Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Grooms Cake: Take 1




Hi guys! Sorry it's been so long since a good meaty post, but I've just been so busy with more better and important things! :) No, but I have been busy making stuff, specifically, cakes! But enough explaining, let's get to it.

So, John's dad and I have been known to make a mean cake together. He bakes and I decorate. It's a pretty good partnership. Recently,
a friend of John's family (and a friend of mine, now, I guess :) asked us to bake her wedding cake! What an honor! But also, what a heavy responsibility. We discussed it and decided the wedding cake would be too big a project for us. We are only novice bakers after all, even if it looks otherwise :) Anyway, the bride understood but offered us the chance to make the groom's cake. That we could handle.

We wanted to talk with the groom to see what he had in mind and it turns out he really likes architectural, geometric designs, which is perfect for cake design. Also, their wedding will be held at the fort in downtown St. Augustine, Castillo de San Marco. I'm not sure who initially came up with idea, but someone said, "let's eat the fort!" What a great idea!

So we set to looking for the perfect chocolate cake recipe and icing to match. We came across this on epicurious.com: Dark Chocolate Wedding Cake with Chocolate Orange Ganache. Perfect! The orange will bring in yet another element of the wedding, Florida! It's also what inspired the decoration on top.

Now, this was just a practice run, the most delicious run I've ever been on. :) This cake is SO good! Rich, but not too filling. Moist, but not too dense. And the icing. Oh, the icing is so decadent and smooth. This version was made in 12" square pans. The final cake will be 14x14", so the oranges won't look so big and overpowering. Also, I think I'm going to try a different shape to carve to reflect the fort a little more. I tried making some chocolate rectangles to represent the brick work, but it just looked kind of amateur. If I do try it again, I think I'll use molding chocolate instead of a melted chocolate bar.

But anyway, I'm happy with this first attempt. The bride and groom seemed really happy with the effort, too, which is all that really matters. Stay posted for more cakes to come!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mmm... This looks so delicious.
And pretty. :D You're totally making my prebridalcake, anytime now.

J. Robinson said...

Chris Robinson and I spent quite a nice time at the fort when we were visiting St. Augustine for your graduation. It's a cool place and having a wedding there is a great idea. But eating the fort - now, that's just brilliant and you totally pulled it off!

Tina said...

I want to stick my face in that cake.