
And Nobody Noticed It Was a Fake Cake - CaliforniaKarl
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/25/fashion/weddings/and-nobody-noticed-it-was-a-fake-cake.html
======
cs702
Yes, non-edible cakes made of light, cheap materials like styrofoam are
routinely displayed at weddings and other ceremonies. One of the layers might
be soft, allowing for fake-cake cutting.

The hosts know the cake is fake. Many of the guests know the cake is fake.
After cake-cutting, the fake cake often remains on display while everyone eats
slices of real cake brought in from a kitchen.

No effort is made to pretend that the cake on display is real. It has come to
be understood, accepted, and expected by society that there should be a _cheap
sculpture of a cake_ on display and that everyone should act as if this cheap
sculpture is a real cake during the ceremony.

How did we, as a society, arrive here?

~~~
ryandrake
The same reason people live in cheap houses with crappy aluminum siding on 3
sides, and fake brick material on the front. The same reason people wear
knock-offs of designer clothing. The same reason cars play fake engine noise
over their stereo system. The same reason people rent Ferraris for the day.
The same reason people go on "vacations" where they spend 5 minutes at each
destination taking selfies.

People care more about the image of something rather than the actual thing.
Authenticity is now something to be faked and posted to Instagram.

~~~
EduardoBautista
Do some cars really play fake engine noises on the speakers?

~~~
jdietrich
Yep. It's pretty much industry standard on mid-range performance cars and
trucks. Many manufacturers are moving to smaller I4 and V6 turbocharged
engines on models that traditionally had big V8s. These smaller engines
provide great efficiency and good performance, but they're much quieter and
blander-sounding than the old V8s. Subtle digital augmentation of the engine
note restores some of the feeling of performance at trivial cost.

[https://www.caranddriver.com/features/faking-it-engine-
sound...](https://www.caranddriver.com/features/faking-it-engine-sound-
enhancement-explained-tech-dept)

[https://www.ford-trucks.com/articles/f-150s-fake-engine-
nois...](https://www.ford-trucks.com/articles/f-150s-fake-engine-noise-
bother/)

------
philliphaydon
Last year I got married in Taiwan, I got to pick between Cake Cutting, or a
giant pyramid of glasses. I picked cake thinking I get cake.

So come wedding day we have this giant cake next to the stage, we do the cake
cutting and we leave.

My best friend at the wedding was shocked I had such a large cake, he was
telling people at the table it was huge, my group of friends informed him it
was fake, he didn't believe them.

So he got up in front of everyone, nervously walked across the room to inspect
the cake, touched it and realised there was dust on the lower pieces and it
was hard, then he went to see my father in law to confirm if it was fake or
not.

Well it turned out the only real bit was the top bit which was super cheap and
not edible, just show for cutting. He was disappointed he wasn't getting cake,
after the wedding my wife informed me I wasn't getting cake and I was sad. :(

Apparently this is the norm in Asia.

~~~
faizmokhtar
Got married in Taiwan > Norm in Asia.

That's a huge jump mate.

~~~
puranjay
People forget that about 2.5B Asians live in the Indian sub-continent and
Middle-East

There are no cakes at Indian weddings

~~~
philliphaydon
Ok so I asked my co-workers.

Muslims = 'no there is no such custom'

Hindu = 'we have, its 100% cake, no fake'

Christian = 'we have cake'

~~~
puranjay
Cakes at actual Hindu weddings is almost never a thing. You might have them
before the wedding - at the engagement for instance. But weddings are almost
always filled with Indian sweets

~~~
philliphaydon
Are you sure? I literally just googled and the first thing that came up was:

> [http://thebigfatindianwedding.com/2014/the-essential-
> guide-t...](http://thebigfatindianwedding.com/2014/the-essential-guide-to-
> hindu-weddings-food-and-desserts)

> Many modern Hindu weddings will also have a giant, tiered cake at the
> reception that the couple cut and do that whole cake-face-smear thing. This
> is an obvious Western influence, but you can keep it in the right cricket-
> field at least by doing something like a mehndi or chai-infused cake. Just a
> suggestion.

~~~
nonamechicken
Living in India for 30+ years. I am hearing this for the first time. In my
state in South India, I am 100% sure there is no cake at any stage of the
wedding for Hindus or Muslims.

