Timeline for Cake

So I have a fairly unique situation that definitely doesn't apply to most people.... My cousin was a pastry chef at the 4 Seasons for years and really is an amazing chef and baker. She will be doing our wedding cake. FH and I already chose exactly what flavor we wanted without planning a tasting with her since we both have enough experience with her food to know what we like. My bridal shower was on Saturday and she provided multiple different desserts for it. One of them was a little dish with small bites of chocolate cake, some raspberry mousse, and a little chocolate ganache... it was our cake in a cup! So it was really nice to have that mini tasting experience with the friends and family who were there. FH and my sister's boyfriend were sent away during the bridal shower, and they got to taste it when they got back afterwards.

Again, a pretty unique situation for us. I wish I could give more insight on timelines, but I have some suggestions for making the tasting a little more fun.... There's always the idea of making a really nice date out of it. Maybe make a nice dinner together (saving room for dessert, of course!) and try your selections afterwards? If you haven't picked out wines yet (assuming you're having them), you could grab a few bottles and do an afternoon of wine/cake tasting. If you guys like doing crafts you could set up something with that. Kind of like a sip-and-paint, but cake instead of wine/beer and whatever craft you want.

I did a cake tasting ‘by mail’ his weekend. It was the only option in the current circumstances, but would probably have been what we chose anyway due to distance.

I really liked it as a way to taste and consider the options. We were able to spread them out a bit rather than tasting them all at once - I think that would have been an overload of sweetness for me. The portions were big enough to be able to come back and have second taste later, and in some cases we ‘deconstructed and reconstructed’ to try different cake and frosting combinations together. I don’t think I’d have been comfortable doing that in the bakery.

We did our dessert tastings right at the start of COVID last year, before everything officially shut down (literally three days before the stay at home order), though places weren't doing in-person tastings anymore. We stopped by multiple bakeries and picked up different flavors of cupcakes with different filling/frosting options, along with tiramisu options, and brought them back to our hotel room to do the tastings. I'm actually kind of glad that we were able to taste them in our hotel - I feel like I would have felt more pressure to "like" every single flavor we tasted if a bakery staff member was standing next to me. This was about 4 months prior to our original wedding date.

We did our tasting well before COVID, and it was a send-home cupcake pack for us.

Loved it, actually, because we could mix and match, and be brutally honest about what we liked and didn't like. That, and we made a bit of a date night out of it!

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That's amazing to have that kind of connection! I wish we did, I have a friend who is a good baker but not up to that caliber.

We did pick out wines, well I did because my FH doesn't drink! But I do like the fun date night type of idea. So we will definitely consider doing something like that! Thank you.

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I feel you on that, it might not be comfortable doing all of that in a bakery at this time. I'm wondering how large our samplings will be, maybe we can space it out a bit as well. I have a big sweet tooth, but FH is definitely not that into sweets, so I'm worried it might be an overload for him as well.

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That's a good point! You have the privacy to actually decide what you like and dislike. I'm starting to think I'll enjoy doing the tasting at home as well vs. doing it in the bakery.

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I'm really glad to hear people had so much fun with this! I think we will get something similar, they told us to call and order a custom kit. I'm looking more forward to it now, thanks!