Elisa Strauss, Author of CONFETTI CAKES FOR KIDS
[0:00]Hi, I'm Zibi Owens and you're listening to Momstone Have Time to Read Books.
[0:12]This episode has been sponsored by Book Ampton.
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[0:17]Book Ampton has a highly curated selection of books for readers of all ages.
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[0:28]I'm so excited to be here with my friend, Elisa Strass today.
[0:31]Elisa is the author of the confetti cakes cookbook and confetti cakes for kids.
[0:36]Founder and head designer of Bakery Confetti Cakes in New York City in 2000.
[0:41]Elisa and her creations went on to appear in more shows than she can count,
[0:44]including the Today Show, Good Morning America, the Martha Stewart Show, the View,
[0:48]and in many publications. Her stylish, elegant modern and creative designs
[0:52]released at her apart from other cake makers.
[0:54]She even designed Charlotte's wedding cake to Harry
[0:56]on Sex in the City, which was basically my favorite show for a very long time.
[1:00]She won the grand prize on the Food Network's Extreme Cake Challenge
[1:03]and went on to judge many other reality cake competitions.
[1:06]In 2010, she shifted to teaching, product design, and consulting projects.
[1:10]She's a graduate of Vassar and the Institute of Culinary Education
[1:13]and lives in large mind with her husband and three children.
[1:16]Hi, Elisa. Thanks for being here on mom's time to have time to read books.
[1:19]This is the podcast version.
[1:21]That's right.
[1:22]After we did our great little video shoot, so thanks for teaching me how to do a cupcakes
[1:27]twirl and a snowflake.
[1:29]See, it wasn't at all.
[1:30]It wasn't at all.
[1:32]Okay, so you are this master cake maker, artist amazing.
[1:36]How did you even know you were good at this?
[1:38]When did this gift start to come in your life?
[1:41]Oh my gosh.
[1:42]I don't even know that.
[1:43]I don't even know that.
[1:44]Oh, stop.
[1:45]No, I mean, there are pictures of me when I was three years old, drawing,
[1:49]you know, on the floor, and I always gravitate it towards the kitchen,
[1:54]and art and anything that was very detailed oriented when I was a little
[1:58]girl, I would make these little like puzzle drawings and submitted them to art fair.
[2:04]So I think, you know, it's been forever and really baking with my grandmother.
[2:09]Nothing elaborate, but she would make these delicious butter cookies and put everyone's name
[2:14]on them and, you know, bring them to my mom's musical concert.
[2:18]So it's always been just such a joyful thing to be in the kitchen.
[2:23]And how did you go from taking joy and being in the kitchen
[2:26]to thinking it could be a career for you?
[2:29]Really by accident, you know, I went to college.
[2:32]I thought, well, maybe I'll be a teacher, maybe I'll be an art teacher,
[2:35]maybe I'll be a doctor.
[2:37]Like my father, you know, the world was my oyster.
[2:40]And I, you know, gravitated towards art, obviously.
[2:44]And it wasn't until after college that I picked up a book by another cake designer,
[2:50]Colette Peters, and she made these beautiful cakes that look like things,
[2:54]like really representational art.
[2:57]And I knew after graduating, I was never going to, you know, sit in a studio and paint somewhere,
[3:02]although that does sound appealing to me right now.
[3:05]But, you know, I love making art, but I also love the art being used.
[3:09]And that's probably what led me to fashion.
[3:12]So I kind of jumped around.
[3:14]I was interested in pastry, but I wasn't ready to make that full leap.
[3:19]I didn't know about being in the kitchen for life.
[3:22]Aside from just baking.
[3:23]And so it was after I went to fashion where I was doing textile design at Ralph Lauren,
[3:28]that I really loved design, color, and all those details.
[3:33]And I loved making them into fabrics.
[3:35]That's what I was doing.
[3:36]I was a textile designer, and I made children's clothes and scarves.
[3:40]But as a hobby, I started baking more and more.
[3:43]And I just loved the reaction that came, you know, whether I was just
[3:48]bringing a plate of cookies to a holiday party.
[3:51]Or I made, I had laser, lacyx surgery.
[3:55]And for my eye doctor, I made a cake in the shape of an eye.
[3:58]And sweet.
[3:59]I mean, he was like, this is what you were doing the night before you had eye surgery.
