Patissier creates cakes to have and to hold, to love and to cherish

What is baked, sculpted in white, towering, transformed with floral adornment, and put forward for all to admire? You could answer the bride or the cake; there's a remarkable resemblance, when you think of it. Did one confection inspire the other?

Everyone knows the bride is the feature of the event, but there is an unspoken arrangement that allows the wedding cake to be just as stunning (not so for the bridesmaids). The cake is more than dessert, it is also a decorative prop for photo ops (like the bridesmaids) and occasionally it doubles as a party favour (optional for bridesmaids). Wedding cake, pre-'80s, was almost always fruitcake, and little girls took their piece home to slide under their pillows in the hope of dreaming of their future husbands.

With so much riding on the cake, how do you get the perfect one for this day of perfection? There are bakers with heavily accented credentials and there are bakers who have taught themselves while their toddlers bang cake pans at their feet. Arduous training whichever the route; Lelani Galley is one of the latter. Denied the coveted Easy Bake Oven when she was five but not deterred, Galley grew up to use the big one. Like many self-taught people, she fell into her trade by accident. Accompanying a friend to a wedding-cake consultation with a high-end Vancouver caterer, Galley encountered a creature who lurks in the wedding business: The Snob. What bride needs an interloper like that in her long-rehearsed dream? Galley offered to do the desired cake as her present. The outcome was exactly what the bride envisioned-more, really, since it was infused with love.

Meeting with Galley to discuss cakes is like sitting down with your trusted hairdresser: it's all about you. She meets with her clients twice to get it right. Brides come armed with pictures of Martha Stewart creations, which Galley is happy to replicate, and she comes with her portfolio to show she's up to the task. After choosing fillings, finishes, and size, there's a second visit, which includes tastings. Galley's cakes range from sponges and butter cakes to carrot cakes and cheesecakes. Right now she's experimenting with some new flavours: lavender-lemon, Earl Grey-chocolate, and ginger-chai spice. The cakes are paired with the perfect fillings of fruit, butter cream, or mousse. Most popular, particularly in the summer, is her lemon butter cake. But Galley's chocolate cake with chocolate butter cream finished with chocolate ganache is making its way onto the pedestal, a perfect kick-start to the second half of a reception.

Wedding-cake finishes are truly enchanting these days. Royal icing, that stuff you could use to dry wall your laundry room, is almost never requested anymore. No longer just white towers, today's cakes come in pretty fresh-fruit colours and are sometimes made to tilt, perhaps to confuse the ubiquitous wedding drunk, but more likely to express the whimsical nature of love. The cake most definitely makes a statement, whether the bride chooses dainty daisies, a monogram, ribbons, leaves, petals (all edible in moulded chocolate or fondant), real or sugar-glazed flowers, or the classic topper of the black-and-white couple. The romantic mind knows no boundaries.

It takes Galley two to three days to make a cake, and they average between $600 and $700. Complexity is the determining factor, something the first wedding cakes were completely without. Galley's professional predecessors made a flat, dry biscuit that was given to the groom to break over his bride's head. The more crumbs the better, as they represented fertility. It took the French to elevate the concept, and somewhere around the 16th century the first towers of cake appeared. The evolution continues. Lelani has two grooms coming up from Oregon to be married in August. Naturally, they are thinking about a tall, dark, and handsome silhouette for their cake.

Galley can be found at causeforcelebration.ca/ or by calling 604-721-4005. Bring your dreams. -

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