~~~
madcaptenor
Does Indian cuisine (and I realize that I'm sweeping a lot of complexity under
the rug) include cake?

~~~
nonamechicken
As far as I know, cake is not part of Indian cuisine. I am from the state of
Kerala (South India). All the bakeries here sell a few types of cakes.

Your question made me curious and I started searching for history of cake in
Kerala and came across this: [https://www.thebetterindia.com/125658/kerala-
mambally-bapu-t...](https://www.thebetterindia.com/125658/kerala-mambally-
bapu-thalasserry-india-christmas-cake/)

[https://m.facebook.com/tellydiary/posts/600462363372968](https://m.facebook.com/tellydiary/posts/600462363372968)

Looks like it started in 1880s.

I am big fan of plum cakes that we get in Kerala.

------
scrooched_moose
In high school I worked banquets for a major hotel chain - mainly setting up
for weddings receptions and conferences. I only saw a handful of real tiered
cakes in the hundred or so I worked.

What was more normal to see was a real and very well made top tier. This was
for the cake cutting pictures and for the bride and groom. The remaining 5-6
tiers were identically decorated styrofoam.

After the cake ceremony, we wheeled the rest into the back, tossed it in a
closet for the caterer to pick up, and served sheet cake.

~~~
conception
My mother has been a florist for 40 years and this is totally normal and has
been for generations. I don't understand why this article exists. Everything
old is new again?

~~~
windows_tips
It's sort of a profile of a local business.

~~~
gowld
[http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html)

------
taejo
About ten years ago my then-girlfriend asked my mother (a retired baker) and
me to make a cake for her cousin's wedding. We proposed some recipes to the
bride and groom, they chose one, told us how many guests they were expecting.
They accepted our quote so we went ahead with the whole hog, three tiers,
chocolate leaves and everything; I show up a couple hours before the reception
to stack the tiers in place and add the decorations, gold dust and all the
rest. But I get to the table and there's another cake! We'd never considered
the possibility that we weren't making a "wedding cake", but the bride's
family was under the impression we were just making a "cake for the wedding"
and they were responsible for buying a "wedding cake" (in this case real, but
flavour not a priority).

~~~
smudgymcscmudge
That must have been awkward. It sounds like you have them a good price if they
didn’t question your price.

~~~
taejo
I'm sure I charged very little on top of the ingredient cost since I was an
amateur (my mother just provided some guidance, really) and they were family.

------
koliber
I wonder if this is a US-only phenomenon. I've been to a number of weddings in
Poland.

The cake is real!

They don't wheel it back to the kitchen for cutting. It's served right there
in the middle of the reception hall. I guess it is less elegant than a stream
of plated cake slices flowing out of the kitchen. However, you know what you
are eating.

Can anyone share their experience?

~~~
athenot
I got married in the US but had the traditional French cake: the "Pièce
Montée", a tower of cream puffs that are glued together with caramel. It
satisfies both the flashy tower requirement, and is relatively easy to dish
out since it's just a matter of pulling it apart, serving 2-3 cream puffs per
person.

And it tastes way better than the US cakes which are glorified pound cakes
with tasteless super-sweet icing.

[http://img.over-blog-
kiwi.com/1/29/25/37/20150328/ob_d45696_...](http://img.over-blog-
kiwi.com/1/29/25/37/20150328/ob_d45696_piece-montee-traditionnelle-pour-
mar.jpg)

~~~
masklinn
FWIW a pièce montée refers to any large/"architectual" pastry, so a tiered
cake would be considered a pièce montée.

The specific dessert you're talking about is the croquembouche. Delicious, but
the caramel ones are so damn sticky.

