I can hardly believe that it's been over two years since my last post--how time flies. A lot has happened since January 2012. Not long after my post two years ago, my culinary adventures continued when I moved to the bustling city of London where I obtained a master's degree in International Development at the prestigious London School of Economics. I remember a handful of people forewarning me concerning the tastelessness of British cuisine; however, they all lost credibility as I found to my surprise that the UK is full of culinary brilliance! A melting pot of ethnic backgrounds and home to so many different people from around the world, London proved to be a culinary hub where my eyes were opened to a variety of different culinary perspectives. It's a shame I never continued my unexpected culinary experiences while I was abroad. Months have come and gone since I returned to the United States. Nestled in the rocky mountains in a quiet city called Highland, I now find myself yearning to return to food, writing, recipes and sharing. So here it is--my return!
I can think of no greater blog-resurrection post than one devoted to the creation of my own wedding cake. Yes, it is true, I am now a married man. My wife, Emilia, and I met in London and were married earlier this year. Of course, my own cake had to be the best one I've ever made! This proved to be a lot more difficult as I began to run out of days and the wedding planning furnished lists upon lists of things to do. There were a few things I knew for sure, my cake had to be large and unique.
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| Gold Wedding Cake |
The Petals
I started playing around with some ivory fondant and made a ton of rose petals. As they were drying, I decided to make an edible gold paint out of a combination of various gold shades of luster and petal dusts mixed with some almond extract. I painted the outer rims of each petal to add a touch of gold. The effect was greater than I anticipated.
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| My Wedding Cake Station |
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| Rolling the Ivory Fondant |
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| Two Petal Sizes |
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| A Fondant Round |
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| Making the Petal |
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| Homemade Edible Gold Paint |
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| Painting the Rims |
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| One by One |
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| Lots of Petals! |
The Cake
I began the construction of the cake months in advance because I was set on making a cake no smaller than 4' tall! When I toured the reception hall I noticed a golden alcove, typically used for picture displays and I knew immediately that it was just the place for the towering cake. Emilia wanted to go with a black and ivory stripe linen for the table decor so I decided to mimic that detail in the actual cake by layering my famous chocolate spice with a new cake recipe, vanilla coconut butter cake. The taste and the combination in general worked very nicely and screamed gourmet! Because neither Emilia or I like a lot of icing, I decided to fix the layers together using a mild fruit jelly instead of layering the cake with extra sugar. The outside of the cake, however, had a sufficient amount of icing so no worries, we had it covered--literally.
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| Black and Ivory Layered Cake |
The Gold Buttercream Icing
Emilia had previously selected black and ivory as the wedding color scheme and we decided to add gold as an accent color. After some time I decided to make a risky move and paint the entire exterior of the cake in edible gold. I purchased an airbrush machine and a lot of edible gold paint. The day before the wedding, I spent hours airbrushing the cake the correct shade of gold and fixing the handmade petals in a cascading fashion wrapping around the cake in two areas.
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| Gold Airbrushed Icing |
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| Cascading Petals |
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| Cascading Petals II |
The Finished Product
Transportation was a nightmare. Two hours before the ceremony, my little brother/best man, my good friend, my dad and I transported the gargantuan cake in two pieces to the reception hall. Once we made it to the 10th floor of our reception hall I quickly situated the cake in its spot and stepped back to admire the work. It was a gorgeous, one-of-a-kind gold wedding cake. Was it worth the stress? Probably not, but I wouldn't have had it any other way.
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| Bride and Groom with the Cake |
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| Gold Wedding Cake |
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| Forking the Cake |
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| Eating the Cake |
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| Cake View |
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| One Very Happy Day! |
Phew, that was easy. A triumphant return to food blogging. I have recently developed a few ideas that will keep me posting so stay in touch as "The Unexpected Culinarian" takes an unexpected culinary move...
