Birthday Cake for Chef Alan Wong

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 The cake was a last minute request ordered as a surprise gift for Chef Alan Wong of Alan Wong's Restaurant and The Pineapple Room by Alan Wong. The woman had called in a panic, "I know this is last minute ..." -- she was so sweet, I would have moved mountains for her if I could, but try and squeeze a cake into Rick's schedule when he is already booked, and my hands are tied, there is absolutely nothing I can do.  Even if the cake is for Alan Wong.  It pained me to say no to our client, she was so excited about surprising him with a cake and I dearly wanted to be able to help her.  She was hopeful and asked when our next availability was.  I told her that we could probably do it for Friday the 12th and she said that would be okay, it would be a belated birthday gift for him.  She called over to his project manager just to make sure he would be in town and it was a Go! 

I went into the kitchen to talk to Rick.  "Okay, now this is for Alan Wong..." and he knew immediately what that meant.  It meant, it better be AWESOME! Chef Alan Wong has long been one of my culinary heroes and consistently wins awards as one of Hawaii's top Chefs.  Alan Wong's Restaurant is considered by many to be the best restaurant in Hawaii and his New Wave Luau Cookbook is absolutely gorgeous!  He's made countless local and national appearances and his food is sublime! As someone who spent 8 years of her life slaving over a hot stove in my previous career, and who had one of her best meals in Hawaii at Alan Wong's Restaurant, it was a huge honor to have my husband make his birthday cake!

Our client wanted a FUN, whimsical wonky cake for Alan that included some of his favorite colors and would really WOW him!  She asked for pineapples (since he owns The Pineapple Room) to be included in the design and possibly a mushroom or two.  On the plaque she asked for the writing "Exceptional Things are worth waiting for.  Happy Late Birthday, Love, (their names)."  After some discussion we selected our Banana Blueberry Mascarpone flavor for Alan.  It's one of our favorite flavors and we thought he would love it.   When we met Alan to present the cake to him, he had a huge smile on his face.  He has a warm disposition and treated us like we were guests in his home. He seemed fascinated by the cake, I don't think he's had a cake like this before and were so honored to make it for him.  He chose the front of the bar area in the restaurant to display the cake during the dinner service.  His pastry team was brought out to see the cake and meet Rick and we took some photos with Alan.  It was a special night that we will never forget!  We want to thank our client for giving us the opportunity, and wish Alan a Happy Belated Birthday! 

www.cakelava.com

www.cakelava.com

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Wonderland Cake

Image courtesy of Rachel Robertson Photography

The Alice in Wonderland cake made for Jolie's birthday party was one of our favorite cakes this month. The client gave Rick full artistic control over the design. She wanted something funky and colorful and left all the details up to him. Rick made each tier with a different scene from Wonderland and added hand painted characters. Handcrafted whimsical flowers and colorful mushrooms, adorned the cake, and at the base and on top of the cake was a black and white checkerboard pattern. The cake was made for a child's first birthday luau, which is customary in Hawaii. In Polynesian culture, reaching a baby's first year is considered a huge milestone, and a cause for celebration. A giant checkerboard "1" was placed on top in Jolie's honor. The beautiful cake was a decadent display of color on the outside and a rich Peanut Butter Fudgey flavor on the inside. The Alice in Wonderland themed party took place at a hotel in Waikiki. Large custom made characters were placed in the room and each table had a whimsical centerpiece scene, thoughtfully created. In the center of the room was the tea party table, with cookies around it and in the middle we placed the cake. Our clients did a fabulous job carrying out the theme and the cake looked right at home. In Wonderland.

Aloha, 'til next time!

Sou and Takako's Wedding

All images courtesy of VISIONARI

If you follow our blog, the names Sou and Takako may be familiar to you. We showcased their super cute, whimsical wedding cake on the blog last month, and after receiving images from their photographers at VISIONARI, we thought our lovely couple from Japan would be a delightful way to end the week. During the process of designing their cake we became very fond of this sweet and gracious couple. They were so excited about their mystery design that they would leave completely up to Rick. We didn't have the opportunity to meet Sou and Takako prior to the wedding, and felt lucky to be introduced to them via VISIONARI's gorgeous images. Sou and Takako did things a little different from many couples, which was just fine with us. Rather than matching the elegant style of their wedding to their cake, Rick designed their cake independently of anything they were using at the wedding. It was the colorful POP, and burst of whimsy in their otherwise formal and elegant wedding. We'd be hard pressed to choose a favorite photo -- they are all spectacular! -- but one of the most meaningful to us was seeing the look of happiness on Sou and Takako's faces as they cut into their wedding cake. It's that look of appreciation that makes all of our efforts worth it! Thank you, Sou and Takako for sharing your special day with us! Mahalo to Hiko, Jon and Mike at VISIONARI for the images!















check out cakelava.com for other fun and whimiscal cakes.

Aloha!

Cutesy Whimsy Wedding Cake

Our wedding couple, Sou and Takako are completely adorable and we wanted them to have a super special wedding cake! I've been communicating with the couple long distance, and I do mean LONG distance. They live in Japan and were flying to Oahu for their wedding at the Halekulani hotel and hired us to make them a bright, whimsical, wonky cake. Other than a few photos they sent us for inspiration and the request for pink, yellow and white to be used in the cake, they left their wedding cake design completely up to Rick. Having never met Sou and Takako in person, Rick took into consideration some cake designs they liked and also the Japanese aesthetic of cutesy things and tried his best to give the couple what he thought they would want. Based on my communications with the super sweet couple I have a feeling they were probably pretty blown away by their cake. We hope they are enjoying a fabulous honeymoon and have a safe flight back to Japan. All the best to Sou and Takako!

Aloha to our new twitter followers! We don't tweet as much as some of you but we do when we can and are having fun with it. Have a wonderful weekend!

French Elegance and Cirque du Soleil Inspired

Saturday night was a bit of a circus -- literally. Our client Candes celebrated her engagement to fiance Milan in a beautiful, Cirque du Soleil inspired party in Diamond Head. She gave Rick carte blanche to design her a spectacular showpiece, using her wedding colors of soft pinks, lavenders, greens, and golds and incorporating an elegant Cirque du Soleil inspired whimsy. She was very open to design and wanted something her guests would be talking about long after the party -- mission accomplished! Shortly after the party Candes left us a voicemail saying how blown away she and her guests were by the cake. Rick had a great time making her cake and was excited about it. We were both thrilled to hear from Candes. This cake meant a lot to her and to us. She had originally tried to hire us for her wedding on the island of Lanai, but circumstances prevented us from being able to make her cake. Candes and Milan chose our Kona Toffee Crunch and Bananarama flavors to serve their guests. I wished we had taken photos of the decor but I was mesmorized by the live acrobat spinning in the ring and we needed to leave for a long trek out to the North Shore (nearly 3 hours roundtrip!). Quite the circus!

Candes and Milan, we hope you have an incredible wedding on Lanai and we'll be thinking of you!

See Candes' cake and many more new cakes on cakelava.com.