I use the White on White buttermilk cake as my white cake. It only has egg whites in it, but has increased amount of butter, which makes it look yellowish, not white. I guess, I could have gotten that complaint as well.
Don't let her bully you.

I wonder how she is going to respond. Seems like she is trying to pull ove over though. My white cake looks yellow too because I put pudding mix it in. Its delicious but it is a yellowish color. Crazy.

I think she'll probably be happy, since it seems her main GOAL is to get SOMETHING for NOTHING!!

I know it's been asked before, BUT why is she asking for a groom's cake?
OP do you know? lol It makes no sense.

lol...no idea on why she wants a grooms cake....too funny.

she probably wants a "groom's cake" at her leisure of course, so she can turn around and use it for her new hubby's birthday down the road! lol

I try & encourage fellow cakers to hang onto as much of their hard earned money as possible when it comes to complaints. But dang a white cake that's yellow is hard to beat around the bush about. And it's a matter of degree too but I mean I use full butter smbc so I tell my brides that the icing is off white a pale pale yellow. Some are ok with it due to the taste factor some say uh ugh all pure white. So that color thing is way important.

I like your idea of offering up the 24 cuppies. Good call.

I think if the contract says "white almond" I can see why she expected to see a white cake since white is part of the wording. If it said "sour cream almond" then color wouldn't make a differnecen because the contract didn't specify a color. I don't know that she deserves to have anything back just because the color wasn't what she expected, but at least she's not demanding the whole price of the cake or something. If she were my customer, I would go ahead with the cupcakes to smooth things over. You never know when something simple like that might go a long way for PR and help your business later on. And a dozen or two cupcakes won't cost you a lot.

I think it depends on what the contrat says. If it says "white" cake then she has an argument, f it says "almond" not so much. If you made a note that she wantd it to be white in color, then it should have been white in colr.

I have three different almond cake recipes that I use, and none of them are perfectly white, but they also are all different, and some brides request one over the other. If I'd had a specific request and made the wrong cake, that would have been my mistake, and I'd give money back. Personally, I don't understand why giving someone cupcakes would be okay. I hate cupcakes and if my baker who'd screwed up my order said "well, I'm giving you these cupcakes and that's your refund" I'd be slightly pissed off, and would tell everyone about it. What did the specific contract say? Has that been said yet?

well...still waiting on her reply. she said she was thrilled with it but just wanted to bring it to my attention because she was surprised. I never use shortening, so I never could have made a brilliant white cake. She did know this, but I also should have clarified further. I told her the cupcakes can be whenever she wanted...so its not like here have some cupcakes even though you have no use for them.

Just to clarify, was this a wedding cake, or was it a shower cake? I still don't get why she's asking for money off the groom's cake, or was it just that she's asking for a refund in general?

Do you mean to say that this bride in her WHITE dress with her WHITE flowers and her WHITE shoes with her WHITE pearl handled cake knife cut into a cake that was not perfectly WHITE???

*gasp* That's IT!

The inside of her cake did not fit with the color scheme of the wedding - who cares if the FLAVOR was actually correct. People cannot SEE the FLAVOR! It must have CLASHED with the place setting that it was served on - the wedding was completely RUINED!!! I can't believe you wont' refund every penny PLUS write apology notes to every person who attended so they know that it was not the bride's fault that the cake was not white as snow like a wedding cake "should" be.

SHOCKING! Simply SHOCKING!!!


LOL!

When I was doing tastings for the bakery I worked for, we presented our 'white' cake. It was French Vanilla so it wasn't pure white. I told the brides that if they wanted a pure white cake we could do it, but it might be a bit drier in texture (this is what the bakers told me). They generally went for the vanilla...but they knew what to expect. Whenever someone was upset (which fortunately did not happen often at all) we would give them a $25 gift certificate to be applied toward their next order of whatever they wanted. Your bride was only unhappy with the color of her cake. It was a misunderstanding and any goodwill on your part should reflect the minimal 'damage' that was done.
I personally like the idea of an anniversary top tier. To me that would be more than fair. But anything you do should be appreciated (unless she's a total B). My guess is you'll be pinning brides down about cake color from now on, huh? LOL! Good luck & hope whatever you do works out well!

I already do a complimentary fresh anniversary tier in a year...hence the cupcakes now. Yes, I will be nailing down the color from here on out . I will also not be offering an anniversary tier on such small cakes going forward. Lots to think about as I work at continuing my business!

I would never assume that weddings would automatically require a white cake, though. I rarely do white cake for weddings anymore, most people want somethng more interesting flavor-wise. I don't use food coloring, but different cakes are different colors, so a wedding cake HAVING to be white wouldn't even occur to me.

yes, i never heard of the white automatically for weddings. I actually don't think I have ever eaten white cake at a wedding...and I certainly never had made one.

I guess I am having a hard time understanding here . . . she got the cake flavor and filling she wanted. Okay, so the cake was not white white, but you said you mentioned to her that it would not be completely white. I can see if the icing or fondant color was not what she wanted and it threw off the color of the wedding scheme, but cutting into a cake and complaining that it was not completely white -c'mon - I am sorry, I think that it is ridiculous. It's not like she cut into a cake and it was red or orange or something. . .

In an earlier post, she wrote. . . "I never use shortening, so I never could have made a brilliant white cake. She did know this, but I also should have clarified further" . . . .so the person did know that the cake would not be white, white.

RoccosMom:
I really love the way you post

And I must agree, even with my sarcastic post, that I do remember that back in the day wedding cakes being mostly white.

Sure. Doesn't mean it's not the industry standard just 'cause there's new ideas. Most flavor charts on websites start with white & yellow. Like yours. Old school white is your first flavor. That didn't happen by accident.

Expectations are expectations. Maybe old school but it's still predominant. To me it's the wrong flavor/kind of cake than what was ordered. Was it ambiguous yes. And the caker lost. I'd refund something.

I love a good debate.