These cakes might be too spooky to eat!
When you picture a bakery, you might think of somewhere cute and rustic, filled with soft earth tones and the smell of fresh baked bread. You probably don't think of horror, Halloween, or the phrase "punk rock". However, Punk Rock Pastries is no ordinary bakery. They specialize in "amazing and weird" pastries and cakes inspired by all things creepy. I recently had the chance to interview Hollie Deville, Punk Rock Pastries' owner and head cake artist.
The bakery is located in Burnaby, British Columbia, only twenty minutes from my own hometown of North Vancouver. "We opened the shop in Burnaby because punk in Vancouver was founded in Burnaby," Hollie explained. "We have our hidden location at the top of Capitol Hill. It's funny because we have multiple phone calls or messages asking us 'where are you located' but like I said we are a hidden gem. We don’t advertise, it's all completely word of mouth and so far it's been incredible. The community has welcomed us with open arms and love that they have something different in the neighbourhood."
Hollie started Punk Rock Pastries after several years of working as a pastry chef. "When I got sick of running other people's companies I decided to take the risk and turn my passion of punk and horror into my dream job, making edible weird things," she told me. That risk paid off – now Hollie loves "that I can make edible masterpieces and make people smile. The whole reason I got into becoming a chef is to make people smile with food. Now I get to do it every day."
The cakes at Punk Rock Pastries look like something you would see on the Food Network – but Hollie stressed that her job isn't like the chefs you see on cooking shows. "To make a custom cake, it's multiple steps and can't be made in one day, unlike the crap you see on TV," she said. "We here at Punk Rock Pastries don’t have blast freezers and crazy amounts of supplies, so it all starts with the sketch of the cake. Once it's sketched I work out what structure is needed to hold the cake in place. Then after that’s designed we start baking the cakes, the cakes need to freeze over night as carving a sculpted cake with fresh cake is a bloody nightmare. Buttercream is made, then we make sure the structure is made to be food safe and start stacking the cakes. That’s basically the first major steps. The cake then sits overnight before we even start carving to get the buttercream hard. The carving is done and then we cover the cake in buttercream and set in the fridge for around 3 hours. Next step is we coat the cake in chocolate ganache to make it more stable, then back in the fridge. Fondant is next, and we add details. Once we have the basic structure covered we can start on finer details, and once again back in the fridge for it to sit overnight. Final steps are airbrushing and final hand painting touch ups so all in all it takes almost a week for one cake."
All that has led to some pretty amazing cakes. Hollie doesn't have a favourite cake of everything she's ever made, but she did single out this cake of Audrey 2 from Little Shop Of Horrors as one of the best from this year.
As far as the future, Hollie isn't looking to change a thing. "I'm happy doing what I'm doing now," she said. "I'll never open another Punk Rock Pastries. I think I’m just happy running the one I have."
The one she has is pretty cool. "I honestly haven’t found a bakery like us anywhere ever," Hollie told me. "We make things that not only look weird and wonderful but they taste amazing too."
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