Let Them Eat Cake!

Penn Appetit got the chance once again to cover the City of Hope’s “Let Them Eat Cake” event, where Philadelphia-area pastry chefs duke it out to make the most beautiful wedding cakes.  This year’s theme was “Masterpieces of Cake”, based on fine art and paintings, and the pastry chefs really outdid themselves representing all different kinds of art in the cake medium. The celebrity judge of the competition was Buddy Valastro, of TLC’s show, Cake Boss, and we even got a chance to interview him personally! You can find that interview below.

Of course, we not only had the chance to ogle the cakes, but also got to taste them as well! Guests to the event were each given a box to stuff full of sweet goodies for later enjoyment, but Sam and I decided to just eat as we explored.  This way, we could pretend to not know how much cake we were ingesting.

Now, a photo tour of the cakes that were on display:
This Salvador Dali cake was stunning. Just look at that fondant work!

This cake took the art theme literally, representing the painting process.

This is more of a traditional-style wedding cake, but beautiful nontheless.

There were also these delightful little butter cookies filled with jam, for when we needed a break from cake.

Another Dali-inspired cake.

Cupcakes for sampling!

Red velvet mini cupcake.

Andy Warhol-inspired cake.

Mona Lisa with cake in hand.

Little vanilla cupcakes.

We really enjoyed these, which were vanilla cake topped with whipped cream, chocolate sauce, pop-rocks, and a cherry on top.

Banana cake with chocolate buttercream.

Creepy-ass cake.

Our favorite bite of the night was this espresso tres leches cake, which reminded me of tiramisu.

This cake is from Elizabeth’s Bake Shop in Manayunk.  The inside was funfetti!

This beautiful cake was peach bellini flavor, champagne cake with peach mousse!

We also got the chance to interview Buddy Valastro, the Cake Boss:

Penn Appétit: How do you decide what medium will be the best to use to decorate a particular cake, whether it’s fondant, buttercream, modeling chocolate, or gum paste?

Buddy: I think that there’s a tool and a medium for every cake. You have to think about the size of it, the structure of it, the technique you’re trying to apply with it. [For example] if I’m doing a competition like this, I’ll try to use multiple techniques; first I can pipe, and I can paint, and then I can sculpt. There’s a best case use for every medium depending on the technique you’re using.

Penn Appétit: What has been your biggest cake “fail?”

Buddy: Probably the solar system cake. I had this idea of doing the solar system and actually putting the planets on top of each other, from Pluto to Mercury. I had this vision of it and I could’ve sworn that it was going to work, but when the cake was done I was like, “What the hell was I thinking?” Some cakes you think back and you know what you could have done better. I’ve done a NASCAR cake, and that cake came out okay. The problem with it was the sheer size of it, but now I think back to if I were to do it again I would do things a little bit differently, I would use a different medium. That’s that cake. But with the solar system cake there was just nothing I could have done to make it better. It was just a stupid idea.

Penn Appétit: How has being Italian American influenced your choice of profession? I know that cakes in Italy are very different from those in the US.

Buddy: My dad was from Sicily, from Lipari. I’ve been and it’s beautiful there. Cakes in Italy are different, but [Italians] are starting to get more into American – style cakes, and in Italy my show is popular! My dad came here from Italy and he worked in a bakery, and he was good at it, and he opened his own. When I was a kid I went to work with him and I really enjoyed it. You know when you do something and you’re like, “This is what I should be doing in life?” That’s essentially what happened, and now 25 years later I’m the cake boss. It’s funny, I was talking to my son (my son was 7 years old at the time) and he said to me, “What did you want to be when you grew up?” and I said “When I was 11 or 12 I wanted to be the best baker in the world,” and he said “Well, you did that Dad, you are the world’s best baker!” and I gave him a big hug. It was so funny.

Penn Appétit: You just have to have a goal and go for it.

Buddy: You do. You have to believe in yourself, you have to love it, and you have to pay respect. I’ve got to tell you, there’s some great work in that room, there’s some really great cakes, and a lot of them taste good too, so the thing is recognizing that it’s not only me, it’s not always about me. There’s so many talented and amazing people who you can learn from who are open to different mediums or different techniques or different ways of doing things. I tell people all the time, I don’t know everything. I’m still learning, I’m always learning.

Penn Appétit: Switching gears a little, I’ve been seeing the chalkboard cake trend really take off lately. Do you think that’s a fad or that’s around to stay?

Buddy: I don’t dislike it. I think it’s okay, but I think it’s more of a fad. Things come and go . Like cupcakes: people thought they were going to be a fad, but they’re not, they’ve been around for a long time and they’re going to be around for a long time. Like the “naked cake” thing, I think that’s more of a fad. And I’ll be honest with you, I did one, and before I did it I criticized doing a naked cake because I was like, “Well, that’s probably just because somebody can’t ice a cake.” But there came a point when I was putting the cake together when I started putting flowers and fruit sporadically [on the cake] to try to draw attention to different spots, and I felt like I was doing the same [amount of work] as I would with an iced cake. I had a new respect for naked cakes after I made it.

-Sam Cordero and Elena Crouch

Photos: Elena Crouch