[4:03]And I'm friendly with him to this day.
[4:06]And that was, I knew nothing.
[4:08]That was, I took the four food coloring gels that you just find in a grocery store.
[4:14]And I painted the iris.
[4:16]So obviously it was my love of art and feeding people
[4:20]that kind of all led to this.
[4:21]And it was after I was in fashion for a while that I thought, oh, let me try this.
[4:28]And I still had my foot in fashion.
[4:30]I went from being a full-time employee to a freelancer.
[4:35]And then just making more and more cakes on the side.
[4:37]And then it was, I met someone who loved one of my cakes, put it in time out in New York.
[4:43]And then, you know, the rest is kind of history.
[4:45]Wow.
[4:46]And then you decided to go back to international culinary.
[4:49]Oh, right.
[4:50]So then at that point, my brother, who's very computer savvy,
[4:54]created a very, you know, ordinary website for me.
[4:59]This is many years ago before Instagram or any kind of social media.
[5:03]So I created the website and I went to pastry school.
[5:07]And I went to pastry school first on the weekends while I was still working in fashion to make
[5:13]the dough, yeah, literally.
[5:15]And then I just saw, it was too difficult.
[5:17]At that point, I had left Ralph Lauren and went to Frederick Fekai,
[5:21]who everyone knows as a hair designer, but he had a small leather goods line.
[5:26]And so I became a designer there, but we were traveling a lot.
[5:30]And it was great as a 20-something-year-old, you know, traveling to Italy and France.
[5:35]But it made it really impossible to stay in pastry school.
[5:39]So eventually, I left fashion, went to pastry school full-time,
[5:42]and then really launched confetti cake.
[5:45]So cool.
[5:46]So what were some of the biggest successes and failures of like the very early days?
[5:52]Oh, my goodness.
[5:53]Or just one success and one failure.
[5:55]So yeah, I mean, I feel very lucky in the sense it's not a specific answer,
[6:01]but in terms of when I started the business, it was like the food network was just starting.
[6:06]So I just felt really fortunate to be, I was featured on a lot of these programs,
[6:12]like, you know, all these food network challenges and morning shows,
[6:17]and, you know, a show called Sugar Rush, about career changers.
[6:21]And so I mean, it was me to order, you know, going from a fashion career to a cake designer career.
[6:28]That success just came so quickly, which was so nice.
[6:32]And then that led to, you know, getting book deal and all that stuff.
[6:37]The failure, you know, I would say that my whole life was wrapped up in it,
[6:41]and I just felt, I felt extreme stress, constant stress.
[6:46]Every week, you know, the cakes would go out.
[6:49]They required tons of work, tons of client interaction.
[6:53]And, you know, I mean, to this day, I still say to my husband,
[6:57]it's like, I've been doing this for over 20 years, and something always goes wrong.
[7:01]Like, it could be the weather, it could be your ingredients, it could be, you know,
[7:05]miss measurement, and especially for what I'm doing, custom cakes.
[7:10]You know, I'm usually not making the same type of dog every time.
[7:14]So, you know, if you're making a German Shepherd versus a little poodle,
[7:17]the hair is different.
[7:18]And so things just always took a really long time.
[7:22]But luckily, I mean, there were a few mishaps.
[7:25]I made one wedding cake, I think, round when I should have been square.
[7:30]No, that's not even enough.
[7:32]I mean, to me, though, that was, you know, disastrous.
[7:36]And I remember I had to call the bride and I said, you know, someone in my company,
[7:40]along the lines, didn't check that they made, you know, and of course, everyone was always
[7:45]so nice.
[7:45]So it wasn't a complete disaster, but, you know, it's like, I tell my kids, like,
[7:49]not everything is perfect, even when you plan.
[7:53]Yeah.
[7:53]And I feel like you need to have so much patience, even just doing our little
[7:57]learning the swirl and everything this morning.
[7:59]Like, you just have to really take your time and be so present to make it so perfect.
[8:03]Like, that's, I mean, that's a testament to you, especially it.
[8:06]I mean, no, it's true.
[8:07]I mean, you don't think about, oh, if you're a baker, you have to have, like,
[8:11]I didn't realize you had to have such a sort of steady temperament.
[8:16]Maybe, I mean, I love to bake, but maybe the swag could not be a,
[8:19]I'm like too crazy.
