The sweet taste of success

Having three sons (eldest, now 21), it’s a safe bet that over the years, I’ve had my fill of birthday cakes, cupcakes, and the novel way in which mothers try to come up with something different and unique for their children’s special occasions. Remember when sugared ink had us all scrambling for photograph images being used as topping for a cake? And pretty much tasting like ink? Or how themed parties would have multi-tiered concepts and/or themed characters adorning that centerpiece of all parties, the cake? Safe to say it is a very competitive business, what with mass market bakers also trying to jostle for business via keen pricing and licensed arrangements. So when a friend asked me to take a look at the Facebook page of Aisa Atilano Cake Design, I must admit I first felt jaded. But take a look I did, and I was taken with how she brings something fresh to the table in terms of design and decorating cakes. I arranged to meet her, and was pleased to find someone establishing a particular niche in the business, resisting the call to go mass market.

For Aisa, it has to be a blend of artistry, taste and technology. Too often, we’ve fallen victim to those cakes that look pretty, but taste pretty blah! And Aisa definitely wanted to avoid falling into that sweet trap. She says, “I have siblings with children, and while it started with nieces requesting me to bake for them and customize the designs, it was always important that I got good feedback about how the cakes tasted — after all, they’re ultimately there to be eaten.” Given the fondant topping, a pound cake has to be used to support the weight of the icing, and she’ll stand behind her chocolate with salted caramel, her vanilla, her plain chocolate, and her lemon pound cakes. In the case of her cupcakes, her red velvet and chocolate with salted caramel are her clients’ favorite chiffon fillings.

Like some bespoke tailor, Aisa makes it a point to discuss the design concept with whoever is ordering her cakes or cupcakes. The recipient’s personality, his or her likes and dislikes, hobbies and so on, are grist for how she eventually will suggest a design. In fact, in order to further improve on this aspect, she’s taking courses on art and sculpting. For a cake maker staking her reputation on being customized and specialized, it’s this preliminary discussion that paves the way for those “eureka!” moments that turn the cake into something singular, like a bespoke suit fit for one particular person.

If there is a “signature” to her design philosophy, it would be the light-hearted, whimsical approach — her Star Wars-themed cupcake spread had the most lovable Darth Vader one could find. It’s how she consistently maintains this design outlook that makes the cakes arrayed on her Facebook page and website so engaging. Her pipe dream right now is to get more wedding projects, where the height and dimension mean more “room to play.”

For inquiries, one need only e-mail Aisa at inquiry@aisaatilano.com.

Casualty Report

These three novels deal with the bitter blows life often throws upon our paths and how from such setbacks and/or challenges, we often find ways to pick ourselves up and resume “living.” Ian McEwan’s latest, Sweet Tooth, is set in England during the 1970s when vestiges of the Cold War still existed. Ned Beauman locates most of his action within the artist community that thrived in Berlin pre-World War II; while the Jess Walter novel takes us over 50 years, with a small Italian seaside village as starting point and ending up in present-day cynical Hollywood.

Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan (available at Fully Booked) McEwan territory means we’re not so much consumed by the action and events, as we are by the moods and states of mind McEwan so clinically dissects with his luminous writing. While some may be familiar with the movie Atonement, a film adaptation of his novel, I reach back to such works as The Comfort of Strangers as my favorites, and Sweet Tooth could very well end up in that select list. Serena is a pretty coed in Cambridge in the 1970s when seduced by her professor, he then recruits her for the Secret Service. Given the paranoia of the times over Communism, she’s assigned to a promising young author, Tom Haley, as part of a program to secretly finance and influence cultural affairs. The novel is about the shifting nature of identity, the corruption of values and morals, and the erosion of all we may hold dear in the name of “country.”

And as befits a McEwan story, just when we’ve given our allegiance to a particular character, tables are turned, and the cat-and-mouse game we thought we were reading about goes all awry. For some, this may be slow-paced, but truly rewarding.

The Teleportation Accident by Ned Beauman (available at National Book Store) This novel will either frustrate you to death pondering “what is it all about?” or you’ll suspend disbelief, go for the ride, and be charmed by the inventive language and imagination that is Beauman’s. Set designer Egon Loesser is part of an artist community living in Berlin in the late 1930s. He’s obsessed with Lavincini, an Italian set designer who was brought to France in service of the Sun King, Louis. Also of paramount concern to Egon is his libido, as he fantasizes about women and love, pining for sex, while gallantly holding out in the search for the woman of his dreams. Flitting across time and space, the novel takes us to Los Angeles, as Egon undertakes a love-fueled odyssey. There’s murder, sex and violence thrown into the mix; all part of us better contemplating the price of art, of friendship, and of the escape role a teleportation device can assume in the scheme of things. There’s very assured writing going on here, even when we’re scratching our heads. While not for the faint of heart, you have to admire the earnestness of Beauman’s style and vision.

Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter (available at Fully Booked) A work of deep resonance, there were times reading this novel reminded me of when I first read Corelli’s Mandolin. We open in 1962 at a poor seaside resort town on the Cinque Terre Italian coast. Innkeeper Pasquale experiences a life-altering vision when American bit actress Dee Moray descends on the town, believing she is dying from cancer. Fifty years later, we shift to Hollywood, where Claire Silver works for producer Michael Deane, in charge of evaluating pitches as potential projects for Deane’s company. Two visitors show up on pitch day, Shane, a young writer out to get his screenplay about a wilderness/cannibalism epic optioned, and an old man who’s looking for

Deane, on a quest to rekindle a friendship with Dee — no other than a grizzled 70-year-old Pasquale. What follows is an engrossing novel that flits in time and space over several characters, including Dee’s son, Shane’s own backstory and the women in his life, and a cameo from Richard Burton — turns out Dee in 1962 was working on the set of Cleopatra. This is romance elevated to literature, a must read.