A wedding cake fit for a princess
Wednesday, December 6, 2017
All the talk of Prince Harry getting engaged to Meghan Markle has prompted me to write this post about making this fabulous wedding cake for my niece, Anna and her new husband, Dave. It's only the second wedding cake I have ever made and I have to say that I am exceptionally proud of it. The main tier is a 12 inch madeira cake and I have shared the recipe here.
While I love baking, wedding cakes are a bit too ambitious for me. I have only ever made one and tackling my second was more than a little daunting. To make life a little bit easier, I decided to have a fake top and bottom tier. This meant I could have these tiers decorated in advance and they were the 2 tiers with the most work.
Fake tiers purchased, I covered them with icing and started the decorations. I didn’t have a clue where to start, so I enlisted the help of cake guru, Ruth Doherty, who makes the most amazing cakes and sugar craft that I have ever seen. Ruth helped me with the one previous wedding cake that I made for my niece, Kirsten and her husband, Michael (you can see their cake here). Ruth was so patient with me. She taught me each technique that I needed to make these exquisite sugar flowers and I will be eternally grateful to her. Her first task with this cake was to show me how to make the icing ruffles for the bottom tier, A tricky little process of cutting icing discs then folding, glueing, twisting and securing them in place with edible glue. Once you get into a rhythm with these, they are quite therapeutic to make but after around 50, I called in the troups- namely my mum, who helped me make and attach another 300 of the things!
Next step was to create the flowers. I love peony roses and Ruth showed me how to cut shape and wire each individual petal, allowing them to dry before assembling the complete flowers. I was totally thrilled when I saw how amazing they looked, almost lifelike.
Thankfully, Anna was a very chilled bride and trusted me to deliver something to her liking. She gave me the swatch of the bridesmaids’ material and left me to it! I will admit to being more than a little nervous when she first saw it but she was delighted (at least, if she wasn’t, she had the good grace not to say so!) I was very proud to see the cake in pride of place in the hotel but even more proud when I saw what a beautiful bride Anna was. Just like a princess! Her and Dave made such a handsome couple and were the happiest I have ever seen them, surrounded by their friends and family, becoming husband and wife
I won’t be rushing to do another wedding cake- too stressful for my liking. Even if Harry and Meghan come begging for my services, I would have to think twice
The main tier of the cake was a madeira cake. You can find the recipe and instructions below the picture gallery.
Ingredients
- 300g butter (softened)
- 300g margarine
- 750g self raising flour
- 10 eggs
- 4 tsps vanilla extract
- 600g caster sugar
- 100 mls boiling water
- Buttercream to decorate
Instructions
- Array
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We were delighted with it!! Might give it a go myself now you’ve shared the recipe! 🙂 x
thanks for the comment Anna! Hope you do try making it x
There is no recipe on this page – can you direct me to it please. You say under the picture gallery but there is nothing there
apologies- my website crashed a while ago and most of the recipes were lost. I am slowly trying to replace them all but is has been heartbreaking to lose them- Lynne