Kim and Mohammad first reached out to me about their wedding cake almost exactly a year before their wedding! We scheduled a tasting for September and we began to plan their wedding cake. I was so intrigued to learn that they were going to hold a traditional American wedding in the Finger Lakes region at Fontainebleau Inn on Saturday and then follow it with a traditional Indian wedding in the greater Syracuse area the next day. They had given great thought to honoring their two cultures and blending their families.

Kim and Mohammad wanted a rustic-looking cake with a rough frosted look accented by flowers. They were really excited to have their wedding cake rest upon a gold pedestal. They sent me a picture of the type of pedestal they were planning. After talking together, they decided they’d make the pedestal themselves. The stand would be waiting when I arrived at the venue and I’d place the cake (on its own gold base) on top of the pedestal that they’d made.

Their favorite cake flavor is red velvet so most of the main wedding cake was red velvet. Ultimately we decided upon red velvet, chocolate and vanilla for options. We needed some extra cake to have enough servings for all the guests so we used extra cutting cakes to give us more servings of each flavor choice, too!

After baking the cakes, it was time to stack them. I used the SPS system for this cake. It has taken me many cakes to get really comfortable using it, and today everything worked beautifully! I decided to do the rough icing on each tier before stacking, knowing it would be a little unwieldy to spin the turntable once the entire cake was stacked.

They wanted the cake to be a very understated slate/violet color, so I worked to get the color just right. The three tiers of the cake would be completed with fresh flowers awaiting me at the venue, so I was looking forward to seeing the final cake as I put it together at Fontainebleau.

The cake flowers were out for me when I arrived, and my husband and I set about arranging. I love working with him on setting up: he’s cool and calm about anything that we encounter (though today there were no curveballs) and he has a great eye for design. We pulled exterior petals off, arranged and brought the extra cakes into the catering area. The wedding party was arriving so we tried to make ourselves scarce and complete things as quickly as possible. Everyone and everything looked GORGEOUS!!

Kim and Mohammad send me pictures of their traditional American wedding and their traditional Indian wedding.