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Cakes with Character

Seven years ago, when I was a human resources professional working in higher education, I started baking birthday cakes for my kids. As I got more adventurous with cake designs, I began posting photos of my creations on social media, and friends and friends of friends would ask me to make cakes for them. My customer base grew to the point where I could work on my cakes only after the kids were asleep—and then I’d often have to keep at it until three or four a.m. I’d collapse into bed and wake up a few hours later to go to my “real” job. In June 2012, I decided to turn my creative outlet into a full-time career. The Sleepy Baker seemed like the perfect name for my Boston-area company.

Today, I get a wide variety of requests—people want everything from traditional cakes and pastries to cakes that look like giant burritos. For a girl’s sixth birthday, I made an Angry Birds cake, adorned with characters from the game. A man who was turning forty-two got a Batman cake, complete with the Gotham City skyline. One of my favorite orders came from the customer who wanted a rather racy cake for her boyfriend. She called and said, “I didn’t think I could ask many bakers to do this, but you seemed approachable enough.” I took that as a huge compliment. Some of my G-rated work is shown above.

—Liz Edgers Berman, J96