October 21, 2006

Getting messy at Tipsycake

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Naomi Stepanek opened Tipsycake 4 months ago in Chicago's Humboldt Park neighborhood, about 1 mile south of my house. I met Naomi at Angela's bridal shower - they met by chance several years ago and both happened to be Australian. Or they were introduced because they were both Australian. I don't know, something like that. When I met Naomi, Angela had long since moved to NYC but was in town for her shower.

Within a minute of seeing Angela at the shower, she effused about her friend Naomi who happened to supply the beautiful cake at the center of the table. She called Naomi over and introduced us. Naomi was chatty and expressive and spoke enthusiastically about her new bakery, Tipsycake, where everything was made from scratch.

Driving home from work one day, I decided to stop in and visit. Naomi greeted me with a Lamington and a cup of coffee. Lamingtons are a made from two layers of genoise with a thick layer of raspberry jam in between. The entire hand held cake (it is a little larger than a brownie) is then completely painted in a chocolate icing and then rolled in coconut. It was delicious - love at first bite.

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Today I went back again and took more photos. What follows are pictures from my day at Tipsycake.

Cupcakes at Tipsycake...scary enough for Halloween, designed by Anne, who is one of two decorators:

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Ann is responsible for the super scary vampire, skull, spider and bat cupcakes. Oscar, the other decorator, does his share of cakes.

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Here are a someTipsycake_1021_042 views of the shop and some sweets:Tipsycake_1021_096

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         Read all about Tipsycake at http://www.chicagoreader.com/features/stories/restaurants/061020/

Oct 21, 2006 9:33:11 PM | Cake

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