Monday, May 30, 2011

Cake Catastrophe

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Well, the worst-case scenario of my baking world finally happened. After preparing a multi-layered stacked graduation cake with various types of filling, frosting, and edible decorations and topper, we had to transport the delicacy almost two hours over rough Southern roads, hills, and four (count them, four) train tracks! Jeff is a careful and conscientious driver, and never more so with fragile cargo. But the last set the tracks, just three minutes from our destination, did the cake in. Even after braking gently down to almost a crawl, the diagonal rails where just too much waggle and sway, with a bounce to boot. We heard a thud from the back and immediately knew our fears were realized; cake down, cake down!

I couldn't look when we arrived, but Jeff surveyed the damage. All things considered, it wasn't actually that bad. I had doweled each layer for support and used a central skewer to stabilize the whole structure, so the cake looked more like the Leaning Tower of Pisa than a pile of smooshed confectionery crumbs. The biggest problem was the pedestal on which the cake platter rested; two of the four short columns had popped off and refused to snap back on. So I carried the cake into the hall as it was and Jeff helped me prop the poor thing up. Once the cake table was arranged, we situated the cake with the flat side to the back and the sad, wonky pillars out of view.

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On the whole, I'm quite relieved. The whole occasion went fine, my homemade ginger ale in the fruit punch was a hit, the table vignette was very pretty, and everyone seemed happy. I lived through my worst fear and came out the other side without too much cake on my face ;-)

3 comments:

  1. It was beautiful and tasty! Thanks for all of you effort Sarah!!

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  2. It looks like a beautiful cake! If you hadn't told the story, I wouldn't even had known anything happened. I'm glad you came out the other side with the cake still in good condition. :)

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  3. Thanks for the compliments. I was vainly (and mainly!) more concerned about how it looked than how it tasted, so I'm glad to hear it was good ;-)

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