My daughter is making a cake for next weekend and it will be 3 tiered. It will have a pudding-type filling. I assume that will need to be refrigerated. DO you know of any good fillings that do not need refrigeration. My fridge is not that big. I might have to empty it to put a cake in. Thanks

Yes, pudding requires refrigeration.

You can substitute a shelf stable sleeved pastry filling (Bavarian cream) to save yourself cleaning out the fridge.

Everything you need to know to make, decorate and assemble stacked/tiered/layer cakes:

http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-605188.html

The above superthread has popular CC recipes for crusting American buttercreams, several types of fondant and doctored cake mix (WASC and other flavor variations) and so much more.

One of the extras is info on the sleeved pastry fillings including a useage chart.

HTH

do the cakes need to go in the frig after they are filled and iced? I know this is a dumb question but I have never used these before.

If you want a low budget, easy to find suggestion - Snack Pack pudding cups are shelf stable and don't need to be refrigerated. Not the Jello cups which are in the refrigerator section of the store, but the Snack Pack cups. You can get 4 cups for about a dollar, and 1 cup fills an 8 inch round layer quite nicely. I used these about 3 weeks ago, cake sat out over 2 nights (torted, filled and frosted Tues night; decorated Wed night; served Thurs AM) and it was fine.

From what I understand, the snack pack puddings require refrigeration AFTER they are opened. If I am incorrect, someone please reply.

What can I say? If I'm wrong - I'm wrong, but I left it out 2 days with NO problems - it's sealed behind a buttercream dam, between two cake layers and entire cake sealed in buttercream - can't see with all the preservatives in it that there would be a problem.

When I first started making cakes I used a recipe that mixed 3 snack pack cups with 1/2 pack of corresponding dry instant pudding mix for a thick pudding-like filling. Got the recipe from Wilton instructor, who never told us it had to be refridgerated, so I never did. Maybe I got lucky, everything was fine and they stayed out for days..

I wonder, if it is ok to leave out cream cheese icing, SMBC, and Bettercreme which start out in the fridge, why is it not ok to leave out snack packs which start out at room temp? Do they have enough sugar for preservation?

Thanks Jan H, that dilemma had me pretty confused.

just checked both the Snack Pack packaging at the store, as well as Jello instant pudding mix - neither packaging states that product must be refrigerated after opening or preparing

It can't be safe to leave Jello pudding out/unrefrigerated after opening the container or after making either instant or cooked.

This thread has been nagging at me - I had visions of thousands of cakes with pudding filling being left unrefrigerated, and since I got food poisoning from something similar I called the Jello people (phone number on package - they are actually the Kraft people). Once prepared, instant or cooked pudding or opened packages of pre-made pudding in cup - all require refrigeration. I asked why they don't tell you that on the package and was told, "everyone knows you have to refrigerate pudding". Hopefully, everyone does now.