FWIW an other common option for pièces montées is to use multiple cakes on
supports, which avoids the structural issues and limited edibility of a tiered
cake, and offers more flexibility (e.g. depending on layout you may be able to
use cakes with pretty different looks and ingredients, or you can create
pretty cool-looking scenes).

------
olliej
Wedding cakes are such an unnecessary expense - I’m not going to say a rip-off
because the impressive looking ones clearly take a ton of time to make - but
if you don’t care about them looking like “amazing one of a kind” cakes a
regular bakery can make super tasty non-sheet cakes for a reasonable amount.

We used the sadly defunct sweet inspiration in SF (sf rent prices happened
afaik) and it was I think 35-40/each for three cakes which was fine.

Venue was still the biggest expense - I think all up we were somewhere in the
5-10k range which was apparently “cheap” o_O

~~~
TeMPOraL
Yes. Weddings are such a ridiculous waste of money that it boggles the mind.

In my region, it is customary for the guests to give an envelope to the
newlyweds, with the sum of money somewhat approximating the marginal costs of
the guests' presence on the event. That is, if all the guests were nice and
following the custom, the newlyweds would have recouped a big part of their
expenses. In other words, a modern wedding is basically a process of
transferring significant amounts of money from the guests to the caterers,
photographers and venue owners.

Capitalism at its best.

~~~
opencl
How are the guests supposed to have any sort of idea what the wedding budget
and number of attendees is?

~~~
dempseye
No, you only need to have an idea of the ballpark figure for a seat at a
table. Then you bump it up by 20% to 50% and apply a multiple related to your
own circumstances and level of personal connection to the guest. Then you buy
a gift worth around that or just give them money in an envelope. (Some couples
make their preferences known in this regard, but generally speaking I would
say that giving a well-chosen gift is nicer than just giving money.)

It is not quite the algorithmic process I have described, though. It is a
matter of custom and manners and therefore people arrive at the appropriate
behaviour mostly unconsciously.

I assure you that if you personally do not have any idea about this, your +1
does.

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _generally speaking I would say that giving a well-chosen gift is nicer than
> just giving money_

I feel this is sort of a thing that's false, but you're required to believe
it. Looking at it from the receiving end, money is worth more than gift,
because a gift will likely be useless, or duplicate, or at best it will lock
down the couple's ability to get the equivalent they want (I give you a good
toaster you don't like; you'll be inclined to keep it, even though you'd
prefer to buy a different one yourself). Money is the best gift, because it's
no-strings-attached.

I definitely noticed that the shift of preference from gifts to money is
happening in the cultural sphere I live in. Of course things may be different
elsewhere.

~~~
dempseye
That's the thing. A bad gift is worse than money, but a good gift - something
that the couple actually wants and would buy - is better because it (a) shows
consideration and thoughtfulness and (b) saves the couple the time it would
take to go out and buy the item. This is the principle behind wedding
registries, of course.

------
peterburkimsher
Making cheaper wedding cakes is definitely a good idea. I prefer flavour over
kitsch. But I think guests would probably notice if the cake doesn't actually
get cut, but a cupcake gets substituted instead.

Instead, I think that only baking a top layer and cutting that would satisfy
the photographers. Then wheel the fake cake away to the kitchen, and bring out
slices of sheet cake to satisfy everyone's stomachs.

~~~
skybrian
Ours was the opposite: a three-layer cake where the top two layers were fake.

This was because we didn't have enough guests for a three layer cake
(according to the bakery), but for a larger wedding, I suppose you could
supplement that with sheet cake?

~~~
carlmr
>we didn't have enough guests for a three layer cake (according to the bakery)

Are you implying that you did, or that your guests really like cake?

~~~
michaelt
I read it as "We told the bakery we had 20 guests and wanted a three-tier
cake; they told us their three-tier cake feeds 40 people and recommended fewer
tiers to save money"

------
syphilis2
Is there a word for this: when the tradition is maintained in form but not in
function?

