Cake Wrecks – Wilton Method Fail-O-Rama

No such prized area of the sugar arts is as ubiquitously used by professional pastry chefs, grocery bakers, and home cooks as cake decorating. In the dawn of the mid-1600’s, the wealthy and the monarchs cherished elaborately-bedecked gateaux crafted by pastry chefs, and cake decorating took off in the mid-1800’s, thanks to the invention of the temperature-controlled oven. Come 1929, a pâtissier by the name of Dewey McKinley Wilton took the sugar arts to light as he established a baking and pastry school that specialized in cake decorating and confectionery in his Chicago home. A few years after World War II, in 1954, the Wiltons penned their book, Wilton´s Encyclopedia of Modern Cake Decorating, which was a pictorial treatise and instructional on the sugar arts. Dewey’s relative, Norman Wilton, developed a mail-order business and made the culinary craft accessible to commoners and homemakers, as well as professional chefs. Had the Wiltons not existed to bring the notability of cake decorating to the world, many homes would not have thrown house parties centering on a cake with roses or in the form of Elmo, and wedding receptions would not have let the couple create the first slice of cake reserved for them -

Neither would bakers cerate holiday, birthday, and special occasion cakes that would have Dewey McKinley (d. April 7, 1965) squirm in his grave.

In May 2008, a Central Florida blogger by the name of Jen Yates established a blog on the most eyebrow-raising red-letter day cakes called Cake Wrecks, which showcases professionally-baked-and-crafted sugar works that are in need of a total redo. It became so popular that it branched off into a book version that induces fits of either laughter or scorn in its audience. When I first read the blog, chock-full of pictures of sugar arts fails, I was amused as well as offended by their work, but in my opinion as a former culinary student in my high school, at least the bakers and decorators put some effort into it. It’s a horribly funny blog, and the amusement is attributed to the Wiltons, especially with the hottest, wreckiest trend in cake decorating, discussed later.

Once upon a time, there was a Walmart employee, and he heard his telephone ring in the bakery. A customer named Suzanne wanted a cake for her going-away party, with a brown shell border on the top and bottom and orange and yellow roses and rosebuds.She told him, "Write, 'Best Wishes Suzanne,' and underneath that, 'We Will Miss You.' The decorator took it by heart the next day, and followed her instructions quite literally - yes, quite literally.

This cake started the blog of the dark and erroneous side of cake decorating, Cake Wrecks. Despite all the prettiness in this floral cake, the typos on the cake is really worth the wreck. If you want a retirement or moving-away cake with wit, be sure to order that one!

Who are cute as heck, ride carrots, wear birthday (no pun intended) suits, and bedeck an otherwise pleasantly-decorated carrot cake? Why, it's the carrot jockeys, and they are using those cream-cheese icing-piped orange sticks as their stallions. The blog just is not identifiable without those cute vegetable riders with mohawks and rodeo gestures. I think it's just amusing enough for a frugal baby shower, providing that it's simple yet entertaining for the unexpected guests!

As a devout Catholic, I know deep down in my heart that premarital sex, that is, not waiting until matrimony’s dawn to make love, is gravely immoral, but even more offensive than that is a cake catered for someone having a baby in her teens. Enrobed in chocolate buttercream adorned with red flowers, the round cake bears the message in hot pink, “Congrats on your teen pregnancy!” Unless the family is caring enough to offer that baby shower cake (actually a birthday cake) for her, the mother should be in confession just about now.

Here’s another cake that would set off baby shower guests in a pinch – it consists of a round cake iced with white buttercream, bordered with alternating (in fours) pink and brown shells, and topped with another cake in a shape of an infant’s diapered rear end and lower limbs enrobed in a pink fondant blanket with pink and brown flowers. The bum is not just the cause for refunds of mothers who wanted a nice, feminine-look cake for a baby girl, but the color scheme is blatantly coincidental – and I’m not telling you why.

Personally, I’m a sucker for Eeyore as my favorite Disney character – and thanks to his rather depressing composure, I think the shades of gray cake airbrushed with splotches of elephant gray would rather suit him more than Hannah. To me, I’d rather have an all-white birthday cake or no cake at all (Hey, a decadent dessert indulgence with candles would do, for sure!) than that depressing usage of the Wilton method.

Well, at least it’s a few steps up from the cake covered spottily with dark chocolate icing in the birthday party scene of Winnie the Pooh and A Day for Eeyore…

In our house, we have a cake decorating book imported from the United Kingdom named Naughty Cakes. So far, the author Debbie Brown made sequels to the book that hoists cake decorating projects as well as entertainment to the lustful eyes of the readers – Xtra Naughty Cakes and Saucy Cakes. If there’s a fourth installment to the series, then I’d request that the work of fondant (aka sugarpaste, considering the book’s and author’s place of origin), intended for a baby shower, be included in the book! Just look at her sexy purple fondant top over her womb - doesn't that look pretty? I don’t know how she’ll make of this, though.

