| home cakes chocolate gingerbread |
| |
|
Seasons of Love |
by Barbara Jo
May 2004
|
I was determined to make this a cake that defied, or appeared to defy, gravity. I'd like to be able to claim that it was some kind of metaphor for the happy couple's love defying the pressures of life that weigh us all down or some such sentimental hoo-hah, but really, I think it was just because I was convinced I could do it and thought that would be really cool.
|
The result - my plan for a cake on which each tier sat only halfway on the tier beneath, the other half cantilevered out in an attractive spiral. I hope to one day adapt this design to allow me to render a strand of DNA in cake. For a while I contemplated having each layer actually next to the previous layer, and slightly elevated, not sitting on top of it at all. While I still believe this to be theoretically possible, I'm glad I didn't try it this time because this way was hard enough.
|
Each tier was to be supported by a circle of 1/2" foamcore, on top of which would rest the cardboard base of each tier, on top of which rested the actual cake. To hold them in place, each tier had to be bolted to the foamcore base of the tier beneath. This necessitated some complicated and mystical-looking hole cutting in each piece of foamcore to allow both for the bolts themselves and for various bolt heads and bolt ends from the layers above and below. I felt like a sorcerer, which is always a good thing to feel like.
|
The assembly of the cake was an arduous and nerve-wracking process. Each tier was individually torted and frosted by Barbara May in advance. Then we started with the large, wooden, circular base, which already had holes drilled for the two bolts to hold the second tier. The heads were also countersunk to allow the base to sit flat on the table. The bolts were inserted first, then the largest tier of the cake, with holes precut in its cardboard base, was lowered into place over the bolts, which, for sanitary reasons, we wrapped in plastic wrap, though we also washed them well first. Next we positioned the foamcore base for the second tier and marked on the first tier where it would sit because we had to insert some 1/4" wooden dowels into the first tier of the cake to support the weight of the tier above. Otherwise, each tier would crush the tier beneath and the entire cake would collapse. I put nine or ten dowels into the fist tier of the cake, arrayed evenly about an inch back from the edge of the area where the next tier would sit. That done, we were ready to bolt the foamcore for the second tier into place. By the way, a cake that requires a crescent wrench to assemble is very funny.
|
The foamcore base of the second tier already had the bolts to go through to the next tier in it at this point. In fact some of the bolts had to be glued in place in advance because the layers of foamcore were covered with gold foil and the bolts had to be in place before that in order for the heads to be hidden. Therefore, we were all set to lower the second tier onto those bolts and repeat the process described above for the third and fourth tiers. Bear in mind that this entire time, despite my professed confidence in my design, I was pretty much expecting the cake to collapse at any moment.
Miraculously, it all went together and appeared to be stable! We propped it up with temporary dowel supports to make sure and later we went out to get some attractive clear plastic supports from TAP Plastics, which we used for transport and actually had to put back in as a precautionary measure halfway through the reception. The layers did begin to settle and tip a bit, which I suspect indicates that the dowels were being tipped over inside the layers. I'm sure I could solve this problem next time by using an internal support with a wider base, like a plastic ring or oval. All in all, I'd say my first foray into the world of gravity-defying pastry was a roaring success!
/a>