~~~
Yen
The word I think of is "skeumorphic", though that's not 100% the same thing
here.

~~~
syphilis2
I believe this is the word that best fits.

skeuomorphic - Pertaining to skeuomorphs, obsolete design elements which are
retained for familiarity or out of tradition, even though they no longer serve
any functional purpose.

------
lacker
We had wedding pie. It was great. Pie > cake

~~~
lostcolony
Oh you pie people. You make me laugh. Cake will always be superior to pie.
Yes, I'm sorry. For one very simple reason. FROSTING! Ya'll forgot about
frosting!

\- Paul F Tompkins.

~~~
2038AD
But the icing is always the worst part!

~~~
masklinn
Preach! Icing is marketing, the entire point is to make a shitty cake look
less shitty by completely hiding it. Heavy icing is usually deceptive, hiding
the emptiness of the actual cake.

------
torstenvl
So now instead of the expense of one cake, you have the expense of two cakes,
_and_ you have a cake-shaped hunk of styrofoam in a one-bedroom apartment in
NYC of all places.

Maddeningly absurd.

~~~
robbiemitchell
The price of a fancy wedding cake is the absurd part.

Even better would be ditching this fake cake thing altogether, but if you’re
going for the traditional playbook, this is pragmatic.

------
gwbas1c
I thought everyone knew that giant fancy cakes are usually props?

Anyway, I wanted a fancy single-layer cake at my wedding, but my wife nixed
it. Our caterer ended up making delicious cupcakes!

------
GrumpyNl
Nothing todo with the cake, but i would like to see, that the people who
prepare my cake are taking all the right steps, beginning with a hair net when
its over 50cms long.

------
gadders
What happens if the bride and groom don't know and try and do that stupid
"smooshing the cake in each other's faces" thing and it's not real?

------
DoreenMichele
_That meant $1,000 to $2,400 worth of cake for a party of 160 or so, even
though the menu at the wedding location we had chosen came with dessert._

Well, good for her on saving some dough, but 160 guests makes this sound like
not only a _First World Problem_ but a rather _upper class_ first world
problem at that.

~~~
sp332
We had over 100 people at our wedding. Our total budget was $2,000 and we went
slightly over that. You can save as much money as you want if you're willing
to give up having the flashiest high-status stuff. Several guests told me
later it was one of the best weddings they'd been to because it wasn't all
high-strung and demanding.

~~~
DoreenMichele
For her second wedding, my sister had a fairly big wedding. She was also part
of a two career couple and had lived a long time in the same state. She knew a
lot of people.

In contrast, I have moved a lot as an adult and nearly 6 years of homelessness
taught me that poverty is very hard on your social life. I would have trouble
coming up with, say, six people to invite to a hypothetical second wedding for
me. I just do not have a big social network of that sort.

Congrats on getting a wedding for very little money. But I strongly suspect
that knowing 200 people well enough to even invite them to your wedding makes
you more upper class than you likely realize.

I eloped at age 19. Including rings (bought on sale), dinner and a movie,
marriage license, blood testing and cab fair, it was under $300. So you sound
like you did amazingly well.

Your testimony doesn't change my opinion that a mock cake for 160 guests is a
rather upper class first world problem.

~~~
sp332
Oh yeah, gotta adjust for the fact that the article was about NYC/Washington
DC and mine was rural New Hampshire.

~~~
DoreenMichele
Edit:

Redacted.

I'm tired and maybe misreading your comment.

I'm outta here folks. Talk at you good people some other time.

------
dmichulke
Related:

"The cake is a lie" is a famous line that happened to become an internet meme
(935k google hits when used in quotes)

It's also really funny if you happened to play Portal 1 which you should
because

\- it's really funny (might have said that already),

\- educative,

\- addictive,

\- less than 24hs to play through (more like 6 to 12 IIRC),

\- teaches you how to interactively teach concepts without saying a word
(there was a great blog post on this topic but I couldn't find it).

