The many cake shows on TV have led to the popularity of tiered birthday cakes for children. As a frugal spinster I can’t see spending hundreds of dollars on cake. But it means job security, I’m not complaining.
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afrugalspinster 
I like the one with the ducks. But you’re right about spending so much money on a child’s birthday cake. After all, who is the cake really for? My guess is it’s for the parents to impress other adults. But it does keep you employed!
A couple of questions — does a tiered cake cost more than 2 separate cakes, just for the two to be tiered? And, is this something that could be replicated by the home baker?
I actually work at weddings held in our church, as a volunteer. I’m the official cake cutter/server. I saw one of the tiered cakes being assembled last summer, and it looked like they were using ordinary wooden dowels, cut on the spot and inserted in the bottom layer, then the next layer was on a sturdy plate sort of thing and rested directly on the lower layer, with the dowels as support. It didn’t look terribly complicated, but maybe there is something to the placement of these dowels. Can ordinary hardware store wooden dowels be used, and would you need to do anything to clean them before hand? I hope I’m not asking “top secret wedding cake industry” questions.
Thanks.
Yes, Tiered cakes are considerably more expensive than two separate cakes. in part because the cakes are 4 layers rather than our usual three layer store cakes.
A two tiered cake should not present any problem for a home baker. Bigger cakes get quite tricky.
Hardware or craft store dowels work fine. We cut them with pruning shears and give them a quick rinse in 10% bleach water.
http://www.wilton.com/cakes/tiered-cakes/stacked-tiered-cake-construction.cfm gives good instruction on stacking a tiered cake.
Since the information is so readily available online I don’t consider it a “trade secret”, but if Show & Tell Sunday suddenly disappears from my blog you’ll know it was because I lost my job for divulging top secret information š
I came over to visit from creative savv! Your cakes are lovely. I have been interested in decorated cakes since I was 7 or 8 and I discovered the Wilton yearbooks at the library. The weeding cakes with lit up fountains! The lattice work! Roses, of course!
I like to decorate birthday cakes but they are totally homespun.