This question has come up several times over the past four years of decorating cake and I'm always at a loss for how to answer.... How Much Cake Do I Need for My Wedding?
For the sake of this post, I'm talking about brides who simply tell me how many invitations they plan to send.
Not how many guests they're actually expecting to attend (I can help if they know that number) or how many RSVP's they have (I can also make a recommendation from that number), but I'm talking strictly about brides who only want to tell me how many invitations they're sending.
And I'm trying to be funny and sarcastic. Mostly. Please remember that as you read on.
Armed with only that information, I cannot possibly help a bride decide how much cake to order. Worse than that - I'm not sure I even want to help them decide. Yes, I sound like a meany... but let me explain.
Here's how I see it (correct me if I'm wrong!)...
If I tell them that I think they should get 300 servings and at the end of the reception, they have a whole tier of cake uncut - then I look like I ripped them off and sold them way more cake than they needed. That's my fault and I'm a criminal.
If I tell them they only need 150 servings and halfway through the reception, they run out of cake, then it looks like I'm a moron and they're embarrassed and their guests are cranky and again... That's my fault. And I might still be a criminal 😉
Telling brides how much cake they need is a lose-lose situation for me.
Now let me backtrack for a moment and say that some - maybe many or even most - bakers/cake decorators would be happy to help you with this. Maybe I'm the oddball here. Oh well. It's not the first time!
But for the sake of argument... I'll let you have a peek into my thought process (hold on to your horsey... it might get scary 😉
Let's say that Mary* tells me she's sending out 150 invitations. She's not doing RSVP's (nobody does that anymore anyway these days, right? That's another pet peeve for another day) and she's "just not sure" how many of those are planning to come.
*Mary is my sister's first name that she does not use. I did not make her wedding cake and I'm not picking on her. I'm just using her name. I am not talking about any bride in particular. I don't think I've ever actually worked with a bride named Mary. If I did, and I've forgotten... forgive me - but I'm not talking about you!
** I'm actually not talking about ANY of you. Every bride I've ever worked with has been an angel and pure delight (I'm lying now) and I'm actually making up this whole scenario for the sake of a funny post. Now that I've cleared that up...
Here are just a few of the thoughts that run through my head for why I cannot possibly figure out how how much cake Mary needs at her reception....
1. Are those 150 invites going to individuals, couples, or families? 150 invitations could be 150 people or 500 people if everybody is bringing a family. How big is Mary's family anyway? Are they close? Do they all dislike Mary? Is Mary weird? Don't answer that.
2. Of those 150 invited guests... are they all family and close friends? Does that include all the nieces and nephews and your best friends kids? If I assume you're a close-knit bunch then most of them will come to your wedding. And most will eat cake ...
3. OR is Mary a people-pleaser and an only child with a small family? But maybe she's afraid of hurting feelings so she's inviting everybody she's ever met and their whole family? Does that include her third grade teacher's assistant and the person that she met once at an office party but only said "Hi" to? If so... maybe most of them can't remember who Mary is and they won't come!? If Mary really is weird, then maybe only 10 people will show up. Then Mary probably won't need so much cake.
4. But wait. Is Mary serving wedding cake only? A full five-course meal? Something in between? Will there be a groom's cake? A dessert table? All of that plays into how much cake will be consumed. Or not consumed.
5. And then of course... this is important: will Mary take the serving size suggestion that I include in her contract and tell it to the person she's asking to cut the cake? Or will anybody even think about the proper serving size or the "right" way to cut the cake? OR will they be carving up plate-sized wedges and turning a 100 serving tier into a 30 serving tier?
Don't laugh... it happens!! Twice that I know of personally. It actually started to happen at my brother's wedding and I stepped in and volunteered to finish serving cake so they wouldn't run out!!
Anyway... I could go on and on and on. Hopefully you see my point by now... I cannot tell you how much cake you need! At least not without a little more information than how many invitations you're sending.
