Thursday night we prepared our first test cake, a Lemon Wedding Cake courtesy of Martha Stewart. It baked up beautifully golden brown and slid right out of the 8″ round pan. Friday, I carefully sliced the cake horizontally in half, and then in a semi-circle so we could experiment with a four layer cake. On each cake layer, I edged the cake with a thin circle of swiss buttercream icing, and then filled with alternating layers of jam or lemon curd.
We asked our friends Mike and Julia to join us for a sunset cake tasting Friday night. Part of the goal of this tasting was to experiment with jam-curd flavor combinations. An informal Facebook poll hinted that lemon-blueberry might be the favored combination, but what about strawberry? Or apricot-lavender? So I decided to divide the cake into thirds, and spread each jam flavor on a section. Here’s how it looked from the side:
And believe me, it tasted as good as it looks. Of course there were slight modifications necessary: for one, in our quest to accurately follow the recipe, we completely forgot the almond meal that we had decided to add for a more moist, dense cake. I was also less than thrilled with the icing, so I’ve decided to try a different recipe. But overall, the cake had a nice light lemony flavor that was accented by the sweet jam and the tart-sweet curd. And as for the jam? We’re going with a tier of each, so everyone wins!
Our plan is to bake the cake layers on Wednesday, cool, slice, and then wrap them in layers of Saran Wrap, and freeze them. We’ll tackle an enormous batch of lemon curd on Thursday, and probably put the icing off until Friday. Saturday, we’ll bring the cake and ingredients to the wedding, assemble on-site, and decorate with edible flowers from the bride’s garden. It will be so lovely.
Also in the works this week are the final touches on our summer accommodations. Our tent is up and waiting for a bed, our outdoor kitchen has shelves and running water, and we are slowly moving our belongings out of this house and scrubbing it clean. In a few short days, we’ll be living on the land, and the next stage of our adventure will begin.
I’ll leave you with a sunset view overlooking the garden.
Wishing you a wonderful week, Teri
Making a Wedding Cake: Part One – Planning
Making a Wedding Cake: Part Three – Baking
Making a Wedding Cake: Part Four – The Big Day
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Now that cake looks delicious! And I was proud of myself for adding raspberry jello to a white cake mix and making raspberry cake. HA!
Best of luck as you move to your land! I love following along.
:)Vicki
Thank you! The recipe really is a wonderful one, and we’ve had a lot of taste testing to be able to get it right!
Thanks for following along!