Seriously, I thought only the navaratri golus come in five, seven and nine tiers in Madurai and other Southern cities. Nay. For that serious ‘wow’ factor they come in cakes too!
Of late, the wedding confections are getting impressive and transcending religious barriers. Apart from Christian weddings, even at traditional Hindu wedding taking place in the Temple town or adjacent cities in neighbouring districts, ordering a mega cake is trendy. Getting creative with shape, themes and colours and driving the business of super size cakes is the young and vibrant CEO of Puppy’s Bakery and Bell Hotels, Vichitra Rajasingh.
Each of her work is equal to crafting a masterpiece. And it doesn’t just end with the visual appeal of the product. When you put a slice of the cake in your mouth, it tastes heavenly.
Orders for the exquisite wedding confections or the funny and weird themed anniversary cakes actually make our job easy, says Vichitra, because the customer comes up with all the ideas. “We tweak the idea for refinement, enhance the aesthetic appeal, bake and make it to perfection and deliver with care,” says Vichitra, who on an average has been doing 15 to 30 super size cakes annually over the last six years. Any cake with five and more tiers and easily crossing seven feet, she describes as a super size cake. “It is catching the fancy of people and orders are steadily increasing,” she says, remembering the one she did last year and which is her biggest and grandest so far.
Done for a wedding in Thoothukudi, it measured 12 feet in height and each tier was at least 1.5 feet high. The base tier was embellished with the most perfect sugar flowers – 200 of them and the real edible part of the cake was placed at the third level since it is easy to cut at that height. The rest of the all-white tiered traditional cake was hand crafted and decorated using styling foam, fondant and sugar paste. “It took us 10 days to make it but hours of planning beforehand,” she says.
In most wedding cakes, the real cake is a small part but people pay big money for the amount of work done on it. Based on the theme and the weight of the cake, the price of these super size cakes spiral Rs.20,000 upward.
Among her favourites of course is the first super size cake she did in 2011. It was a Cinderella-themed wedding cake. “It took five people and one week to make the fabulous cake,” she says, “and it was also one of the most elaborate ones we did.” The cake had Prince Charming's fondant castle on the top tier that would also light up. "And they lived happily ever after" was inscribed on the next three layers with rhine stones. Cinderella's pumpkin chariot was made entirely out of sugar and her glass slipper was done in gold with lots of bling as the wedding colours were white and gold.
The Rapunzel cake was the first big one Vichitra did for a Hindu wedding in Sivakasi. “For Christian wedding cakes, names are not inscribed but here the bride and the groom wanted their names on the cake and so this was different,” says Vichitra, who has done many fully edible bigger cakes as well and instantly recalls her first biggest order – a 45 kg cake based on Disneyland Paris -- for its embarrassing moment.
“The customer while booking gave us the wrong delivery date! We were upset because we had put in so much hard work and yet the occasion was missed because in our order book, the delivery was 24 hours later. The customer too realised his mistake and so the cake was cut the next day with family members and few friends since the guests had left.”
Combinations of granulated sugar, multi-coloured modelling chocolate, fondant or marzipan and creamy butter cream go into the making of couture confections for people who want to make a statement. “I love every minute of making such cakes,” says Vichitra, and adds, “there is an indescribable happiness in giving something that people would be amazed and thrilled to look at and love to eat.”
But sometimes the funny and weird requests people come up with stump her. “Last year on All Fool’s Day (April 1), I got identical orders from two different customers in Madurai who wanted the cake in the shape of Indian commode with poop in it!” she says, and adds jokingly, “with our artistic skills we can fool people thinking it is real!”
She has also done revolving cakes with lights and stunning birthday cakes weighing over 20 kg depicting angry birds smoking, Michael Phelps in swimming race, snooker table, money bag, radio FM, Bollywood theme and many more. So what does she choose for her birthday?
“Nothing fancy, just a brownie nutella cheese cake,” she smiles and gets going for her birthday today(September 30)!
