Here Fishy Fishy...
March 25, 2010 How to tell if the sushi served at the wedding is fresh:
Yes, those are live fish in wineglasses.Naturally, I have a few questions.
1) Live animals in a wedding cake? Really? What next: hamster rolly-balls?
2) On a scale of 1-10, how bad is it that now I want to see a hamster in a rolly-ball jammed between two cake tiers? I mean, are we talking "not our first choice for babysitter" bad, or "your name should be on a national watch-list" bad?
3) Is "rolly-ball" even what you call those things?
4) What was I talking about?
Oh, right.5) Getting back to the fish thing: if you MUST have fish in your wedding cake, why wouldn't you at least use pretty ones? Was the bait shop having a 2-for-1 sale?
6) You know how the wedding cake usually gets set up a few hours before the reception? Well, just how long do you suppose the fish were in there? I mean, not to be indelicate or anything, but what happens if one croaks before cake-cutting time? ("It's ok, kids, he's sleeping! And his friends are just...kissing him! Yeah! Really!)
And if you're not completely grossed out yet, just imagine the smell of old fish water mixed with the smell of icing when they took that top tier off. Mmmm.
Perhaps you think I'm coming down too hard on this cake, though. After all, the cake itself isn't so bad, so maybe the whole live-fish thing was an isolated incident. Right?
Right?
Uh...
WRONG.
If this groom's cake teaches us anything, it's this: when there are live minnows embedded in your cake, RC cars mashed down into the icing can seem downright classy.
Stacey W. & Karen W., believe it or not, these aren't the first wedding cakes with live fish in them here on CW. There was also this one. So, are we looking at a terrifying new wedding trend? (And who among us secretly hopes so?)
- Related Wreckage: The Groom's Revenge
Reader Comments (185)
My kids would love a cool cake loving babysitter, Jen. And I think a hamster ball cake would rock. Except how to explain those little black things under the hamster? Of course they're sprinkles! And I agree - maybe they could have used betas, a fighting fishy cake! Much better than the "baitshop special".
ugh, the idea of having anything alive besides the bridal party and guests is not a good one. Animals are living things, not disposable for the sake of our entertainment. :(
Poor fish.
Jimma Lou said...
"Well, HAVE you seen the episode of Cake Boss? Would ANYONE else like to comment on that?"
-----------
Well, yes, I just barely watched it myself...but I'm not quite sure what your point was.
The whole scene was ludicrous! The "Boss" was yelling at the birds, "Get outta there!" and THEN the bridal couple had to DRAG them out of the case! The most MORONIC thing of all was that they released them with the ribbons still TIED ON and dangling from their legs...auurrgh.
!! IDIOTS !!
=^>.<^=
Um, this may sound weird, but the fish in the champagne glasses is actually a cool idea. It would have been better if they had used fake ones though.
AAAAAAAAACCCCKKKK! I want to run away but I can't stop looking. . .Yeah they really did that. EEWWWEEE!
I'm late to this posting but have to chime in to say that not only is wanting to see a hamster-ball wedding cake completely understandable, your coming up with the idea just launched you guys to the top of our "please babysit" list when we have our baby in June.
Fantastic image. Maybe I can convince my friend who's getting married in 2 weeks to let me have a few minutes alone with her cake before the reception.....
Fish POOP.
Nuf said.
I find it weird that anyone needs to be told this, but Fish and Cake do not mix!!
Ugh. =( That's fish abuse. Those poor fish are in a horrible, horrible place. that's not even the amount of water you throw in a fish bag that's supposed to last the hour or so ride to the house and the aquarium. They've probably been in there a whole day.
Those poor fish. This is just horrible from an animal lover's standpoint. And for everyone saying 'use betta fish!' no! No, that's even worse =(!
This is just terrible. I'll be so glad when they finish passing laws in every state that makes it a crime to do stuff like this to fish. This is abuse.
The awfulness of having something that swims around with strings of poo hanging from its behind and occasionally jumps out of its container ON YOUR FOOD is distracting y'all from the other bad badness in this horrible thing.
1. So it's an all-white cake, except for the electric blue streaks of . . . something. And the feeder goldfish.
2. Either they molded sugar shells and then skipped painting them in order to spend that whole couple dollars on feeder goldfish, or they plopped white plastic shells on the cake.
3. Somebody put a lot of thought into the engineering required to get the fish onto the cake in the first place. That was the detail that mattered most? Really?
With just a bit LESS work, this could have been a white sand beach with lifelike sugar shells scattered on it. And no half-suffocated pooping fish.
Jenny Islander
I was at a friend's wedding. She had huge vases on each table with flower bouquets and goldfish in the vases.
The problem was either the water hadn't been treated for the fish or the flowers were poisoning the water, but, yes, you guessed it, the fish started going belly up all over the hall. Reflected on mirrors on the tables, too.
Sometimes, the simpler weddings are the best!
It's terrible that just because fish aren't fluffy or have feathers that people think they can just treat them as disposable ornaments. They're living creatures and they need proper spance and oxygenation for the water.
I wonder how long they had to be in those glasses for? I'm assuming quite a while so as someone else pointed out, those fish are suffocating. They have a limited amount of oxygen and what some people don't realise is that the wanter NEEDS to be CONSTANTLY oxygenated by an air pump or something. That's why keeping them in bowls is also cruel. You wouldn't stick a cat in an airtight box and stick it on a cake -- why would you do it to a fish?
When I was checking out venues/caterers etc for my wedding, one suggested mini ice sculptures for each table (no). He said that they could do frozen spheres with flowers in the middle (no thanks) or goldfish. Yes, welcome friends and family. The menu is vegetarian, but no worries, there's a dead-ass frozen pet on each table for decoration. We also have a frozen puppy spewing fruit punch over by the cake.
