Let Them Eat Cake Sculptures
Baking Up Delicious Works of Art

by nw farms and food - Permalink
May 25, 2011

Chef Andy Millage of Let Them Eat Cake created this celebration cake in the shape of a champagne bottle.

Pastry Chef Andra (Andy) Millage wants you to eat her artwork. From her artisan bakery at Let Them Eat Cake in Bellingham, Washington, she creates one-of-a-kind cake sculptures of everything from animals to mountains, toys, sandwiches, swimmers, trains and more — whatever is unique and personalized to her customers.

“I think a cake should reflect the person,” says Millage, who bakes all her cakes, cupcakes and gingerbread from scratch using quality butter and pure flavor extracts. “What I enjoy is making people realize that a cake—be it a wedding cake or a birthday cake—just doesn’t have to be boring. You can have something elegant and still be unique.”

Zebrazz Cake

Cattywampus Cake

Fondant Rose Cake

Flavors and Passions

While Millage is happy to create lovely, traditional wedding cakes, she derives the most pleasure and challenge from designing a cake that truly fits the person and the occasion.

It starts with the customers. People come to her with an idea and she shows them what is possible. Offering some 25 cake flavors, tasting samples, and an idea book of photos with 26 years of baked artisan delights, they look for the “jumping off point” that will help create a cake unique to the client.

Never Enough Garlic Cake

“It’s a collaboration between the client and myself,” Millage says. “I like being able to work with them and bring them out of their comfort zone. Instead of doing what they ought to do, do what they really want to do.”

“They might come in and say they want something traditional. But maybe they’re sky divers; that’s their passion.” So Millage creates an elegant cake that reflects that passion in subtle way.

The reward is seeing the joy her cakes bring to people . “I feel I’ve done my job if someone walks into an event and says, ‘That’s it! That’s perfect. You took my vision and made it happen.’”

The First Cake

Millage wasn’t always a pastry chef. As a geologist who worked for years in the oil industry, her fascination with creating artistic cakes began one year on her mother’s birthday when she decided to make a birthday cake model of her mother’s home, complete with a mini hot tub. She had fun with the project and soon found herself reading books about cake decorating and trying out new designs. In time, friends started coming to her for unique event cakes, offering to pay her, and the idea for Let Them Eat Cake was born.

Today, with 4,000 cakes and 26 years of baking under her apron, Millage averages 150 unique wedding and event cakes in a year—mainly through word-of-mouth recommendations and the Bridal Fair. Her inventive cakes have included such unusual shapes and themes as these:

crocodile cake