"Holy Cake!"

Last Friday, I had the opportunity to make my first ever tiered cake! The reason? For the past 3 years I have had the opportunity to provide pastries (through my bakery, The Pink Box) for a local breast cancer awareness gala put on by The Pink Ribbon Fund. This year, I am honored to announce that I am donating the dessert centerpiece: a 6-tiered cake! The thing that makes it all the more fun is that each tier is a different flavor. That's 6 flavors, people! I'm SO excited!!! To start preparing for the massive feat, I tested cake flavors and fillings. And that's what I did for about a month and a half....testing cake, after cake, making sure that the flavors and fillings worked together and were "perfect." Then, it was time for me to put it all together. *Dun dun dunnn* ;) I'm telling you, it took me about 3 weeks to get up the guts to do it! 

I decided to pick my 3 most "challenging" flavors (Pink Champagne with Strawberry Mousse, Mango Passionfruit with Vanilla Mousse, and Lemon with Lemon Curd and Blackberry Filling) and put them together to test their durability. (By challenging I mean I didn't know if, when stacked together, all of the filling would come rushing out of the center like some...*shiver* awful muffin top-like picture.) There  was no way that I was going to make all 6 tiers. Can you just imagine the amount of cake that would be??? Holy cake!! I knew that it would be big enough for me to try it out for the first time without being completely overwhelming! (I estimated that this one would stand at 1-1/2 feet at the finish...I was simply 5 inches t00 high.) :)

So anyway, I gathered all of my supplies that I would need. I researched and studied how to put a tiered cake together. I was ready to get started. Except for one thing. How was I going to consume a one and a half-foot cake once it was together?!?! Granted, there are 6 people and 2 dogs in this house (yes, you crazy person, I allow my dogs to eat cake on occasion!) , but there is no way that we could eat an entire cake that's supposed to easily feed 100 people. Well, we could, but I'm not even going there! Long story short, I rallied about 15 of my friends that were willing to come and help me get rid of the thing. That, or they just really like free food. ;) Either way, I was absolutely thrilled and I hope they enjoyed it too!!  

As a last minute add-in, I made everyone fill out "comment cards" to let me know what they thought about each flavor. The favorite of the night was the Lemon cake, closely followed by the Mango Passionfruit!

I hope that you didn't get your hopes up, because I'm not including any recipes in this post. Sorry to disappoint! However, I will share how to assemble a 3-tiered cake because I have YouTube to thank for my lesson. 

Once you have made, filled, and decorated each tier, it's really pretty easy. Simply stick 3-4 dowels around the center of your bottom tier. Press all the way to the bottom and trim any excess wood, making the dowel flush with the cake. Repeat this process with the middle tier. Once you have placed the top tier in the center of the middle tier, get a large dowel (taller than your cake) and shove it all the way through each tier until it touches your board base. Make sure to trim off the excess wood and make it a little lower than flush with your cake to allow for ample decorating. (You will need to fill in the hole with frosting.) After you've completed this, you are ready to apply the finishing touches on your cake and serve it!

I think that my first tiered cake was a HUGE success and I can't wait to make another one!!!  I'm posting pictures below so that your mouth can water just as much as mine did when I was cutting it. ;)  

Happy eating,

~HB~

Bottom tier: Lemon

Middle tier (dubbed the second floor): Mango Passionfruit

Top tier: Pink Champagne