30th wedding anniversary cake

After our Parisian break, I received a phonecall from JD's mum asking if I would be able to make a celebration cake for JD's aunt and uncle as they were about to celebrate their 30th wedding anniversary. Of course, I was more than happy to oblige but the tricky part was knowing what sort of cake to make and also what decorations were suitable. I was given "carte blanche" in this instance for almost everything which was great but daunting at the same time. The only stipulation was that there would be some form of writing of "Happy 30th Anniversary" on the cake and that the cake would feed a minimum of 30 people.

One of my first ideas was to create a tiered cake as it would be more elegant and it would be a reminder of a wedding cake which would be quite apt as we were celebrating a wedding milestone. I then did a bit of research on what flowers, colours and precious stones are associated with a 30th wedding anniversary which turned out to be lilies, sweetpeas, the colour green and pearls respectively. I then decided to base my cake decoration on these different components. The cakes themselves (6" vanilla sponge with vanilla buttercream and raspberry jam and 8" chocolate cake with chocolate ganache) were pretty straightforward to make but the real time killler was making sugarflowers and  foliage (not to mention traipsing around town searching for fondant, cake boards, gum paste, dust colours, flower wires, etc....) My flowers were made all well in advance and drying on my clothes rack nicely (with no laundry on it at the time, of course!) only for my clumsy partner in crime to lean an ironing board against a double door which is NEVER bolted in place behind said clothes rack and flowers. Cue major crash with ironing board landing on flowers!! Needless to say, I was not best pleased about having to make some more!!!

In the end, the cake was finally finished on time. The happy couple were very appreciative of the cake and it tasted good which was nice feedback. In hindsight, I probably should've made a 1-tier cake as the cake needed to be transported by car and maybe not sugarflowers (as they are very delicate, even with no ironing board damaging them!!) so I guess experience for the next celebration cake :) 

(I also need more practice with tying sugarflower bouquets, methinks)

 Sweetpea before.....

.......and after :)

Lily

Finished cake!