Cake Wrecks, The Book: An Interview with Creator Jen Yates
"The classic Wrecks are those that are misspelled, misunderstood, or trying way too hard to be creative."
Since May of 2008, Jen Yates has been documenting moldy feet, pregnant bellies, and misplaced apostrophes spotted on cakes on her wildly popular blog Cake Wrecks. Very quickly, Jen has made a career out of ridiculous cakes. Her new blook (blog-turned-book?) Cake Wrecks: When Professional Cakes Go Hilariously Wrong comes out on October 1, and features a bunch of brand-new content. Yes, that means more creepy baby cakes! We chatted with Jen about the Cake Wrecks concept, what holidays are most wreckable, and more.
So, let's start at the beginning. The Cake Wrecks creation story. It quite literally began with "The Cake That Started It All," my first post. My friend Abby forwarded that e-mail to me, I laughed, started wondering if there were more like it out there, and, well, one thing just led to another! Within a few hours, Cake Wrecks was born.
Did you think it would blow up the way it did? (And wherever you are, Abby, thank you for bringing this bundle of joy into our lives.) Absolutely not! I figured it would be a fun diversion for a little while, but I never thought anyone other than a few close friends would ever read it. It was really more for my own amusement. In fact, the first time a stranger commented on a post, I was a bit freaked out. Today I'm *still* stunned by CW's continuing success.
A smashing success! How did the book deal happen? Do you envision a movie too à la Julie & Julia? (Sorta kidding) A few months into writing the blog, an editor contacted me. Then a few agents. It was quite surreal, and I actually dismissed the idea of a book at first. It was only when multiple people approached me that I started seriously considering it--and from there it wasn't too long before I teamed up with Andrews McMeel to actually put the thing in motion.
Somehow I don't think CW would do well on the big screen. Heh. Besides, I think the spirit of Cake Wrecks is alive and well in some of the cake reality shows out there, and that's good enough for me. ;)
Why should people buy the book when they can, ahem, get the milk for free? The spirit of the book is the same as the blog, so if you enjoy Cake Wrecks online you'll enjoy it in print. In addition to all the new Wreckage (about 75 percent of the book has never been on the blog) there are also some behind-the-scenes tidbits I think fans will enjoy. You'll learn a little bit more about me, the early days of the blog, the controversies I either incurred or survived, how bakers have reacted, and other fun facts. There are also some reader stories sprinkled throughout the book. Mostly, though, it's all about the Wreckage.
Did you have to get permission from all the readers who submitted photos? As far as the legalities go, yes, we had to set up a special contract page for readers to submit any photos that they wanted to be considered for the book--so we have official permission for everything printed. Getting that set up and establishing a filing system to keep track of it all was quite the challenge, too!
What are the classic trademarks of a Cake Wreck? From the frosting font to the airbrushing to the plastic toymabobs. The classic Wrecks are those that are misspelled, misunderstood, or trying way too hard to be creative (hellooo, pregnant belly cakes!). And, of course, you can't go right with tons of airbrushing and plastic flotsam.
[Naked Mohawk-Baby Carrot Jockeys]
Is there one theme that's continually wrecked? Babies? I'm seeing a lot of freaky babies. Baby showers continue to be the Wrecks-theme champion. I don't think there's any other category of cake that is so consistently Wrecky, which must be why I love them so much.
A holiday that's most wreckable? Christmas was INSANE last year, so I can't wait for those holiday cakes to start showing up again. Wreckerators in a festive spirit produce some absolute wonders.
Can you tell if any "Cake Wrecks" were intentionally made just to be on the site? (I mean, you are a pretty big deal.) We do our best to screen out the intentional Wrecks. Most fans tell me if they did it on purpose, and I screen out those that seem overly suspicious. We also will follow up with submitters if we suspect an amateur at work. The good thing is that I do occasionally feature Fan Wrecks, so hopefully readers know they can still get on the blog without resorting to a "fake" Wreck.
Have you ever found yourself the victim of a Wreck? Me? Hah, not that I know of! Well, unless you count the intentional homages to the blog--those are always fun to see.
Is there a classic Wreck flavor? Note: not regular cake flavor. Not a regular cake flavor, huh? Uh, well, it seems like every creepy Wreck is always made of red velvet. You know, the better to resemble guts and gore? So I guess that's kind of the unofficial Cake Wreck flavor.
Have you ever made a cake "artist" cry when he or she realized their "art" was on your site? Ooh. Well, yes, I think so, unfortunately. It was the very first baker I ever heard from, in the very early days of the site, and she was so sweet and so embarrassed at the same time that she actually made *me* cry. (Turned out she wasn't a professional, which made me feel even worse.) Obviously I removed her photo and wrote her a heartfelt apology, but that experience taught me a lot.
Now I try to consider every post from the baker's perspective, and I always try to keep my humor light and as insult-free as possible.
[Hey Mister, Why the Long Face?]
What entry got the most comments (or just created the biggest Wrecksplosion in general)? That's a tough one, since there have been a few (inadvertently) controversial posts since CW began. I think the most traumatic for me was the insulin pen cake, which I talk about in the book. But there was also the horse post, which I unknowingly posted the day after all those famous race horses died. (Later I posted some realistic baby cakes the same day a news story broke about a baby's gruesome death. My bad timing is becoming legendary.) The controversies don't necessarily get the most comments, though--the more popular posts or the ones with spelling errors in them do. :D
The post with the most comments, though, is the one announcing the book tour. When I ask for feedback, the fans give it in spades! I think we have something like 800 comments on that entry, all demanding we add the commenter's city or country to the tour. That kind of enthusiasm is why the tour went from an initial five stops up to the 12 scheduled now.
