COMING SOON: TRETCHICAKE
Shelley Seid meets a cake innovator who is inspired by one of SA’s favourite artists
Lucy Markewicz is Durban’s cake queen. Her outlet, CakeLab, conjures up bespoke baked creations, from tortes to tarts to tea cakes. With a database of more than 1 000 customers, Lucy and her cakes are the flavour of the times.
I’ve not had any formal training. My ex-husband was a chef and he taught me to cook. He wasn’t great at desserts or plating so I’d make the food look pretty. When I started Vanille Café, I hired a chef and learnt from him, and I learnt cake decoration from Sue Edgecombe. I’ve spent a lot of time reading books and practising. It’s about being brave — and brave enough to make mistakes.
I do unconventional things and I really enjoy the design side of things. I like to be creative in different ways. I’m not into stock standard cake production. At the moment I am playing with paint and stamp techniques. I’m planning to produce Tretchik-off-style cakes and I’ve taken up art classes to work out how to do this. I’m also busy setting up an interactive website where customers will become involved in designing their own cakes.
I made a metre-square cake for an ANC Youth League rally. It had an outline of silhouettes and the youth league logo and they loved it. It was so big we had to have a cake board custom-made and when it came to delivery it didn’t fit in our car. I’ve also been asked to make penis-shaped cakes for hen parties.
I have had tons of disasters. I’ve had cakes hit the dashboard when I’ve braked too hard. I’ve had them sliding off the boards, and in summer I’ve had stuff melt as I drove to the destination. I once had a customer who loaded his cake into his Porsche and took off at a rapid rate. He returned half-an-hour later to ask me to fix what his driving had done to the cake.
At the moment our rainbow cakes are quite a fad. I suppose they’d be our signature cake, but my carrot cake has always been a winner — I’ve even had a marriage proposal over it.
I love making them, but I’m not really a cake person. I’d rather have an apple tart and custard. ......................................... Visit www.lucyscakeshop.co.za or e-mail cakegirl@mweb.co.za.