Birthday Cake Update

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Where do you live, OP?

Geneva Switzerland

Whole Foods makes phenomenal yet simple and unpretentious birthday cakes.

Oh, Geneva, Switzerland.

Try Gelson's in Rancho Mirage. They make good cakes.

Those died around 87-88 , along with Civility .

Can't you make your own?

Cakes with shortening have a better texture and a slightly less oily texture

I want to know if YOU can still find them. At YOUR local shop. Or has Amazon and Walmart destroyed everything.

Well I understand some shortening might help a buttercream frosting but 100%?

Mama loves shortnin’ shortnin’ shortnin’ , mama loves shortnin’, shortnin’ bread.

I’m glad this topic was brought up because I have been thinking recently that cakes do not taste nearly as good as they did pre-2000. There’s something weird about the taste of the icing and and the cake itself these days.

Just hit the nearest Carvel and grab yerself a Fudgie The Whale!

That “buttercream” shit they’ve been peddling the past 20 years is disgusting and greasy.

Does anyone know what type of icing they used in the old days?

What they peddle now is "buttercreme" - the spelling is necessary because there is no cream. In the olden times, cakes were made with fewer ingredients and butter and cream if also some crisco type shortening.

There are several places to find such a thing in LA.

I've had a cupcake at a place called Yummy Cupcakes and that was heavenly. It's in the valley and I liked it so much I contemplated driving into the valley to get another one.

There is a bakery in the Atwater section of LA called Proof. I've had slices of their cakes, they are good they also make a wonderful flourless chocolate cake that is excellent. It's almost like a solid mousse, light and chocolatey.

My parents had a German bakery in Chicago when I was growing up.

First of all, we went to Germany, Austria and Switzerland every three years when I was a kid, to visit my grandparents. And to keep our German up to par.

The bakeries there are beyond first class. There is NOTHING the US has to offer anywhere that can compete. Their ingredients are simply finer. Better eggs, richer cream, flours that are finer for pastries. Etc.

My father, who was trained in Germany, used to complain about this issue all of the time. And it went far beyond just quality differences. If he wanted to, he could have gotten the best of everything and made things for sale at unaffordable prices. But the bigger problem was that the American government regulates the types of ingredients that can be used in baking. For example in Chicago, the Board of Health made monthly inspections; my dad used to pay them off, so he could use fresh eggs that he bought especially from a farmer in Indiana. The Board of health wanted you to used homogenized pasteurized eggs that came in giant buckets and were vile. My dad said this kind of thing accounted for the sorry state of baked goods in American bakeries. He used fresh butter, eggs, flour, cream. He had many ingredients sent to him from Germany and he baked for the finest establishments in Chicago, including the best hotels and the fanciest restaurants.

But he also had different levels of deliciousness. If the birthday cakes were just for sale in the store, buttercream was made of shortening and margarine. If the cakes were to order and at the highest price level, they were all butter and cream.

So, Geneva Switzerland person, you can still get great birthday cakes, but mainly from home bakers. I bake cakes for sale out of my home and they are the most fabulous of the fabulous. I am a scientist, so this is a sideline. Mainly wedding cakes.

You can get really great cakes from cake bakeries who specialize in making only cakes, but they are not the birthday cake crowd. These are wedding cake and specialty cake establishments that charge about $15/serving. Mainly, I think, people who bring birthday cakes to office parties, or to surprise parties, are still getting them from places like Wegmans or Stop n Shop.

As to buttercream. There has never been cream in buttercream. It is made of butter, pure vanilla extract, eggs, milk and powdered sugar. Italian Buttercream and Swiss merengue buttercream involve making a merengue first, or a sugar syrup first, and adding butter to that.

No cream anywhere in buttercream.

Thank you. It's true about the difference in basic ingredients. However, I figured in recent years quality dairy may have reappeared in American shops. I grew up in NYC suburbs and we went to Italian and German bakeries, thus my interest in the current State of the Cakes in the USA. There were always buttercream and whipped cream options at those bakeries but you had to be sure to ask and also keep it all refrigerated.

By the way in Switzerland we don't refrigerate eggs and they taste better than American eggs. And many people don't bother refrigerating butter, either.

McDonald's used all Swiss ingredients and its tastes better than USA.

"No cream anywhere in buttercream."

You realize that the chief ingredient of butter is churned cream, right?

As per OP's question, I find "traditional" bakery cakes from storefront bakeries to be the same as when I was a child. However, my palate has significantly changed and they seem to be unbearably sweet.

In the 'burbs of Philadelphia there are bakeries that make cakes from scratch. They are VERY expensive, as is everything else. Make your own.

Up until a few years ago Publix had the best bakery items. But theyve changed,and now its no better than walmart crap.

[quote]You realize that the chief ingredient of butter is churned cream, right?

Pedant.

The ONLY ingredient in butter is cream, unless you add salt.

RR20, you have got that backwards. Cream is not the chief ingredient in butter. Butter is the fact in whole cream. If you let the cream settle, the fat rises to the top and can be separated out of the cream to be solidified as butter.

You realize you are insufferable, right?

Fat not fact.

let's get back to cake and frosting

It comes with a cost...……….

The tired cake.

Scary Frau cakes. NO!

Deluxe. Only $49.99.

OP, how many ration coupons do you have?

NOT the wee-whah Little Rascal cake.

Whole Foods and Quackenbush's are the only decent choices here in Austin and I need to produce a birthday cake in a couple of weeks for a skinny love who normally isn't into that sort of thing. No way I'm dropping $90 for a decorated cake (Quack's price), so it looks like I'm going to jump into the DIY lake (of buttercream).

Wish me luck.

Make sure you have sprinkles.

Ran out of icing...…...oh well...………..

Great cakes!

How about a turkey Birthday Cake?

It's a rather dumb question to ask a bunch of anonymous strangers on a chat board, OP.

Basically find some bakeries in your area and ask them to make something you want, out of the ingredients you want.

Go back to your child-rapist threads. They need you there to fan the crazy flames.

child rapist threads? I have never been a habitué of that. You must have me confused. I was wondering how much they cost. Someone mentioned 90 bucks!

90 bucks might be a bit high, but it sounds like you are looking for a high end cake. You should be able to get a 10" cake with all butter, eggs, cream, etc., for probably $50. You can get it for half that if you are willing to settle for cheap ingredients and shortening buttercream.

A lot of it depends on location as well. Left or right coastal areas will have prices twice that of fly-over land.

"You realize you are insufferable, right?"

Oh, the unintended irony.

I've been on keto all summer and because of this thread, I broke my diet. I ran out to the store and got a birthday cake. I hope you all are happy.