Almost every special occasion has a cake themed to the event, mainly bridal and baby showers, first communions, christenings, graduations, and of course, weddings. But what about divorce cakes? It’s designed as a beautiful, high-end wedding cake, in its fondant-dressed glory, with floral sprays and roses galore. But among the pink and white color scheme, splattered red fondant blood cascades down the tiered tower leading to a corpse of a murdered groom at the bottom. On top of it, a bride looks with anger at her victim, happy she that she disparaged herself from the bonds of her cheating husband. Needless to say, Shanna Moakler, a former Playboy playmate, had it featured in her divorce party. If I were to undergo a painful one, I’d just not have that bloody cake for that occasion – it’s as tasteless as it is offensive. Good thing I’m a virgin, for now.

I have to admit that as a seasoned, veteran Disneyphile, I had several cakes decorated with Disney princesses just like a huge percentage of preadolescent girls when I was young, and 3-year old (now 4) Ruby’s cake, which is a garish and demented representation of my childhood, is no exception. The roses are decently defined, but the leaves and the waterfall where Ariel sits on the rock at the top are so out of place. This one is so messed up, that I want one at my party without kids for laughs!

What if bakers lump together standard-size cupcakes, ice them over with buttercream simultaneously, and create the best alternative to a sheet cake? They would create the most Wreck-tastic of cakes – the cupcake cake. Cupcake cakes are either slathered together with icing or used with pre-iced cupcakes to form a shape of any item or character. One of the most popular cake guise of the type is a turtle, which is one of the simplest designs with such “puzzle cakes,” and speaking of which, Wilton sells how-to kits of them under the title – you guessed it - “Puzzle Cakes!” Sure, some who read this blog (even the founder) shirk at the enterprises that make cake decorating equally at home or in the food business for them, but I think it’s innovative enough to keep party guests laughing! Thanks to Wilton, decapitating teddy bears can’t be more fun than eating it voraciously! Yummy!

As PBS television series Sesame Street celebrates its big 4-0, many bakers pay tribute to the human cast, living or dead, and those classic furry Muppets. Sure, there's cakes in the forms of Elmo and Abby Cadabby, but in Cake Wrecks, Jen devoted her post (see "Like THIS, Not Like THAT") to two cupcake cakes and two cupcake displays featuring the biscuit-philiac (for you, UK readers), blue furball, Sid. Known famously as Cookie Monster, he may be enjoying his treats in moderation since 2005, but decorators decided to stuff his mouth with at least one cookie. My favorite one of the lot is the display at a corner bakery that appears to be Baby Cookie Monsters chocking on monster chocolate chip cookies, and it's blatantly adjacent to the ones looking like demented Elmos. The buttercream on them is at least white, with blue nonpareils denoting their fur coats and chocolate morsels denoting their eyes, though. As the choking Cookie Monsters give me a good laugh, especially during the Street's I hope the same bakery would make a Don Music cake, complete with piano and Mr. Music himself disgustingly slumped on it, head resting on the keyboard!

Bereavement receptions end series of funeral services of members of very affluent families on bittersweet notes, and decorated cakes are seldom found at those comforting, yet solemn gatherings. Take this innocuously cute baby shower cake, with a baby resting  with his head on a pillow on a white bed of rose, draped with a blue fondant blanket that extends to one corner. To me, as well as Jen, that looks like a bier for a shaken baby syndrome victim, do you think? This is a rather sad cake to serve at a boy's baby shower, and even worse it it has that baby lying in a white coffin-shaped cake.

There's a cake for almost all occasions and seasons - anniversaries, moving away parties, vacations, sports victories, graduations, weddings, holidays, and of course, birthdays. The song, "Happy Birthday," sung by the excited crowd, is usually accompanied by a cake with candles lit for the celebrant to orally extinguish their flames to make his or her wish. The bride and groom slice their first devoted to them from one of the tiers, creating a sensation among the wedding guests and party. In the case of Cake Wrecks, there's always a cause for a good (if funny) or a ruined celebration, and cakes that look professional but with typos, errors, mess-ups, and so forth are mostly unsuitable for most parties, but they are eligible enough for the blog where cake decorating goes bad.

You can thank the Wiltons, who revolutionized cake decorating and the cupcake cake, for the laughs and shaking heads.