I apparently have polka dots on the brain. Just finished with the cheesecake pops and it's time to make a prototype of Shasha's wedding cake. I baked the layers over the course of a week - high school math comes in handy, surprisingly, when you are trying to take a recipe that bakes in 2 - 12" round pans and convert it to square pans - so I baked one 7" layer and one 12" layer (square) out of each batch, then baked 2 - 9" square layers out of the third batch.
The final batch should have had a small third pan as the 9" pans were overfull. But hey, at least I did the math and knew what was going on!
Then, 5 cups of rum syrup, 5 pounds of mascarpone cream cheese frosting, and 5 pounds of whipped chocolate ganache
The assembly was pretty easy with the divider plates and the columns to provide support and a little extra lift - the space between the bottom and middle tiers will be filled with fresh flowers in the wedding version of the cake.
On this one, I decided to do the middle layer with chocolate just for fun after I realized that I didn't have enough cream cheese frosting - in the final product I will have to make even more cream cheese frosting because the entire cake will be white. And I had more than enough chocolate ganache.
The decorations are a shameless theft from the cheesecake pops, but hey, it works! Take some lukewarm molten chocolate, spread it on waxed paper, cover with more waxed paper and smooth out to a thin sheet. Then, when it is just cool enough to peel the paper off, but not brittle, cut rounds out with small cookie cutters. That's it - they stick naturally to the cream cheese frosting with no additional help.
All recipes are from the Cake Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum, modified per my little quirks - for example, she likes really bittersweet chocolate - I usually substitute semi-sweet. And for some reason she likes to make white or yellow cakes with either all egg whites or all egg yolks - I usually use whole eggs but just make sure the weight is the same - so her recipe for 11 whites or 9 yolks ends up being 5 whole eggs. This does not make the cake too yellow, and it has the benefit of using up the whole egg, which I consider a plus. Many of her buttercream recipes call for either yolks or whites, so it might all balance out in the scheme of things, but I generally don't use her buttercream recipes, so it makes sense to use the whole egg.
After it was done - probably 30-35 pounds (!), I emptied out the fridge to store it overnight, then took it apart for transport into work. So, happily, the architectural issues and transportation issues are all resolved since I now know I can build it and move it. Tonight I am going to a cake decorating class so the final product is lovely and level!!
January 3 and 4, 2009 - here is a picture of our booth. This was an amazing adventure. So many new things to learn. Working on developing a logo, working on design and copy for a brochure, physically getting everything printed, deciding on what display cakes to bring, how to set up the booth for best visual impact, what we needed in the booth, staffing the booth, moving in and moving out (in the snow!), how much cake to take, the best way to serve samples (there are actually more options than you might think! - sample cups, on napkins, in cupcake holders, etc). This was so much adrenalin, and fun, and exhaustion. 
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