Mini cakes in lunchboxes have recently become an Instagram hit. Customize their colors, text, and flavors with ease to make a unique Korean-inspired treat for yourself!
Expand your dessert recipe book and discover new delectable dishes by taking baking classes in NYC. No matter if you’re an experienced baker or looking to learn something new, these workshops offer fun learning experiences with minimal pressure.
1. Three Petals Cake Studio
This bakery specializes in Korean bento cakes featuring customizable designs with wide-ranging, unique flavor options. Starting at $28, cakes can be delivered for an additional $10 fee and come in varieties such as cherry tahini, matcha, carrot ginger, and coconut rose. Customizable options are also available to celebrate birthdays or anniversaries!
Cake artists with backgrounds in art or other creative industries tend to stand out. Ksenia Penkina and Ron Ben-Israel, for instance, can capture the essence of their subjects within cakes as an expressive canvas for their interpretations. Furthermore, these artists understand both the making and creation processes, which help create stunning edible products with aesthetic qualities.
Cake artistry is a highly competitive industry, and many skilled pastry chefs can command high prices for their creations. Additionally, these talented pastry chefs often teach tutorials and classes online or around the world; Sideserf plans a course in San Diego on how to create a flamingo-shaped cake; Portaleo travels to Lima to teach goblin-shaped cakes, while Ben-Israel holds three-day immersive experiences at his New York studio.
Some cakes may be strictly decorative, while others incorporate edible components like flowers, fruit, and candy into them. No matter the style, each requires hours of manual labor with high-grade materials – no surprise then that these price tags often surpass thousands. Yet most artists find great pleasure in knowing their creations will eventually be eaten; Rae recently spent 120 hours building a miniature replica of Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre!
2. Angstbakes
New Yorkers are finding ways to satisfy their sweet tooth as the coronavirus pandemic progresses, including photogenic showpieces or classic cookie jars; NYC bakeries still offering pickup or local delivery are still offering pickup, and some are even raising money for local organizations while spotlighting lesser-seen dessert flavors.
If you want something different from traditional chocolate and vanilla cakes, Angstbakes provides cakes in unique flavors like matcha and Ovaltine crunch. Their customizable bento cakes start at $28, with delivery available for an additional fee.
Lady Wong offers another fantastic alternative, where Seleste Tan and Mogan Anthony specialize in Southeast Asian kuih (an umbrella term for Southeast Asian steamed cakes) made with ingredients sourced directly from farmers. Not only are their cakes delicious, they give New Yorkers a chance to taste part of their heritage.
If you want to learn the art of cake decorating, UniqueWorkshop provides classes that teach hands-on experience in creating unique shapes and flowers with frosting flowers. Their workshops are perfect for beginners as well.
Empire Cake stands out as an icon of American baking with its selection of cupcakes, cookies, breakfast pastries, and cakes on the Upper West Side. Made fresh with ingredients sourced from quality local producers and accommodating to an array of allergies or restrictions, their 24-layer chocolate cake draws customers such as Oprah Winfrey and Martha Stewart back for more! Additionally, Empire Cake runs Bake the Vote 2020, an initiative where local bakers sell their goods while raising funds for anti-racist and feminist organizations.
4. Bento Box
Bento boxes should feature variety. Mixing textures and flavors (such as sweet pickles with toothsome rice or mild egg noodles served alongside meats and fruit) helps promote digestion, while in Japan, it’s customary to include all colors of the rainbow as part of healthy digestion strategies.
Aisai bentos, or heart-shaped bentos, bring new meaning to “food is love.” Traditionally made by significant others or parents for their children’s lunches and decorated with loving messages written in furikake seasoning. Kyaraben (character bentos), often inspired by anime, cartoons, comic books, or video games to delight both children and adults, draws its inspiration from anime characters like Pikachu or Hello Kitty from manga or comic books to create delicious delight for both. Seaweed was cut to form whiskers, and eyes completed the natural look! In contrast, shikaeshiben (revenge bentos) use food to express anger or displeasure – preparers may draw monster faces on rice palettes while sausage severed fingers are added or even add unpleasant seasonings so as to provoke recipients’ appetites!
No matter your taste, this small Japanese market offers delicious bento meals for every craving. Fridges line the wall and house a daily selection of bento boxes that are freshly made in their back-of-store kitchen.
Dainobu also offers hands-on classes where diners can learn from chef Ivan how to make authentic bento boxes. Participants will enjoy creating miso soup, rolling sushi and okonomiyaki, filling, folding, and pan-searing gyoza, and, then finishing it all off with vanilla ube ice cream – you’ll feel like an expert bento box creator after this experience!
5. Insta-worthy Minimalist Bento Cakes
If you’re in the mood for something sweet that doesn’t need to be shared and makes for the ideal Instagram post, check out Korean-inspired bento cakes. These single-serve cakes can fit in lunch boxes and can be fully customizable when it comes to flavor, colors, and text – they make for the ideal Instagram post!
Eating one at a time makes these mini cakes ideal for parties and intimate gatherings alike, and their popularity even increased during the coronavirus pandemic as people turned away from significant events to focus on these bite-sized treats since they feature only short messages or piped designs instead of elaborate decor elements.
Three Petals Cake Studio provides customizable cakes designed to commemorate special events. Their mini cakes start from $29, and delivery can be added for just an additional $10 charge.
