A gorgeous venue booked, fabulous florals arranged, the wedding breakfast menu chosen, a wedding cake design to wow guests, and invites sent out to 100 plus friends and family. And then Covid comes along and scuppers all of your wedding day plans.
Sadly this has been the all too familiar story of the wedding season in 2020 with a huge amount of stress suddenly lumped upon the couple. Cancel, postpone or carry on and downsize your wedding? If you do decide to carry on and downsize your wedding then when it comes to your wedding cake it shouldn't mean that you can't have something that will look super impressive and complement your day.
As of October 2020, wedding receptions in England are currently limited to 15 people. For this many people what size of wedding cake would you need? Assuming that the wedding cake was being served after the wedding breakfast and you wanted finger portions - 1" x 2" - a 5" diameter wedding cake consisting of 4 layers would serve 16 portions, if cut correctly. If you wanted the wedding cake to serve slightly more portions just to be on the safe side or have left overs, a 4 layered 6" diameter wedding cake would serve approximately 24 finger portions.
Both of the 5" and 6" diameter wedding cakes measure approximately 7" in height, but to increase this even more, additional decoration can also be added such as moulded chocolate or wafer paper.
If you did want to go for a two tier wedding cake, the smallest size would consist of a 4-layered 6" diameter lower tier and 3-layered 4" top tier. This size of wedding cake would yield approximately 30 finger portions, so plenty to go around along with leftovers. And just to remind you, the wedding cake can be frozen - simply portion it out, wrap well and freeze for up to 3 months.
If you wanted the wedding cake to serve dessert-size portions, remember that these can be up to twice the size of finger portions - 2" x 2" - so as minimum, a two tier wedding cake similar to the size above would suffice (30 finger portions equals 15 dessert portions). Alternatively, an extra tall 6" dimaeter cake consisting of 5 layers would also yield enough portions.
One final thing to consider is the wedding cake stand. Ask the venue what they have availble and also check with the cake designer who will often have a wedding cake stand more suitable. These of course also add extra height and wow factor to the cake.
Simon's Bakery is located in Tooting, south London, and I deliver across London, Surrey, Sussex, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Suffolk, Essex and Norfolk. I design luxury modern bespoke Swiss meringue buttercream and ganache wedding cakes and event cakes, characterised by a clean precise finish, with sharp edges, a bold use of colour and other modern design techniques to create interesting textures and shapes.
I draw on my years of cooking and baking experience to cakes that not only look stunning, but also taste amazing, experimenting with flavours and texture combinations to create a memorable taste sensation.