Here Comes the Cake

Over a year ago, while we were planning our wedding, AC became focussed on finding the best vendor for our cake. Neither of us are big cake people, but AC had a wacky idea, and he wanted to find the right bakery to pull it off.

We settled on Charm City Cakes, helmed by Duff Goldman, who you might know from various Food Network cake challenges and, now, his own show. At the time, we had no idea of the fame (or, frankly, the mad scientist) potential of our cake baker. He is known for his off-the-wall creations that sometimes involve moving parts and non-edible objects. But when we arrived at Duff's bakery, we knew we had made the right choice.

AC wanted our cake to evoke fin de siècle artist Aubrey Beardsley, so we took in a book of drawings and showed Duff a picture we liked, which actually ended up being a knock-off Beardsley but still had that masqueradey/exotic feel of an original.

Duff seemed to be excited about the challenge and even said something to the effect of "thanks for bringing this cool idea to us."

Fast-forward several months, just a couple weeks before the wedding, I get a call from the bakery asking me if it's okay if they film the making of a cake for a Food Network special, and also would we like to be in the show extolling the glory of our cake on camera in all of our wedding glory. The answer to the first question was, "of course!" But we respectfully declined the offer to be on camera on our wedding day. No thank you.

The cake was tremendous. We opted for a cherry-almond cake with a basic buttercream frosting. In between each layer of cake was a filling of
fresh cherry chunks. It was amazing. Because I didn't get the chance to
actually have a full piece during the wedding, I shamelessly dug into
the top tier later that night. Come on, how could you expect AK and AC
to keep food in our freezer for a whole year!?

Three months after the fact, we have learned that our cake did not end up on the proverbial cutting room floor, as our wedding creation will indeed be featured on tonight's episode of "Ace of Cakes," the new show devoted to the innovation and madness of Duff Goldman and his crew. Check it out at 10:30 Eastern/9:30 Central on the Food Network.

Cake photo by Jay Wilson.

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—AK