Clearly people will be a little starstruck around the original Cake Wreckerator herself. Who does the same for you? I still get a little starstruck when I hear from some of my favorite bloggers--and bakers, too. I'll be watching some cake challenge on TV and squealing over all the contestants that I "know" from e-mail. Elisa Strauss (of Confetti Cakes) sent me her new book some months back, and over the past few weeks I've gotten to exchange a few chatty e-mails with Mary Alice (from Ace of Cakes), who is even cooler than I thought she'd be--and that's pretty darn cool.
[The Dreaded Manicured Alien Hand of Doom!!!]
Do you have a day job? Right now it's all Cake Wrecks, but John and I also own and operate a faux finishing company called Artistic License. I don't paint onsite much anymore. The past few years I've just handled the paperwork and website and such from home. Now that the economy has taken a downturn we don't have much work, though, so John's been helping me more and more with Cake Wrecks. I'm getting quite spoiled, too. We work so well together that I'll be a little sad to see him go back to his day job.
Is there potential for BrownieWrecks, CookieWrecks, and CupcakeWrecks? From what I've seen, if a decorator can squirt icing on it, s/he will--and that means Wreck potential. So I do occasionally post the non-cake Wreck, and you'll continue to see the odd cookie Wreck or bread Wreck from here on out.
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6 Comments:
I love the cawrecks site and have been looking at it almost daily for quite a while, but every time I look, I find myself wondering two things:
first, [how] do those who are responsible for absurd cake wreckage keep their jobs? And second, given the potential for disaster, why do people persist in ordering important (e.g. wedding) cakes from anyone who doesn't display visible evidence of a reliable track record? I mean, I can see getting an office-party cake at Costco, but surely for an important occasion, one would be willing to dig a bit deeper into one's pockets, to ensure satisfaction..?
mongoose at 9:26AM on 09/22/09
@mongoose:
1) People are amazingly cheap, sometimes,
and
2) There is NO accounting for taste.
akk328 at 1:28PM on 09/22/09
I ordered a cake from a bakery for the specific reason that they could take digital photos and print them onto cakes with edible ink - I SWEAR this was NOT my idea, I just got manipulated into ordering the thing because the fool throwing the party didn't know how to send photos. The whole concept seemed unappetizing and toxic to me!
Anyway, the geniuses at the bakery misspelled "congratulations". They put "Congradulations". It was too late to get another cake, but fortunately it was for a graduation party, so guests thought it was a play on words.
yayfood at 2:35PM on 09/22/09
Cakewrecks makes me laugh so hard that it moves me to tears. The first time I went there, I got a pain in my side from laughing so hard. Jen, I'm asking for your book for my birthday.
@mongoose, The cake decorators who are hired at most chain grocery store bakeries (see the WalMart and Safeway labels in those Cake Wreck photos?) are people who filled out a job application and have never decorated a cake in their lives. They are trained on the job by someone who also started out the same way. I have no clue how they manage to keep their jobs. I do know that production counts--if you can churn out cakes quickly to keep display cases full, it doesn't matter that the cakes look like an amateur decorated them. The emphasis is on speed, not quality or symmetry or spelling.
As for why people persist in ordering amateur-ish cakes, most people wait until the very last minute to order a cake. I bake cakes for all the special occasions of family and friends--often, my cakes are my wedding gift to my sons' friends--but I'm not a business. I can't begin to tell you how many people have gotten my number and called me in desperation because they can't get a $100 wedding or shower cake for next weekend. But WalMart will do it, so that's where I tell them to go.
Very few towns have full-service bakeries, but grocery bakeries are everywhere. Very few people bake cakes, but grocery bakeries always have them in stock. Very few people have the money to spend on the gorgeous cakes you see on "Cake Boss" or "Ace of Cakes" or in magazines, but grocery bakeries have catalogs of cake designs to choose from. That's why most people go to WalMart and Costco and Safeway when they need a cake NOW.
Consider this: a serving of cake is measured at 4 square inches, which is a slice that's either 2x2 inches (take a look at a cupcake) or 1x4 inches (look at your pointer finger). The cheapest, plainest special occasion buttercream-frosted cake from a professional baker runs about $3.25 a serving; you will pay much more for fondant, separated tiers, gum paste flowers, etc. The very minimum for the Ace of Cakes is $1,000 and they're booked for the next couple of months, but you can get a cake within 24 hours from from a grocery store for 100 people for about $150.
Gotta get busy. . .It's son Andy's 28th birthday today. I'm making Dorie Greenspan's recipe for white buttermilk celebration cake with raspberry filling, but I'm playing around with it by using semisweet ganache between the two cake layers (cake, raspberry filling, cake, ganache, cake, raspberry filling) and milk chocolate whipped cream frosting. I will whip some of the dark ganache to use as a bottom border and for some decorative piping on the top and sides. I'm baking two 12" layers, so the 14 adults and kids who are helping him celebrate will be able to have a slab o' cake, not a weeny finger-sized slice. Even with the fresh raspberries, ScharffenBerger chocolate and quart of heavy cream, the cake cost about $1.50 per slab.
And it won't be featured on CakeWrecks. Hopefully. Happy Brithday, Andy! Congradulations! Your awsome!
betteirene at 4:49PM on 09/22/09
Highly entertaining!!! And the site has come a long way since I first looked at it. Good luck with the book!
chanterelle at 9:38PM on 09/22/09
That site is unbelievably funny, I do my best to see it weekly. There are so many cakes than can cheer you up (If you're not the one who ordered them, that is).
mtgall at 12:17AM on 09/27/09