I just think it's ugly.

Cake wrecks!
 

THIS IS AWESOME! I looked at back blogs for hours. Thanks KSUViolet for sharing.

I guess I should have followed up this cake drama. Our cake and baker were fantastic. We ended up with 3 tiers with a cookies and cream filling (yes, it was oreos ground up with buttercream...omnomnom). Delivered to the venue more than on time, done exactly how we asked him to. He did a super good job of replicating the above cake based on a photo. Even improvised the pearls...in the original, they were like a hard sugar pearl, but my grandfather has dentures so in our cake they were just little fondant pearls. Did I mention that it was cheaper/around the same price as the original drama bakery cake? Did I also mention how lovely this guy is? And how good his cookies are? If anyone in Pittsburgh needs a cake, send me a PM and I'll put you in contact.

Here's the final result
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y42...xAzul/cake.jpg

I love it - it's gorgeous! The story, the cake, the finished product. If you want to PM me the baker, I'll love you forever! Did you say he does the cookies, too? As in Cookie Table cookies? Wow!

Quoted for awesomeness and win.

That cake looks amazing- and a great story too!

Being fresh out of Culinary School (Pastry), and after reading through this thread, I wanted to give those who do not like fondant and have ideas in mind that a buttercream will not work....you may want to ask your Pastry Chef about using modeling chocolate...whether it be dark/milk/white chocolate or as someone stated earlier in the thread marizpan, but if you want a white cake, white modeling chocolate will work great.

For those budget conscious wedding party people: An idea of you don't want to spend too much money on a wedding cake: Have them decorate as elaborate as your budget will allow a bunch of styrofoam rounds (or whichever shape you want) in fondant, with a cutout for a real cake insert and then have them bake full sheetcakes with the flavors of your choice.

Great tips! Thanks for posting these. I used to work @ the California Culinary Academy (before they were bought out by the company that owns the Le Cordon Bleu program) and I would check out the final projects from the cake & pastry program and see the same things you described.

I went to California School of Culinary Arts, now know as Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Los Angeles (based in Pasadena)

My wedding was at a lighthouse. For the the cake, my baker smoothed out buttercream and placed seashell candy around the cake. She painted the candy so it looked like mother-of-pearl. The result was very simple and pretty.

Since my wedding was a destination event and my hubby and I were starting our honeymoon immediately after the reception, my mother-in-law decided to temporarily take custody of the top tier of the wedding cake. She kept it in a cooler, drove it home, and then opened the box to take a peek before she re-wrapped it and put it in the freezer. Apparently, she thought the caterer had wrecked the top layer by just dropping it in a cake box and taping it up. She said it was lopsided and the frosting was everywhere. What does she decide to do? THROW OUT MY WEDDING CAKE AND REMAKE IT!!!

But before she does this, my MIL salvages some of the candy seashells to reuse. Unfortunately, she has the IQ of a rock. SHE THOUGHT THEY WERE REAL SHELLS AND TRIED TO WASH THEM IN HOT DISHWATER. She realized they weren't real as they disintegrated in the sink.

She told me all of this a week later as she sheepishly handed me a bakery box with my "homemade replacement cake" and a gawdy lighthouse snowglobe to use as my cake topper on my one year anniversary. I was too horrified to say anything.

you really don't want year old cake, when I get my business up and running, it will be in my contacts (I have a working copy now) and an anniversary cake, with the same flavors included in the price.....

We ate the top tier of our cake the day after the wedding, standing up at my parents' kitchen counter. Haha. We were like, "We could save it...but we're hungry now."

I don't know how, but my cake was delicious a year later. My mom had some kind of directions on how to store it, and she had it wrapped up in like a million alternating layers of plastic wrap and foil and stuck deep in her freezer. We thawed it out (took forever!) and it was still good! Not as good, but still really good!

My cousins cut our cake...my aunt told them the big cake was probably Styrofoam, so they just cut the 5 little "satellites" and left the big 4-layer cake untouched. AND Mr.WinniBug cut his own groom's cake and they didn't do jack with that, just left it there! My mom handed out cake to EVERYONE she knew the week we were gone on our honeymoon and there was still a $h*tton of cake left over when we got back!
I was pretty ticked.

