"Wedding Cake Tips"

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Enlist help from your mother, bridesmaids and family who are talented to help create the perfect wedding cake for your special day. If you plan to bake your own wedding cake, do a trial run.

If your having an outdoor wedding and your cake will be outside, don't use chocolate or buttercream icing to decorate your cake. Use fondant, it helps preserve wedding cakes the longest, especially if they are going to be sitting out for an entire day.

Don't refrigerate a cake made with fondant. Condensation can occur when being defrosted and brought to room temperature can destroy the finish of the fondant.

Keep your buttercream cake refrigerated as long as possible and keep out of direct sunlight so it won't melt.

If you follow tradition and save the top tier on your wedding cake, make sure you freeze it right.



MONEY SAVING CAKE IDEAS:

Add a personal touch to your wedding day by making your own wedding cake. Why pay big money on a bakery made wedding cake when you can build your own unique creation. This will help keep your cost down rather than spending hundreds to thousands of dollars.

Add creative touches to your cake by placing fresh raspberries, strawberries or chocolate covered strawberries on top of your wedding cake instead of a cake topper.

For a unique effect, stencil your monogram on the top of a flat glazed surface wedding cake with coco powder or powdered sugar. For a simple technique wrap a ribbon around the base of each wedding cake tier. Make sure the icing if firm before you do this technique, so the icing will not stain the ribbon.

Make your wedding cake chocolate icing with chocolate. Line chocolate Hershey bars on the outside, around the cake, giving it a nice clean look. Use your imagination. Wrap a ribbon around the base of each wedding cake tier and top with fresh flowers or fruit.

Place a bundt cake on a cake plate sprinkled with powdered sugar and fill the center of the bundt cake with fresh flowers. You can also stack iced bundt cakes on tiered cake plates for your wedding cake. Make them in interesting shapes that will wow your guests.

Make mini bundt cakes for your guests instead of purchasing or making a large wedding cake. Use as a dessert or a wedding favor.

Cheesecakes are very popular instead of a wedding cake filled with fresh fruit, nuts or jams.

If your good at baking cakes but not very good at decorating them, try making a wedding cake covered in coconut, nuts, glaze, or chocolate curls to cover any flaws you might make.

Purchase your wedding cake from a grocery store. They taste just as good and are cheaper than a bakery wedding cake.

Order three white cakes from a grocery store bakery in different sizes. Stack cakes on a cake plate to look like a wedding cake and decorate. Make sure you don't let the bakey know you are using the cakes for a wedding cake or they will charge you wedding cake prices.

If you want a wedding cake but short on money, order a small decorative cake. Display it on the top layer of a cake stand or cupcake tree. Place cupcakes on the bottom layers.

Another option is have a small decorated cake on display and a sheet cake in the kitchen for your guest. It will taste just as great.

A cupcake tree is the easiest and most economical way to serve cupcakes without the price of a cake. Add flowers, lemon leaves, strawberries, chocolates or shells to add a unique look and color.

For a formal touch on your cupcakes try adding pretty trimmings. Try toasted coconut, sliced almonds, white chocolate curls, pastel chocolate candies or edible flowers.

Order plain cupcakes from the grocery store or bakery and decorate them yourself.

Use crystallized edible flowers and sugared fruit to top a wedding cake. Make sure the flowers you use on the cake are food safe and pesticide free.

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