Layers and graces

AS the royal wedding draws near, Catherine Scott takes a trip to Bettys to find the secret of perfect cakes for the big day.

Speculation about the royal wedding cake is rife. Whatever its form, the cake is the centrepiece of any marriage celebration and is a major investment for the bride and groom.

It is a subject they know all about in the wedding cake section of the craft bakery at Bettys in Harrogate, a rather well kept secret of the company’s empire.

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Everyone has heard of the tea rooms, the fat rascals, the chocolates and the special tea time treats.

But Bettys has been making and intricately decorating wedding cakes since it was founded by Frederic Belmont back in 1919. This month, they have launched a new range of cakes, all hand-made to the last petal and leaf in the Harrogate bakery.

The seven-strong team are all master craftsmen, having honed their skills the Bettys way, with attention to detail all important.

Bettys is one of the few places which still works in royal icing, seen by many as a dying art, to decorate their cakes which are all made on site with same eye for detail. A lot of cake decoraters instead choose sugar paste, which is easier to work with.

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According to cake designer Alison McCabe, who has worked in the bakery since she was 18, trends in wedding cakes have changed over the years.

Apart from the traditional square tiered fruit cake, a bride and her groom can now have round, oval even hexagonal cakes in fruit, sponge or chocolate and decorate with just about anything you can imagine, within reason –- this is Bettys, of course.

“The favourite at the moment is for our fondant fancy –- one, two or three tiers of our fondant fancies,” explains Alison, who believes our current obsession with cupcakes could be responsible.

Alison prefers to work on the more intricate lace work using royal icing and the elaborate chocolate ruffle cake which involves working quickly with melted chocolate and working it into fan shapes before the chocolate sets. Some of the icing flowers, which can take hours to make, are hard to tell apart from the real thing.

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Prices also range from around £100 to nearer £1,000, depending on what the customer wants.

And that is the joy of Bettys.

“We have meetings with the customer and they tell us pretty much what they want on their cake. Be it roses or orchids or lattice work, we can do whatever they want, so long as it reflects well on Bettys.”

With some cakes taking up to five days to decorate, it is a labour intensive process.

Realising that handcrafted wedding cakes can be a major expense in these austere times, Bettys has introduced ts first postal cake. Starting at £145 plus postage, it can be a more affordable choice for those on a tight budget who still want a bit of the Bettys quality.

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When I visited the craft bakery, Alison was in the process of designing a special wedding cake which would be centrepiece in the Betty’s tea rooms in Yorkshire on April 29.

“We may not be making the actually wedding cake but at least our customers will be able to have a piece of Bettys wedding cake to celebrate the big day,” said Alison.

For more details visit www.bettys.co.uk

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