Lindsay Stamhuis
Between cherry pie, doughnuts, and damn fine coffee, it should surprise no one that Twin Peaks fans have a taste for the culinary good stuff. So it was with great interest that we stumbled upon Cakes Cove, a Toronto-area specialty bakery who just happened to make a Twin Peaks-themed cake! And we just had to find out more about their creations:
From there, we fell down a dizzying vortex that would give Gordon Cole pause, filled with cakes and pastries of all shapes and sizes…and many of them celebrating some of the most popular and beloved pop culture entities of our day. Our inquiries led us to owner Sam Lapointe, who takes her passion for cakes and fandoms to new heights, especially with her bakery’s astounding Make Every Genre Delicious series.
We at 25YL cannot be held liable for the hunger-induced actions of any of our readers who venture ahead on an empty stomach…may we suggest a slice of delicious double chocolate espresso cake?
25YL: How did you get into the cake-making business?
Sam: I have been baking since I was two years old — I started with an Easy Bake Oven, and the rest is history. I was never not going to be making food…but what that “food” was changed over the years as I found what I liked and didn’t like working with. Eating bread is divine..but making it in a commercial setting didn’t have enough artistry in it for me, so I kept experimenting.
25YL: What prompted to you to start making your geeky designs?
Sam: Why being a geek of course. Some of my earliest memories are watching Star Wars, Back to the Future, and Indiana Jones. I’ve always, and will always be, a huge geek. But in addition to that, as I grew up I noticed that fandoms and good food bring people together — so I figured melding the two would make for an amazing combination, and it certainly is.
25YL: How long does it typically take to make a cake from start to finish?
Sam: That really depends on the cake. Cakes Cove has a line of simple and delicious bakery cakes that don’t take much time at all, while other cakes like the life-sized R2D2 cake took a week, and some other cakes take even longer — there isn’t a rule for how long a cake will take, it really just depends on what I’m trying to create.
25YL: Are the techniques you use to make these cakes and chocolates fairly standard or have you had to invent things to make your creations really come to life? (I’m thinking of your Porg cake, for instance – it looks like real fur!! How did you do that?!)
Sam: There are some basics that you can certainly learn to get started, and I try to show some of those in the new YouTube series so people can get creative too, but there is always more room to learn. I do a lot of experimenting with many different mediums to see what new things I can come up with — my mad scientist moments don’t always have a specific purpose, but it’s always fun to have a huge tickle trunk of experiments in the back of my mind to pull from as needed.
25YL: What was your first cake?
Sam: I don’t remember what my first cake was, but like now, I loved creating weird flavour combinations….though I like to think I’m much better at it now.
25YL: What has been your favourite cake to make so far? The craziest, or most-involved, or biggest, or the tastiest…
Sam: It’s a bit silly, but I love the next one the most. I really love a challenge and trying to figure out how to make something that everyone else says is impossible. Some of my favourites are Tainted Love, the life-sized R2 cake, and the wearable chocolate N7 Armour from Mass Effect.
25YL: What is the one cake design that you would love to do but haven’t done yet?
Sam: I have a large number of cake designs I have in my head I would love to see become reality, but clients’ cakes come first — it’s especially fun when one of the designs finds a home during a consultation — but the ones that don’t will be in the YouTube series. That’s actually part of the reason I started the series — I wanted to have a bit of time to make cakes just because. It’s also amazing to spend some time celebraing a fandom that I love…like Twin Peaks and Ash Vs Evil Dead.
25YL: Where do the ideas for your designs come from?
Sam: Ideas come from anything and everything. But popculture certainly is a large inspiration.
25YL: Your Twin Peaks cake is spectacular – double chocolate espresso? Um, yes please! How did you make this such a Peaks-y tour-de-force?
Sam: This flavour is actually one of our signature flavours – and it fit, so why the heck not? The Cakes Cove flavours and recipes are all unique, delicious and exclusive to the shop that I created myself. I have to admit, I just created things that I love to eat too.
25YL: Are you a Twin Peaks fan? If so…can you please explain the finale of The Return to us??!
Sam: I am a huge Twin Peaks fan, but…I was really hoping you could explain it to me. I must admit I watched a few YouTube videos trying to understand it better myself, but It just gave me more brain food – and thats part of why I enjoyed Twin Peaks as much as I did.. it makes you think.
25YL: You make custom designs too – for weddings and such. Do you ship to Edmonton and would you consider making the cake for our Twin Peaks-themed vow renewal ceremony?? haha but seriously…what is the wildest custom cake request that you have ever been asked to make?
Sam: We can’t ship cakes to Edmonton, but — shameless plug — we do have an online shop, with lots of geeky and traditional chocolates and cookies that we certainly can ship. We can also do custom cookies…like Twin Peaks ones and ship those.
As far as the wildest cake…I think I have a very different threshold for what a wild cake is. A weird cake for us was creating a replica of a bed. But the majority of the population would probably think some of my horror creations are the “wildest” like a roasted head.
25YL: What the best sellers from your online shop, or the creations that everyone can’t seem to get enough of?
Sam: Bestsellers depend on what is in theatre, but the Fleur De Sal chocolate bar is the most popular flavour, and the Falcon is always one that people love.
25YL: What are your future plans – sneak peeks of your next design or some big ideas you have coming up.
Sam: There are a lot of very very exciting things coming up, but we can’t talk about most of them yet. But what I can say is Cakes Cove will be at Fan Expo Canada, and not only will we be making a sweet table for the green room again — it’s always so much fun meeting all the celebrites — but we will have some new designs for geeky chocolates at our booth I’m terribly excited about and I can’t wait to see everyone’s cosplays.
If you are in the GTA, you should definitely stop in and see the wonderful folks behind the creations you see up above — they are located at 1074 St Clair Ave W, York, ON. (And send us some of those Twin Peaks cookies while you’re there!)
