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Posted on Thu, May. 29, 2008
A sweet dream job: Dressing up cakes
By Marilynn Marter
Inquirer Food Writer
In her 20s, Nina Asadoorian tried several different outlets for
expressing her artistic talents, including dabbling in clothing
design. She worked successfully as a makeup artist.
And in time turned to making fanciful desserts.
That led to cakes:
Carrot cake with pineapple compote and cream cheese filling. Butter
pound cake with lemon curd and raspberry preserves. Chocolate fudge
cake with chocolate ganache, bits of Reese's peanut butter cups, and
chocolate-peanut butter buttercream.
Not your typical wedding cakes, to be sure.
But the basis for the decorative cakes that won their creator
Asadoorian, now 41, top honors this month on the Today show.
"I want my cakes to taste as good as they look," she says.
Fifteen years ago, Asadoorian was busy building credits as a makeup
artist in Los Angeles working mostly on music videos and shows, with
some success but little real satisfaction. She came home in 1994.
While she was in L.A., her parents in Philadelphia bought the popular
Rilling's Bakery from the original owners, transitioning from the
clothing business to baking. (Though her mother still helps out with
the baking, Nina's brother and brother-in-law now run the business.)
In time, between makeup gigs here, Nina began helping out at the
bakery's second location (since closed) in Warminster. Later, in 2000,
she produced a line of individual, plated desserts for area markets.
It would be another two years before Nina (then married and the mother
of one son and with twins on the way) stumbled onto what would become
her true calling: cake decorating.
In theatrical "understudy" style, the regular decorator for Rilling's
broke her foot and a very pregnant Nina was called in at the last
minute to help out.
"It was an emergency, we had a lot of commitments, so I filled in,"
Nina recalled.
"And I really, really liked it."
So much so that several months after her twin daughter's, now age 5
1/2, were born, Nina began on her path toward becoming a decorating
diva by taking a three-day class with a professional in Lancaster.
"That's when I decided I loved it. I drove home with a big grin on my
face," she recalled.
By the time her daughters' first birthday rolled around, she was ready
to produce a special cake for the occasion, one that prompted family
and friends to insist she start doing more.
More classes followed in New York City. She won a city-wide charity
cake competition in 2005 and started taking orders for cakes,
including one for a wedding at the Four Seasons that ended up being so
well-received that it prompted the hotel to place a few orders of its
own.
"At 37, I found my niche and things sort of snowballed," said
Nina. Now she focuses on creating unique, artistic (and pretty costly)
cakes for special occasions.
Truli Confectionary Arts was born as a division of Rilling's, with
Nina at the helm, and has grown to a staff of six including two
decorating assistants.
And her credits include the cover of the Knot's "Best of Weddings
2008" issue now on the stands. (She was asked to submit cover
contenders after being featured in the magazine last year, and says
she didn't know she had won the coveted spot until she saw the
magazine on a rack at Wegman's.)
Most recently her cakes, the luscious ones aforementioned, were chosen
for Today's on-air wedding and reception airing June 25.
In addition to the main, three-tier cake for the bridal couple,
smaller (4- to 5-inch) individual cakes - 200 of them - will be served
to each guest at the reception.
Such mini cakes, she concedes, are "a total indulgence" for a bride.
"It's expensive. Doing smaller cakes is a lot harder work and takes
more time," Nina explained, citing a starting price of about $35 per
cake. With the large handcrafted gumpaste flowers that have become
part of Nina Asadoorian's signature style, the price goes up from
there. And yes, those big orchids and roses on the cakes shown here
are all handmade and (technically) edible although many prefer to
preserve them in airtight containers or show them off under glass
domes.
"They dry hard and can last a lifetime with proper care," says Nina.
For more traditional large wedding cakes with varying degrees of
decoration, she notes, prices typically run from $6 to about $15 per
person (or serving). She estimates her average cake being $8 to $10
and serving 125 guests (that's $1,000 to $1,250). On a higher plane, a
seven-tier cake with handpainted designs, flowers, drapes and swags
was among her more expensive contracts at $6,500.
While more orders are coming in from her own and bridal Web sites,
most of her cakes are for private clients and are local jobs for
delivery within reasonable driving distance, which has stretched to
include New York.
"And we had one cake delivered to Belize, by air," she noted.
Along with her custom-designed cakes, Nina does simpler party cakes
that go into the cases at the family bakery every week.
But her interest is in custom work. Even if a customer asks for a
particular design from the Truli Confectionary photo gallery, Nina
encourages personalizing each cake.
"We rarely repeat ourselves. I just love making creative, beautiful
things."
Her inspirations can come from anything and everything - invitations,
pieces of jewelry, gardens, textures, patterns, fabrics.
She has replicated a Marine cap for a groom's cake, a saddle and boots
for a horse-lover's birthday, and a poker table so realistic that the
recipient tried to pick up the winning hand of slick gumpaste cards.
Among her favorites: a five-tiered square cake with stenciled designs
and huge lifelike peonies, and a scaled down cascade of Niagara Falls
complete with a mini Maid of the Mist.
Between cakes and caring for now four children (the youngest is 2),
Nina is compiling a book on cake decorating that she expects to
complete next year.
"I'm doing it for charity, either Smile Train [for children with cleft
palates] or St. Jude's.
"It will be tips and tricks of the trade, with decorating instructions
and recipes from 13 of us, myself and 12 other decorator's from around
the country. My decorators' dozen. We each have different styles and
each will do one or two cakes for the book."
Truli Confectionary Arts
2990 Southhampton Road
Philadelphia 19154
215-856-9206
www.truliconfectionaryarts.com
Contact food writer Marilynn Marter at 215-854-5743 or [email protected].