Cake Decorators and Bakers... help me out here! I'd love for you to leave me a comment and tell me how crazy I am your tips for helping brides determine how much cake to order! Next week I'll put together a post of your best tips and link to a few articles that I've found that will seriously help brides (without sarcasm!)... ha!
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PSS. The cake I featured in this post was done for one of my dearest friends in the world - Kim. Her sister is my best friend. Her mom and mother-in-law are also precious friends of mine. I just love the whole family to pieces and Kim was, in fact, a dream bride. She wanted a simple cake on the outside, with electric rainbow on the inside. She and I (and maybe a family member or two?) were the only ones who knew that FUN little detail!
She didn't even freak out when her five tiered cake became a four tiered cake because the bottom tier just fell all to pieces within miles of her house (we drove over 2 hours and it made it SO close before it just imploded). She just shrugged it off and smiled and went on... LOVE HER!!!
Angie Pauly
I agree with you.
Leah
I have only baked one cake for an event and most of said cake went home with the hostess as she had requested far more cake than was needed. (She loved the cake and had no complaints about how much she had leftover for herself though. Lol) But you are spot on - a baker can't help without a better idea of the number of guests. I saw something on a cake forum years ago where a baker said she had her husband cut blocks of wood the sizes of the three options of serving sizes she offers (1×2×4 for example) and she painted them to look like pieces of cake. These give the client a 3d visual of just how much each serving size of cake is so they can better determine how many servings they want and what size servings they want. It still doesn't help if a person has no clue how many guests may show up but I think it is a brilliant idea regardless.
Rose
That IS a brilliant idea!! Love it!
Ami
Awesome idea! I show people the Wilton Cake Cutting guide and then show them with styrofoam dummies how many cake slices each tier would provide based on that guide. It helps them, but then - the concern always is - what happens after I leave the cake? Does the person cutting the cake get it? I've worked in the banquet world for years, so I know how to cut a circular tiered cake with concentric circles - but how many times have you gone to a wedding and got an outside piece that was just all frosting because they hacked into it like a sheet cake?
I will definitely add the wood piece idea to my consults.
Debbie
I love this idea of the cake slice wood blocks. It really helps the person ordering visualize the actual cake slice size when ordering their cake, for any event. I just may have another "honey-do" item to add to my hubby's list. 🙂
Jennifer
I had a friend request a wedding cake for herdaughter's wedding. She wanted large, full size slices (3 in.x 1 in.x 4 in.) to feed 300! I did the math, figured the tiers and side cakes necessary and even printed out cutting charts for each tier. The event staff ignored the charts and cut the cakes into 1x1x4 inch slices to serve to the party. They were then caught trying to load the leftover 4 tiers into a car. Needless to say, this did NOT go as planned.
Rose
Ohmygoodness... that's crazy!! And you have to tell me - how big was that cake?? I made a 6 tiered cake for 300 people with the 1x2x4 slices and it was HUGE. I cannot imagine the one you made!
Jennifer
If my memory serves me right, it was a 5 tier cake with 5 satelite cakes around it AND 2 sheet cakes hidden back in the kitchen. It did not help that I had a slipped disk in my back (2 weeks before) and was on massive pain killers. What fun!
Aisha
What size tiers did you use for the 6 tier cake to feed 300 people? I recently had an inquiry for 300 servings for a wedding.
Rose
I used 6", 8", 10", 12", 14" and 16" rounds. That comes to 308 servings.
Sarah
I always say "How many servings are you going to need?" At least that helps a little! But I have had people do the same thing! Not even know how many people they are inviting and ask for a cake quote ....
Rose
Yes, if they'll answer that, I'm good to go! I just have no idea how to answer when they want me to decide!
Susan
One of my good friends is a wedding planner/caterer/cake baker extraordinaire. When I was planning my daughter's wedding and picking her brain, she said that in her 20+ years in the business, a good rule of thumb is that approx 40% of the people invited actually come to a wedding. I found this to be true of my daughter's wedding. For what it is worth.....,
Rose
40% huh? That's lower than I've ever heard... interesting!