I'm going to repost this because it is really good idea and everyone (I think) should really do this....and this is coming from a pastry chef:

An idea of you don't want to spend too much money on a wedding cake: Have them decorate as elaborate as your budget will allow a bunch of styrofoam rounds (or whichever shape you want) in fondant, with a cutout for a real cake insert and then have them bake full sheetcakes with the flavors of your choice.

I like this one for a winter theme:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4.../snowflake.jpg

Really good idea. I don't even think you have to do this if you are on a budget. I was at a pretty nice wedding a few years ago and I'm pretty sure they did this. The wedding was so big (about 200 people) they passed the cake around to everyone anyway. So if you did use a sheet cake no one would know because it all tastes the same and looks the same.

http://www.alarmingnews.com/archives/hostess%20cake.jpg

Made of Hostess snack cakes.

P.S. I don't think I ever shared my sister's cake. Here is where she got her idea. It is made of M&Ms on the outside.
http://z.about.com/d/weddings/1/0/E/...eddingcake.jpg

Here is her interpretation and the cake lady's interpretation. It looked really awesome and tasted even better! My sister only did 3 layers and then it had their first initials on top with LOVE going all the way around.
http://i440.photobucket.com/albums/q...tter/vcake.jpg

Cupcakes!

http://www.bridalbuds.com/wp-content...e-cupcakes.jpg

http://jonandandrea.files.wordpress....upcakes_xl.jpg

I LOVE these cakes! M&Ms are my favorite candy! Might have to borrow this idea when it is my turn to get married!

LOL - a friend of mine & I actually did this for a mutual friend's birthday - only we had sparklers on it.

LOVE the M&M's idea! But I don't care what Martha Stewart says - cupcakes at a wedding should be for children only!

I like the cupcake/ small cake concept, if done right.

http://www.cakesite.net/wp-content/u...upcakes-02.jpg

http://www.cakesite.net/wp-content/u...-cupcakes5.jpg

Those are beautiful!

I'm hungry. :o

http://www.cakebox.ca/wedding/w3.jpg

http://www.sugarcraftemporium.com/sy...daisy_cake.jpg
http://www.my-wedding-cake-ideas.com...ng-cupcake.jpg
http://66.39.126.184/luxeevents_cont...ng%20cakes.jpg
http://www.bridalwave.tv/Maisie%20mini%20cakes.JPG

^<3

Small Cakes= Beautiful, Upscale Desserts for Adults
Cupcakes = Child Food Which Will Be Worn by Anyone Within 10 Feet of Kids.

Those are some gorgeous small cakes, NJ!

LOL! My solution=NO KIDS.

Most of the weddings that I attend are adult-only. It's awesome.

Ditto.

AMEN.

do a cost comparison....small cakes (depending on size) and cupcakes are more labor intensive...thus more expensive....also I know a lot of pastry chefs who HATE people to ask for fondant cover cupcakes....it is not fun at ALL, especially when swiss dots are involved.

I can believe that! I'm all for a nice (not extravangant) wedding cake, a groom's cake, and whatever type of cake in the background. I've been looking at a few places where the price includes the wedding cake, and have been wondering how nice they could possibly be. There's a bakery here that is SO good, I know people who changed their wedding date to be able to have Bethel Bakery do their cake!

All of those are beautiful... but fondant tastes like butt. Wish it didn't! I might like cake then.

Nah... nevermind, I still wouldn't like most cakes.

Truthfully? None of those styles are me. But the taste of a BB cake is beyond decription! FWIW, I've heard that they put a thin layer of either jam or icing between the cake and the fondant.

This is what I'm thinking of getting for my wedding. Except I only want the thin stripe.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c2...ry-Stripes.gif

A sister's wedding cake. The color palette was white and navy because her husband is in the Navy. The cake was delicious, and everyone got half of a cake. Even then it was still a rather large portion--those little boxes are deceiving.

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._4203023_n.jpg

ETA: The groom's cake--german chocolate...yum!


http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._1698429_n.jpg

I swear, if/when I get married there'll be a bride's cake and a groom's cake... none of this "he gets the fun one" stuff.