Photo by Georgi Richardson, Maggie Marguerite Studios
Fashion continues to cycle and reinvent itself season after season. For example, the Spring runways were flooded with revamped trench coats and oversized floppy bows (remind anyone of a certain Melanie Griffith movie where she stole Harrison Ford’s heart away from a conniving Sigourney Weaver?) Your mother’s closet was probably full of drapey-bowed blouses that would cost you over $1000 if you walked into a Valentino boutique today. Now imagine your younger self possessed enough forethought to carefully store those blouses away, keeping them secretly preserved until they resurfaced on the runways 30 years later? Not only would your wardrobe be on trend, but you would be able to flaunt your vintage label with abandon.
Proper storage and preservation of a cake is essential as well. There is an old tradition that says to ensure your marriage’s longevity, you should enjoy a slice of your wedding cake on your first anniversary. At Ron Ben-Israel Cakes, we gift an entire tier to the betrothed couple as their “Anniversary Tier.” If you want to enjoy that delicious ambrosia of flavors that you and your significant other enjoyed on your big day, you will need to follow your baker’s instructions on how to carefully package any left over cake at the end of your reception.
High humidity and warmth is deadly for a cake’s structure. Throughout the baking and decoration process, we keep our cakes in a specially built walk-in refrigerator that is designed to maintain the structural integrity of our sweet creations. This is because our cakes are laden with creamy butter and lightened with whipped egg whites, as opposed to cakes in days past which were heavy boozy bricks designed to withstand the rigors of time. Today, for a cake to still be edible one year after it was first served, it must be returned to a similar environment. Freezing your top tier can be daunting, but a few simple tips will help guide you through the process. Make sure to completely cover your cake with several layers of cling wrap. It should be as air tight as possible, no gaps or underlaps of the plastic wrap, to protect the cake from the frigid air. The cake should then be placed immediately in your freezer and kept there without being disturbed until you are ready to eat it. That means, no peeking, no taking just a forkful every few weeks, no bringing it out to show guests at dinner parties. Think of it as a beautiful wool sweater that you absolutely cherish and someone asked you take it out of it’s cedar lined garment bag in a room full of moths. Would you risk it?
Time can be your friend and your enemy. While cake will not necessarily stay fresh indefinitely, thoughtful storage will preserve the special memory of that wonderful day when you enjoyed a bite of your wedding cake giving you a chance to be a Mr. or Mrs. for the first time all over again.
Photo by Georgi Richardson, Maggie Marguerite Studios
Don’t believe us? Watch Carli and Ryan’s Instagram story below to see what their Anniversary Tier looks like one year after their wedding.
Once had to freeze a 4 tier wedding cake for a year because the groom was going to jail. The couple insisted on using the original cake as if nothing happened! Cake was still a great success!