Skarto sez:
"You wouldn't stick a cat in an airtight box and stick it on a cake -- why would you do it to a fish?"
Don't be so sure nobody would do that. If people would put live fish and live birds in cakes, can cats and dogs be far behind?
(No animals were harmed during the writing of this comment.)
Una, I'm still chuckling over the caterer who wanted frozen dead fish as centerpieces at your vegetarian wedding. Vegetarianism seems like such a simple concept that I'm amazed at how many people don't seem to get it. I've lost count of how many people I've heard saying things like, "I'm a vegetarian. I only eat chicken and fish." (Huh?) My favorite was a woman who told me, in all seriousness, that she was a vegetarian and therefore she didn't eat meat unless it was Kosher.
Must have been the Little Mermaid's wedding? She wanted some of her closest friends to be a part of the wedding...you know, make 'em feel real special.
... Fish in a cake?
That's it. I'm putting a PONY in my wedding cake! Fish are for amateurs.
Man, this is how I ended up with goldfish. My friend went to his cousin's wedding and came home with three of the goldfish decorations just because he couldn't stand the thought of the unwanted fish being thrown out. I'd kept fish before so I had an empty tank and I ended up taking them.
Except my tank was only 10 gallons and that's still too small for three of those tiny "feeder" goldfish once they start growing. I kept them for as long as I could, but trying to keep three growing goldfish healthy in a 10 gallon tank is a lot of work and once they reach a certain size, it's just not possible. Luckily another friend's stepmother has a proper fishpond and when the fish were finally just too big for the tank, she agreed to take them. So that's four people who were willing to put more thought into those fishes' lives than the bride or wedding planner who just thought they'd make an interesting and inexpensive wedding decoration.
I liked my goldfish. They were pretty and a lot more interesting than I was expecting after years of fiesty bettas. I'm just gonna pretend that the fish in that cake were and are now in a fish pond somewhere.
While the blog entry is funny, the cakes are not. This is animal cruelty, pure and simple. Goldfish rapidly suffer the effects of hypoxia and ammonia levels when contined to a small container like that, particularly for prolonged periods of time like the duration of an entire wedding/reception. Plus, what is the fate of those fish once the wedding is over? With proper care goldfish should live upwards of 20 years, and single tail varieties like that need to live in ponds to reach adult size and remain healthy. How very tragic that people use living creatures and decorations.
OK.
My cousin thought live goldfish were a sweet wedding centerpiece idea.
1) dead fish + reception hall reeking of dead fish on the wedding day.
2) drunk guests eating said live goldfish on dares
3) no one wanting t take home sickly goldfish centerpieces and being stuck with 30 or 40 fish and a honeymoon trip to attend to...
bad idea.
OMG. That's all I can say.
Fish? In a cake? What has this world come to?
Am I the only person who noticed that the grooms cake had real rocks in it??? Please tell me I'm not the only one. :( It was gross to see the fish, but that just made things worse....
Ren, you're awesome ;)
Fish as centerpieces, to me, is an ok idea.
Not taking into account the fish's wellbeing, and what to do with them after, BAD idea. Capital B-A-D!
If someone had described this wedding cake to me, I probably would have thought it was an awesome idea, but after seeing it...not so much. And the groom's cake...I'm not even going to get into that one.
Those remind me of the creepy cakes here - http://www.flickr.com/groups/creepy-cakes/pool/
-Jen
Those remind me of the creepy cakes found here - http://www.flickr.com/groups/creepy-cakes/pool/
JEN
You might be a red neck if - YOU LIKE THIS CAKE!!!
I would have laughed until I peed myself and then run for the hills!
Words fail me. The thought of fish water and icing made me want to throw up right on my laptop! To ask what these people were thinking is just the tip of the iceberg! I sincerely hope these were homemade. What self respecting baker would do that?!
I cannot believe some folks approve. Yeah they're fish but they are still alive and feel pain.
I wish I didn't know about this, it makes me sick to my stomach.
Oooo let's display a torture chamber on our wedding cake. Sounds lovely.
I cannot believe some folks approve. Yeah they're fish but they are still alive and feel pain.
I wish I didn't know about this, it makes me sick to my stomach.
Oooo let's display a torture chamber on our wedding cake. Sounds lovely.
I have never laughed so hard in my life. I went to a wedding not long ago where they had live fish as centerpieces and the fish were going belly up through the reception. Of course, having a sense of humor but in poor taste, the people at my table wanted to roast the poor fish on toothpicks over the candles burning at the table. This is priceless.
Ha! I had a beta in my wedding cake. My friend made it, was a total surprise and a big hit!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/budgiejen/1460587575/
fish in glasses? I fear the worst ;) xx
those poor fish... cake-ruining aside, the chances of their survival are VERY slim. We had to do a bio project with terrariums/aquariums made of 2-liter bottles and I drew the line at fish... many people used them and had them die. Anti- anthropocentrism!
Arguments pro and con not withstanding, this wreck just is in need of some puns. So we turn it over to our emcee to entertain us.
"Captain Hook, would you tackle this task and try to reel these folks in with some fish puns?"
"Gladly. The bride and the groom thought this was such a good idea and told the baker so, and he was breaming with pride. Of course, he tried not to be koi. But some of the guests were mollyfied by the display and were carping about it. So much so, the baker began to get a haddock and was afraid he might have to call a sturgeon to help relieve the pain. Meanwhile, the band was getting ready for the first number and wanted to sing that tuna with sole. They wanted to play well and not just skate by. The bride and groom hoped the band wouldn't flounder. One member of the band really played a wicked bass, while another was really banging the drums. In the end, it all went well and everyone decided that the bride and groom and the baker did this just for the halibut.