, round, three tier wedding cake for my wedding.  I want my wedding to have lots of traditional elements: fancy white dress, classical music, and to me, nothing says classic wedding like a three tier wedding cake.  So I was excited to find that vendors brought samples of their gourmet cakes to try. 

Spinellis had several gourmet cakes on display.  I wasn’t sure what look I really wanted though.  I thought of my color palette, with the orange, pink, and purple.  Should I get flowers on it?  That does seem to be the trend with gourmet cakes for weddings, it seems.  There was a very pretty three tier wedding cake with orchids cascading down.  I do love orchids.  But I feel like those bold colors I plan for my color scheme are too much of a contrast with the white.  I would prefer the intricate filigree to be the center of attention on the cake.  For me, I think that I want to look across the reception and see my white three tier wedding cake; not the colors, just the silhouette.  I want the close up photos of it to show the elegant filigree decorating it, but I don’t want to see that from far away.  Just nice and subtle.

So I tried the different gourmet cakes at Spinellis.  Instead of going for the chocolate (as usual) I thought the white cake with raspberry mousse frosting.  It really was nice and light with whipped cream mixed in.  It’s no wonder people rave about their cakes at work.  Could do with some sliced strawberries in the center though!  Mom liked the chocolate too, I just figured I’d try the white cake since that’s Adam’s go-to flavor for special events. 

Since Spinellis was my first ever bridal show, I didn’t know what sort of questions to even ask at that point.  After the show some questions started popping up in my mind.  For one thing, if I’m only going to have less than 20 guests, won’t a three tier wedding cake be WAY too big!?  I felt so down about this; I had my heart set on that silhouette.  I started to feel bad about having a small wedding, and wondered what other things I’d end up not being able to do up as grand as I envisioned.

However a month or so later I went to a second bridal show in Haverhill, at the Bradford Country club.  This wasn’t as fun; there was less food, and they stuck us in a tent on a FREEZING night.  I didn’t realize it was going to be outdoors so I didn’t dress for it.  But the one thing that made up for this place was the gourmet cakes that we got to sample.  This one was even better than Spinellis.  It was moist and the frosting was not too sugary.  It was nice and creamy but light.  They were beautiful too, so I asked if they could make a three tier wedding cake for 20 guests, and they said yes!  THAT was a load off my mind.  The dream of my three tier wedding cake was ON!

When I got home that night I looked around online to see what the average price of a wedding cake costs.  It appears that the average price for gourmet cakes is $5 or $6 per slice.  That doesn’t seem too bad, given the importance and design of it.  I saved the information from the baker I enjoyed, but I’ll still shop around.
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Photos courtesy of:
Afroswede          Cherry Pi           Frostnova     
Samdogs             Caribou               Daveynin
Soa2002              Donnaphoto     Amy the Nurse
Basykes              Phil_g                   Karla Cakes