Food and Cakes
alhaley88
member
Help me with Cake!
We are thinking of doing a small 1 or 2 tier cutting cake (and for pictures) with sheet cakes in the back for the guests. The bakery I am looking at can do the same gourmet flavors and fillings in the sheet cake, which I am very happy about. We are thinking of doing Vanilla w/ filling, Chocolate w/ filling, and 2 gourmets with filling. We are estimating between 120-140 guests.
How much of each sheet cake do I order? 1/4 sheet will feed 45...I don't want to order WAY to much cake.
Is 4 flavors too many? Should we stick with 2 basic 1 gourmet?
I want the guests to have options but I don't want to get a cake that feeds 45 and only 2 people eat that flavor, but I also don't want to get a cake that feeds 45 and 60 people want that flavor....Anyone have experience in doing this? What did you do? How much did you order?
EDIT: Servings are according to bakery stated servings.
How much of each sheet cake do I order? 1/4 sheet will feed 45...I don't want to order WAY to much cake.
Is 4 flavors too many? Should we stick with 2 basic 1 gourmet?
I want the guests to have options but I don't want to get a cake that feeds 45 and only 2 people eat that flavor, but I also don't want to get a cake that feeds 45 and 60 people want that flavor....Anyone have experience in doing this? What did you do? How much did you order?
EDIT: Servings are according to bakery stated servings.
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Help me with Cake!
1) Same exact portion size for all guests!!! This means, same number of layers to fillings and portion size cut for all guests!!! No guest gets the unfilled slice of cake while others get four layers with lemon and raspberry filling...
2) Great tasting cake gets eaten, lousy tasting cake is left at the end of the night. Choose the yummy over the cheap! (if the "gourmet" flavor is flat out awesome and the white BUTT-r-crap tastes like freshly molded Crisco, spend the what's likely to be around $30 to have the gourmet flavor that they'll talk about positively for years to come. If they all taste great, obviously price it out and make your choice that way)..
3) If you choose to serve buffet style, I'd recommend using disposable plates/forks for this reason - the staff won't be in a rush to get their plates back so they can leave for the night thus picking the plates up and trashing what's left of the cake instead of leaving it out for guests to take their slice but if there are any leftover slices, your guests can easily have it for a take-home snack or snack later on during the evening (this is where you get your halo as a hostess because not only was the cake yummy, we got to grab a slice to take home; have later on when the sugars allowed me to because of that there diabedus; late night snack; etc.). Sure, you'll need more servings for this option, but that doesn't mean enough for both of each flavor for each guest to have two slices. You know your guests and how big of dessert fans they are.
4) If you're having your servers do 100% of the serving, go with one flavor option for all of the guests servings. They aren't going to take orders, they're going to plunk down whatever slice happens to be on the tray when they get to whichever guest they come to. In the ideal world, they'd take orders, but 99.8% of all caterers don't operate that way (yes, some do, clear majority, don't!)
5) Find out what portion size the bakery is operating from!!! The geometry factor is HUGE!!!! For example, Big Blue Box and Big Red Range Logo claims to be super cheap for cakes. When you look at their portion and do the geometry for portion sizes, they're right in the running with the average bakery. Some bakeries work off of a 1x2x4, others 1x3x4/5/6, others 1x4x6.. That's a huge difference in what you get for the money.
IMO - I MUCH prefer the "buffet" style for cake service. I'm a cake snob so want one of everything as is my foodie SIL who I'll compare notes with, DH OTOH, is going to go for the slice that has the absolute least amount of frosting and filling as humanly possible. And the list goes on (gluten free cake, sliver slice, "Give me frosting or give me death!", etc.) The buffet often satisfies the most people and gives a mingling opportunity as well as people can go get a slice as they finish eating so no one is waiting horribly long after they're done for the slice of cake.