A sweet dream job: Dressing up cakes
By Marilynn Marter
Inquirer Food Writer
In her 20s, Nina Asadoorian tried several different outlets for
expressing her artistic talents, including dabbling in clothing
design. She worked successfully as a makeup artist.
And in time turned to making fanciful desserts.
That led to cakes:
Carrot cake with pineapple compote and cream cheese filling. Butter
pound cake with lemon curd and raspberry preserves. Chocolate fudge
cake with chocolate ganache, bits of Reese's peanut butter cups, and
chocolate-peanut butter buttercream.
Not your typical wedding cakes, to be sure.
But the basis for the decorative cakes that won their creator
Asadoorian, now 41, top honors this month on the Today show.
"I want my cakes to taste as good as they look," she says.
Fifteen years ago, Asadoorian was busy building credits as a makeup
artist in Los Angeles working mostly on music videos and shows, with
some success but little real satisfaction. She came home in 1994.
While she was in L.A., her parents in Philadelphia bought the popular
Rilling's Bakery from the original owners, transitioning from the
clothing business to baking. (Though her mother still helps out with
the baking, Nina's brother and brother-in-law now run the business.)
In time, between makeup gigs here, Nina began helping out at the
bakery's second location (since closed) in Warminster. Later, in 2000,
she produced a line of individual, plated desserts for area markets.
It would be another two years before Nina (then married and the mother
of one son and with twins on the way) stumbled onto what would become
her true calling: cake decorating.
In theatrical "understudy" style, the regular decorator for Rilling's
broke her foot and a very pregnant Nina was called in at the last
minute to help out.
"It was an emergency, we had a lot of commitments, so I filled in,"
Nina recalled.
"And I really, really liked it."
So much so that several months after her twin daughter's, now age 5
1/2, were born, Nina began on her path toward becoming a decorating
diva by taking a three-day class with a professional in Lancaster.
"That's when I decided I loved it. I drove home with a big grin on my
face," she recalled.
By the time her daughters' first birthday rolled around, she was ready
to produce a special cake for the occasion, one that prompted family
and friends to insist she start doing more.
More classes followed in New York City. She won a city-wide charity
cake competition in 2005 and started taking orders for cakes,
including one for a wedding at the Four Seasons that ended up being so
well-received that it prompted the hotel to place a few orders of its
own.
"At 37, I found my niche and things sort of snowballed," said
Nina. Now she focuses on creating unique, artistic (and pretty costly)
cakes for special occasions.
Truli Confectionary Arts was born as a division of Rilling's, with
Nina at the helm, and has grown to a staff of six including two
decorating assistants.
And her credits include the cover of the Knot's "Best of Weddings
2008" issue now on the stands. (She was asked to submit cover
contenders after being featured in the magazine last year, and says
she didn't know she had won the coveted spot until she saw the
magazine on a rack at Wegman's.)
Most recently her cakes, the luscious ones aforementioned, were chosen
for Today's on-air wedding and reception airing June 25.
In addition to the main, three-tier cake for the bridal couple,
smaller (4- to 5-inch) individual cakes - 200 of them - will be served
to each guest at the reception.
Such mini cakes, she concedes, are "a total indulgence" for a bride.
"It's expensive. Doing smaller cakes is a lot harder work and takes
more time," Nina explained, citing a starting price of about $35 per
cake. With the large handcrafted gumpaste flowers that have become
part of Nina Asadoorian's signature style, the price goes up from
there. And yes, those big orchids and roses on the cakes shown here
are all handmade and (technically) edible although many prefer to
preserve them in airtight containers or show them off under glass
domes.
"They dry hard and can last a lifetime with proper care," says Nina.
For more traditional large wedding cakes with varying degrees of
decoration, she notes, prices typically run from $6 to about $15 per
person (or serving). She estimates her average cake being $8 to $10
and serving 125 guests (that's $1,000 to $1,250). On a higher plane, a
seven-tier cake with handpainted designs, flowers, drapes and swags
was among her more expensive contracts at $6,500.
While more orders are coming in from her own and bridal Web sites,
most of her cakes are for private clients and are local jobs for
delivery within reasonable driving distance, which has stretched to
include New York.
"And we had one cake delivered to Belize, by air," she noted.
Along with her custom-designed cakes, Nina does simpler party cakes
that go into the cases at the family bakery every week.
But her interest is in custom work. Even if a customer asks for a
particular design from the Truli Confectionary photo gallery, Nina
encourages personalizing each cake.
"We rarely repeat ourselves. I just love making creative, beautiful
things."
Her inspirations can come from anything and everything - invitations,
pieces of jewelry, gardens, textures, patterns, fabrics.
She has replicated a Marine cap for a groom's cake, a saddle and boots
for a horse-lover's birthday, and a poker table so realistic that the
recipient tried to pick up the winning hand of slick gumpaste cards.
Among her favorites: a five-tiered square cake with stenciled designs
and huge lifelike peonies, and a scaled down cascade of Niagara Falls
complete with a mini Maid of the Mist.
Between cakes and caring for now four children (the youngest is 2),
Nina is compiling a book on cake decorating that she expects to
complete next year.
"I'm doing it for charity, either Smile Train [for children with cleft
palates] or St. Jude's.
"It will be tips and tricks of the trade, with decorating instructions
and recipes from 13 of us, myself and 12 other decorator's from around
the country. My decorators' dozen. We each have different styles and
each will do one or two cakes for the book."
Truli Confectionary Arts
2990 Southhampton Road
Philadelphia 19154
215-856-9206
www.truliconfectionaryarts.com
Contact food writer Marilynn Marter at 215-854-5743 or [email protected].