Hi folks! We’re back at it again with our latest epic cake! It was not one, not two, but THREE sculpted building cakes! PHEW yeah, we’re tired just thinking about it. So let’s take a look at how your friendly bakers and decorators here at Oakleaf Cakes, took 1,000 servings of sugar, flour and butter and turned it into three huge building cakes straight from Dartmouth College’s historic campus in New Hampshire.
Finished Dartmouth Hall cake in all it’s glory, built in 1784, sculpted out of cake in 2019.Dartmouth College’s Wentworth Hall, Dartmouth Hall, and Thorton Hall soon to become cake. Photo credit: Eric HartStep 1. sketch it. Step 2. ALLLL the math! dimensions, volume, pan sizes, number of batches, timelines, ingredients, shopping lists….All the brick panels we created using this custom silicone texture mat that we made ourselves for our first epic building cake back in 2014 for Brown University. Each facade of each building has it’s own unique dimensions, window quantities, placement, and details.That’s only 1/3 of the cupcakes to be baked!With the help of our trusty 60 Qt Hobart mixer, Humphrey, our amazing bakers Mike, Renata & Diva were able to crank out all 3,000 servings of cake and cupcakes in just a few days. Photo credit: Eric HartEpics cakes are not complete nor possible without the critical structural support system built by our in-house woodworker, Tyler.Time to stack all that cake! Photo credit: Eric HartStacking, carving, and crumbcoating a 500 serving building cake is definitely a 2-man job and definitely adds a few pounds to the cake.Decorator and crumbcoat master Steph puts the finishing touches on crisp edge crumbcoat of Dartmouth Hall.Each side building is 250 servings. Templates get made as guides for both placements of windows as well as carving the exact dimensions of cake. Photo credit: Eric HartAll cakes are now out of the fridge, covered in fondant and ready for us to start adding 300 windows!Decorator and figurine master Krystle custom-built the bell tower out of sugar then moved onto painting windows on the building cakes. Photo credit: Eric HartAfter each window gets painted the panels go on!A 3-vehicle delivery and 2 1/2 hours drive later it’s a group effort to assemble the cakes and add the final details. Note: the actual buildings in the background! It was fun to finally see them in real life after looking at just photographs for a whole week.Grass tuft here, grass tuft there, and over there….Ta-Da! 7ft long cake complete!After all that we still have 2,000 cupcakes (including vegan options!) to set up.Cut to the end of Dartmouth’s homecoming parade and ceremony: we stayed to help cut and serve all 1,000+ servings of building cake to the hungry crowd.Yum! Who knew buildings taste so good!
