It's a fine morning here in Annapolis, Maryland... i'm sitting at "Ahh Coffee" enjoying a Key West Latte. This morning I feel like telling you a story. A story of a cake disaster..
It all started this previous saturday, October 2nd.. The day was beautiful, the breeze was calm, and the temperature was just right. The morning started off just like any other day before it. I headed into work at 8am absolutely sure that I was going to have a lot of time to finish my cake. After all two of my four wedding cake orders were already completed, all that was left was the octagon shaped cakes.
Fast forward to around noon.. the first octagon wedding cake was finished and ready to go, all I had left was to deliver. So I started on my way to the Naval Academy Officer's Club still thinking that I had more than enough time for the additional deliveries. All went well with the first octagon cake, all except that the cake started to crack around the border! I had no tools available, so the best I could do was cover up the cracks with rose petals. All in all it didn't look bad.. I would say it was a good first attempt at making the octagon cake.
I arrived back at the shop just in time to grab the second octagon cake, finish the detail icing on the top of the cake, and head out. I began driving through the bump and curve ridden roads of Annapolis, as cautious as possible. When I decided to make a left hand turn onto west street, I thought that 15 miles an hour was slow enough to ensure that the cake wouldn't move.. I heard no sound indicating that there was a problem, but I felt the urge to stop and check. After pulling into an Exxon gas station, I opened the back of my car and my jaw just dropped!
The cake board slid to the right, when the cake board stopped moving, the cake itself began sliding off the board followed by each individual tier! The cake stopped moving when it hit the side of my car leaving a nice icing footprint all over the place.
I called for immediate support, and sure enough Eric (my boss) showed up 15 minutes later with repair supplies. Meanwhile i'm getting phone calls from Jacintha at the shop asking where the wedding cake was, that the customer's are asking about it. I began driving to the event even more cautious than previous.. I know that the cake was already destroyed, but I couldn't risk the product being gone completely. I arrived to the event 40 minutes late with a cake that needed serious repairs.
Using my bag of supplies I began to piece back together the three tier octagon cake. After fifteen minutes of smoothing and making a new border this cake was ready for final detail. Just as I was cutting up some flowers for the top, the wedding coordinator reached across my cake to grab the scissors and ended up taking off a large section of icing from the only remaining "good side" of the cake! Instead of my jaw just dropping, I began to back away almost ready to cry.
The wedding coordinator looked at me, knowing that I was incredibly upset, and she gave the idea that we should just cover it up with flowers. I pulled myself together and finished the floral design that now included a rope of flowers leading up the side.
This wedding cake disaster set off a domino effect... one cake after another became increasingly late. I delivered my final wedding cake at 4:45pm, 45 minutes past it's delivery time. After explaining why I was late, the customer shook her head and said "Thank god it wasn't my cake!"
It all started this previous saturday, October 2nd.. The day was beautiful, the breeze was calm, and the temperature was just right. The morning started off just like any other day before it. I headed into work at 8am absolutely sure that I was going to have a lot of time to finish my cake. After all two of my four wedding cake orders were already completed, all that was left was the octagon shaped cakes.
Fast forward to around noon.. the first octagon wedding cake was finished and ready to go, all I had left was to deliver. So I started on my way to the Naval Academy Officer's Club still thinking that I had more than enough time for the additional deliveries. All went well with the first octagon cake, all except that the cake started to crack around the border! I had no tools available, so the best I could do was cover up the cracks with rose petals. All in all it didn't look bad.. I would say it was a good first attempt at making the octagon cake.
I arrived back at the shop just in time to grab the second octagon cake, finish the detail icing on the top of the cake, and head out. I began driving through the bump and curve ridden roads of Annapolis, as cautious as possible. When I decided to make a left hand turn onto west street, I thought that 15 miles an hour was slow enough to ensure that the cake wouldn't move.. I heard no sound indicating that there was a problem, but I felt the urge to stop and check. After pulling into an Exxon gas station, I opened the back of my car and my jaw just dropped!
The cake board slid to the right, when the cake board stopped moving, the cake itself began sliding off the board followed by each individual tier! The cake stopped moving when it hit the side of my car leaving a nice icing footprint all over the place.
I called for immediate support, and sure enough Eric (my boss) showed up 15 minutes later with repair supplies. Meanwhile i'm getting phone calls from Jacintha at the shop asking where the wedding cake was, that the customer's are asking about it. I began driving to the event even more cautious than previous.. I know that the cake was already destroyed, but I couldn't risk the product being gone completely. I arrived to the event 40 minutes late with a cake that needed serious repairs.
Using my bag of supplies I began to piece back together the three tier octagon cake. After fifteen minutes of smoothing and making a new border this cake was ready for final detail. Just as I was cutting up some flowers for the top, the wedding coordinator reached across my cake to grab the scissors and ended up taking off a large section of icing from the only remaining "good side" of the cake! Instead of my jaw just dropping, I began to back away almost ready to cry.
The wedding coordinator looked at me, knowing that I was incredibly upset, and she gave the idea that we should just cover it up with flowers. I pulled myself together and finished the floral design that now included a rope of flowers leading up the side.
The octagon disaster...
My final cake delivery... a beautiful finish to the day
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