Pumpkin and Spice

When I have some time to kill, I love to visit the blog Cake Wrecks. Have you been? It's side-splitting. If you haven't been, go right now and poke around a bit. Don't worry, it'll open in a new window. I'll wait here... Back? Funny, right? Anyway, the premise of the blog is essentially that people send in photos of professional cakes gone horribly and hilariously wrong.

It's obvious from most (like, 98%) of the pictures that the cakes came from grocery stores. Okay, I live on planet Earth. I've been to a grocery store. I've seen half-heartedly decorated cakes sitting sadly in bakery cases and thought, "Man, oh, man. What jerk made these?" I don't fool myself that those cakes are made by highly experienced pastry chefs.

Well, the shoe's on the other foot... Or, karma's a bitch... Or, but for the grace of God there go I. Something like that. Now, I am that jerk. I'll be honest, when I was in pastry school, I really wanted to work in a hotel or resort (I still do), though I liked doing just about everything. The one thing I told myself that I did not want to do was decorate cakes. I mean, I like decorating cakes, and doing one every now and then is fun, but I knew that I didn't want to be that poor sap at the local supermarket pumping out sheet cake after sheet cake with roses (my roses were a little meh) and "Happy Birthday, So-and-So!" scrawled on them in loopy cursive.

Well, I finished my pastry externship, and was dumped out square in the middle of a depressing economy (in a small-ish town). I looked high and low for a job- anything even loosely related to pastries. (I was getting to the point I was considering applying for waitressing jobs, just to stay in the industry.) Then, a nearby grocery store (which shall remain nameless) posted a job opening for a cake decorator/baker. I lept on it, and was hired as Head Cake Decorator (a coveted position, and pretty decent pay, based on my education/experience).

Don't get me wrong- it's a good job. I like the people I work with, I'm good at what I do, the higher-ups like my work. I'm not a decorator at heart, though, and I do miss getting my hands in dough and flour and batter. (I don't bake anything- I strictly decorate.) Someday, I'll be back on that side, dusty with flour, sticky with batter. Meanwhile, I've been honing my piping skills- I am like lightning with a shell border, and my roses are awesome.

I have strayed from the crux of my post, though. I wanted to share some things that may help you to... understand some of the abominations on Cake Wrecks. Not excuse them, mind you, just shedding a little light on how such things could happen- from an insider's perspective.

• Many grocery stores (especially chain stores) have corporate mandated cake designs for the case. (About 90% of our case is "by the book".) Some of the designs are really cute. Some of the designs look awful even when well executed.
• A lot of stores have a per-shift quota for the decorator. (I knew a girl who worked at a different store who said their quota was 40 cakes in an 8 hour shift. They had a "decorator's assistant" that base iced all the cakes, though. Still, that's a lot of cakes.) At our store, case cakes are generally expected to take less than 15min (start to finish), and even special orders should take less than 30min. (Longer than that, and we have to charge extra for labor.)
• Most decorators aren't formally trained. A lot of decorators start as bakers and slowly get introduced to the decorating. Some stores require a decorating test to get a job, some don't.

Also, a lot of customers aren't very clear with orders. ("I want a summer-themed cake." Do you want a beachy-type summer theme, or flowers, or...? "I dunno, you know, summery... Summer colors." Yellow? Blue? Pink? "You decide. Whatever you think will look best." Gaaaaaaahhhhhh!!!!!!)

I always let customers see the message/name as it is written on the cake to verify spelling, punctuation, &c. If the name is especially weird, I'll make them write it themselves. Don't be afraid to ask to look at the message on the order form to make sure stuff is spelled right.

Make sure you're putting your trust in the right person. Thanks to shows like Ace of Cakes, people think nothing of ordering bizarre, complex cakes. Don't expect a grocery store bakery to craft a 3-D sculpted, fondant covered unicorn cake. They don't have the staffing or the time (or the inclination) to do those cakes. They take dozens of hours and cost thousands of dollars. If you want something unique, ask what the decorator's good at- for example, I "specialize" in free-hand icing drawings. If they say, "Uhhh... I dunno. There's the stuff in the book..." maybe stick with the designs in the book. Just sayin'.

Finally, to restore your faith in the grocery store decorator, I present to you some of my favorite special orders...

Lego cake!

Lion cake.

A Lord of the Rings cake (that's real Elvish on the Ring. )

For a kid's rocket/space-themed party.

And, an Army cake for a VA doctor.