Wedding Cake Disasters

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"Ever experience wedding cake disasters?" is something I'm asked by my clients, A LOT. These mishaps are called lots of things: snafu's, wrecks, flops, horror stories, totaled and probably many more.

There is so much expectation for perfection with wedding cakes, that the slightest flaw or tilt will be deemed a disaster or wreck by your guests, and the world. That's a lot of pressure right? Yes, it is.

So the answer is, yes. I have witnessed many wedding cake disasters. Some of them, way worse than others. Thankfully, the very worst I do not even have a picture of, but would be happy to tell you all about it. I've included some pictures of some of the wedding cake disasters I've experienced below.

Melting Butter Cream
The first flop was at a wedding at the Basque Cultural Center in South San Francisco, CA. It must have been summer, because it was blazing hot that day. I believe the cake had butter cream frosting, and had been sitting in the warm reception hall for a bit too long. I'm not sure if the venue even had air conditioning. If you're familiar with South San Francisco, it's in the fog belt, and it's not a place that gets over 70 degrees F very often. With 300 guests in the room, and no AC, it was no place for an extended visit by a butter cream cake. As you can see, the cake is literally melting to one side. Do yourself a favor, learn from this experience and don't let this happen to you!

Inexperienced Cake Stacker
The 2nd cake pictured, was a fondant pound cake for a 40th wedding anniversary luncheon at the Mezza Luna in Half Moon Bay, CA. It was a small quaint affair, with tenor Pasquale Esposito serenading the guests to Volare and That's Amore. Tutti Italiano! The day had a great, loving vibe. But! There was an eye sore of a crooked cake sitting in the corner! This is what happens when an inexperienced cake baker (total novice, family member) tries to pull off a 3-tiered cake. We tried to rotate the cake to get the least tilted angle for the pictures, and what you see is the outcome. Everyone joked that it looked like the leaning tower of Pisa, but given Italian theme of the event, this disaster fit in nicely.

No Hope for Outback Cake
The 3rd absolute, over the top disaster that I have experienced, involved trailer-ing a wedding cake into a remote camping location. Given those conditions, there's of course going to be some mayhem right? There was. The story is, some good friends were getting married in Rubicon Springs, which is a very remote and gorgeous location in the Sierra Nevada. It can only be accessed via a 4 wheel drive vehicle. I've included a picture of the terrain so you get the idea of what the cake had to go through to get there. A friend's brother made the cake, and my friend transported the cake (3 tiers in separate boxes) into our "reception camp" via trailer. I think the trailer tipped over on its way into camp at least 2 times. The cake was a freaking mess.

Luckily we had extra frosting and decorating supplies, so dressed that cake up the best we could. Luckily I had a bag of fresh red rose petals from a wedding I planned in South Lake Tahoe the day before, and were able to covered the cake's flaws. I think there was probably bugs and pieces of pine tree stuff in the frosting by the time we finished up, as it was getting dark. By the time we actually got around to the "cake ceremony" it was well after dark. The Coleman lanterns were purposely set on low, the bride and groom were thankful, and everyone ate some damn good cake in the middle of nowhere.

Celebrity Cake Flop
I really like Katie Holmes, but I'm sorry, her ten thousand dollar cake was crooked. See for yourself. What was going on here? How could celebrities who can afford to pay for the best of the best, have a wedding cake disaster like this? Even more, could they have been photographed from a better angle, so the cake did not look crooked? We may never know. It's not that big of deal for the average bride. But when your cake is plastered in People Magazine for the world to see, it is.

So there's my three stories of wedding cake disasters! Don't be afraid to share any of your stories with us below.
Here's an unfortunate wedding cake disaster!

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