Hurray! Booking the Cake (aka My Last Vendor)

This morning, Mr. Peacock and I had a late and yummy breakfast. It consisted of chocolate cake, vanilla cake and chocolate and vanilla cake. On the side, we had lemon custard, strawberry preserves and cannoli.

This is how I felt about it afterward. I made friends with that cute little Italian baker next to me. He was offering cookies.

All the other goodies...

I had been planning on going to one of the many fancy and supremely talented bakeries in Chicago. I was suffering from a bit of sticker shock, however, after my first tasting. Although they had many delicious flavors of cake and fillings and their book of cakes was full of "Oh my gosh, is that really a cake?!" cakes, I was hesitant after they handed me the proposal. I had one of those devil on the left shoulder, angel on the right shoulder fights going on.

Devil: WHO CARES how much the cake costs?! You have been eyeing their cakes for years, dreaming of the moment when you could actually place your order.

Angel: Ummm... are you sure about this?

Devil: Of course she is sure! Quick, sign the contract!

Angel: But remember your friend's cake? It was gorgeous AND delicious. She got it from that Italian bakery that you love.

Devil: But they are known for their supermarket breads, not wedding cakes! They won't compete in a Food Network cake decorating challenge!

Angel: Let's just go for a tasting and see what happens.

Miss Peacock: That's a good plan!

Devil: Fool!

So, the angel won. The Italian bakery was not only delicious, not only did they seem qualm-less about making the pretty cake that I saw in Martha Stewart Weddings, but it was $5.50 less per slice. Yup, per slice. We are planning on having about 200 guests, so you do the math. (Fine, I will do it for you. That's $1,100.)

Here is the pretty cake I showed them. The baker didn't even flinch when she commented on all the detail. A lot of the cakes in their book of photos were much more complicated than this beauty-


The one downside is that their list of flavor options was significantly paired down. They couldn't do white cake, only yellow, and they couldn't do the lemon curd with cream cheese filling that I had fallen in love with at that first tasting. In the same way that the baker didn't flinch at my MS cake photo, she didn't bat an eye when I asked about the cream cheese filling- "We don't do that." Ah well. At $5.50 a slice, I can bring my own cream cheese frosting and ask the cater to slather some on.

Just in case you were wondering about lemon curd and its endless delicious uses, I found a great post on Stephmodo to fill you in. I thought making some might help me say goodbye to that dream cake. Enjoy (preferably with cream cheese frosting- trust me)!