Susan
Oh man....I hate it when I mess up. 40% do not come and 60% come. I'm soooo sorry! Is that more in line with what you've heard?
Rose
Oh yes - definitely closer. One of my friends said 60-70%. Someone on Facebook said 75-80%. I've never actually talked with a bride afterward to ask about percentages... it would be a good poll to take!
Winsome
Thanks so much for that interesting post. I don't really have any tips to add. A lot of my brides tend to go for the look of a cake rather than quantity luckily. I was just wandering why your bottom tier on that lovely cake fell apart. Was it dowelled?
Rose
Because it was nearly a 3 hour drive, I didn't stack the cake when traveling. The bottom tier was just sitting by itself in my truck with no dowels or anything. I assume just all of the jiggling and shaking from such a long drive made the cake unstable and it just cracked and broke apart. If it had been covered in fondant, I think it would've been okay, but it was just cake with a thin crumb coat.
Marion
Rose, have you ever put your cakes on cushion foam while delivering? The foam absorbs a lot of the bumps. I've driven cakes three to four hours (not stacked more than two high). Every cake has dowels in it not just for delivery but for when it is assembled. I learned the hard way...
Rose
No, I haven't! That sounds like a great idea!
Joanne
it's amazing how many people do not realize how small the actual size the usual wedding slices are and shop around to be sure that you are not joshes them. Even those that usually ask for smaller slices of cake at their friends homes, think we are giving them small servings at first. I think more and more people are going for the smaller tiers with the addition of sheet cakes, or at least I am finding that lately, with our economy. It is hard to decide the number since no one RSVP any more and there are the extra children, or whoever is visiting at the time.
Rose
It's definitely surprising to some people how small the slices are! And I agree - it's SO hard to decide without RSVP's or a really good idea of who will/will not come.
Katherine
The rules that I've heard and use are that about 80% of the invited guests will attend the wedding, then about 80% of the attending guests will eat cake. There are always some people who leave before the cake is cut, there may be a lot of alcohol which reduces the amount of cake eaten, and some people don't eat it because of dietary reasons. On the opposite side, if you have several flavors, there's a good chance that people will come back for more to try the ones they didn't get. I see this most often with cupcakes.
We work with those numbers at first, then get a final RSVP count closer to the wedding and adjust the tiers as needed. I find that many MOBs think that no one will eat wedding cake, then I have lots of brides tell me later that there was no cake left because everyone loved it so much.
Terry Carter
As a consumer and I was once a bride, I'll tell you how a bride (at least me) thought. When the baker asked how big I wanted the cake, I told her 3 tiers. What size tiers, she asked. I don't care was my answer. I gave her a price range and told her to do whatever she could do. My mother-in-law was very outdone because I just was not following the social elite rules of the metropolitan town of Port Gibson. So, she called the lady (behind my back) and ordered a HUGE tier that was not a part of the wedding cake, although it matched it. (Duh, I was on a budget, she could have put the danged tier on the cake and made it look better.) But anyway, at the end of the wedding, while Wayne and I changed, out came this HUGE cake. This was back in the day when they used lard or something in the icing. It was fairly disgusting to eat the dadgum thing. One of my husband's little cousins (probably 7 years old) had a birthday the next day and that was her birthday cake. No Barney, Snow White or Cinderella for her. A big old nasty white cake. Anyway, after all that, I'm just going to tell you that some brides are more worried about the budget than if the people get a piece of cake. And that my dear is the rest of the story. haha
Maegan
I'm making my own wedding cake and grooms cake(I'm a home baker and cake decorator), I've narrowed by guest list to around 300 people expected to show up (that number is after all the people I know will not come) I'm making a 6" 9" 12" wedding cake, - 6" 9" grooms cake, 100 cupcakes. I'm sure I will have extra but it's always good have to much than not enough, I think I'm going to have someone at the door and try to catch all the kids before they walk out the door the pass out the extra lol