And for dessert….. the wedding cake

We decided not to go down the road of a traditional English/American style wedding cake. We figured whilst in France do as the French do, so we went with a Croquembouche.

The name comes from the French words 'Croque en bouche' meaning 'crunch in the mouth', because of the sensation one has while eating one of the puffs. The croquembouche has been used as a celebration cake for weddings by the French nobility since the early 18th century. Each wedding guest would bring a “sweet bread” or two with them to help create a tower of cream puffs. The couple of honour would attempt to kiss over the tower. As tradition has it, the hope was that this ceremony would grant them a prosperous life together.

The cake is made from choux buns filled with vanilla crème (profitteroles) held together with caramel in an impressive pyramid, and often decorated with threads of caramel, sugared almonds, chocolate, flowers, or ribbons.

Our cake was arranged through the venue with La Boutique at Oasis Raimbault. Contact there is Valérie Raimbault boutique@oasis-raimbault.comRue Jean Honoré Carle - 06210 La Napoule - FranceTel direct 33 (0)4 92 97 31 82Tel 33 (0)4 93 49 95 52 - Fax 33 (0)4 93 49 64 13http://www.oasis-raimbault.com

For those keen cooks, or brides on a budget here is a recipe which serves 20 people http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1801/croquembouche

The Yummy Stuff

Club Port la Galére offers various options with regards to catering your wedding. You can choose from either one of two all-inclusive packages which they call Les Formules or go a-la-carte. The two packages are:

The Preimiere Formule
Cocktail Open-bar without champagne
Menu options 3 to choose from
Wines of the slopes
Mineral water
The hire of the club incl. all equipment, chairs, tables, linens etc
Personnel until midnight

The Deuxieme Formule
Open cocktail bar with the champagne
Menus options 5 to choose from
Higher wine selection
Mineral Water
A goblet of champagne with dessert
The hire of the club incl. all equipment, chairs, tables, linens etc
Personnel until 2:00 am
Incandescent Decoration

Les Formules work out to be great value, and you can add things on and pay a supplement. We went for the Deuxieme Formule and it was great, as previously mentioned nothing was too much trouble. I won’t list all the menus or prices as I am sure they change from year to year.

However to give you an idea our menu was 5 courses followed by wedding cake, we did warn our guests not to eat a big lunch that day!

Our Venue

The most spectacular venue Club Port la Galere, in Theoule Sur Mer, 15kms from Cannes.

It is a private gated residence club, (i.e. where people own summer apartments and villas). It has a club house with 17 bedrooms, 2 restaurants, 2 swimming pools, and various other amenities. We took over the club house hotel and some of the villas for larger groups of guests.

During the course of the weekend we held several events around the 23 hectare resort, starting by having a welcome drinks reception on the terrace of our penthouse suite in the Club House.

The wedding ceremony took place up in the gardens of the Club House, which was then followed by Cocktails and aperitifs set up around the winter pool.

We then had everyone move down to the Summer Club for dinner and dancing with our band all set up outside around the summer pool, then at midnight moved inside to continue dancing away to the DJ.

The next day we held a brunch up on the main lawn in front of the winter pool to say goodbye to all our guests – those who could get up that is!

Not only was the venue beautiful, but the resort manager Kartik Kashive was amazing and nothing was too much trouble for him and his staff.

So sorry I have not posted in such a log time, as any recent bride can tell you, just before the wedding and just after the wedding time runs away from you…..

But now the big day has come and gone, and I just want to share with you how amazing the whole weekend was, everything was more than I could ever have dreamed. My word for the weekend that kept popping in to my head was “it’s surreal”

But before I sign off and close this blog (sadly no more excuses to research the South of France for wedding things now) I thought it would be nice to share with you how fabulous and amazing all our wedding suppliers were and let you know who we used, so I will be posting all info over the next few days.