[8:20]I'm going, you know what, it's so funny, because on one hand, people always say that baking is
[8:25]therapeutic and, and I do that, you know, like, when I go away, let's say I'm at a beach house,
[8:31]and there are no mixers, no nut, like, I love to just make a simple banana bread, right?
[8:36]Like, on the door and chocolate chip cookies, like that really is a love.
[8:42]But what I do as a career is so stressful and there are so many levels, like, people see the end
[8:49]result, but even what we were doing with the cupcakes, it's like, but we had to bake the cupcakes,
[8:54]bake the fill, you know, you have to make so many things, especially like making everything from scratch
[9:00]with the best ingredients, that even just shopping for say, you know, everything takes so long,
[9:05]and then you have to decorate it.
[9:07]So, but yeah, I do love, I think it's just more about being a perfectionist than anything,
[9:13]which is sometimes a detriment, you know, like I just can't stop, I used to share a commercial
[9:19]space on the Upper West side, and I shared it with another baker, and she said, my friend Jerry,
[9:25]she would look over and she'd say, oh, you know, you're done with the cake, and then I keep
[9:31]working on it, like another hour, and then she'd say, oh, you're done with the cake, and then I'd
[9:35]work, you know, and it's like, that it's just everything was the details were everything to me.
[9:40]It's in a way, it's kind of like writing, because you're never really done.
[9:43]Like, you can always just tweak it a little more, make it a little better, like,
[9:47]it's something you just have to like, no, it's too stop, and yeah, even our little cute penguins,
[9:52]you know, I was trying to make it like a family, but I thought, oh, I could have added some
[9:57]cheek color, no, I could have done some eyelashes.
[10:00]You know, at a certain point, you just have to stop and, you know, but yeah, there's
[10:05]always more to do.
[10:06]So tell me more about the books, confetti cakes and confetti cakes for kids.
[10:10]Both books.
[10:11]How did you go from, you know, your success on TV and all that to the book deals and
[10:16]what was that whole process like for you?
[10:18]Well, let's see.
[10:19]You know, I always wanted to write a book.
[10:21]I felt like that would be such a great vehicle to get sharing my recipes and then, and
[10:27]also a marketing thing, right?
[10:29]Like, I was starting my business and I thought, oh, this is a great way to show people
[10:34]like, actually know what I'm doing.
[10:36]And so I remember I was dating someone, not my husband, and I brought a whole bunch of
[10:42]before you were married.
[10:43]Before I was married, I took a whole bunch of cake decorating books that I had and through
[10:49]that ex-boyfriend's friend, he had a literary agent and so I got a meeting and I said,
[10:56]I want to write a book, but I want to do it, not like any of these, you know, and so
[11:01]I had a vision, but then I was running my business.
[11:04]So then I, you know, she's like, okay, great, write a proposal.
[11:08]And then I went back and it was like six months later.
[11:10]I still didn't have the rep proposal and she had seen me.
[11:14]She was like on a jet blue flight coming back from LA and she saw me on TV on the food
[11:18]network doing what.
[11:19]And she's like, all right, we have to get this book done.
[11:22]And so she paired me actually with a writer who, again, is my friend till today.
[11:28]And that just got me to really like sit down and think about what I want to do.
[11:32]And then we wrote the proposal and I had some photographs and I wrote out some recipes.
[11:37]And then the publisher at the time was Bulfinch, which was later bought by Little Brown.
[11:42]They loved the idea so much that it was a two book deal.
[11:44]Okay.
[11:45]And so the first one was more of a general, you know, cookies, cupcakes, mini cakes, sculpted
[11:51]cakes.
[11:52]And again, like each chapter goes from easiest to most difficult.
[11:56]And then the second book, you know, we toyed with different months of the, I mean, there
[11:59]were so many ideas, but even the adult cakes I make, so many of them are stuffed animals
[12:06]or kids like things that we ended up going with the kids.
[12:11]It's called Confetti Cakes for Kids, but I sometimes laugh at that because it's not really
[12:16]for kids because the people who are making the cakes aren't kids and the themes aren't
[12:20]all, you know.
[12:21]Okay.
[12:22]It's usually for like 30 year olds that are celebrating the birthday.
[12:24]Although I have to say, and I'm not just saying this, my kids, these are their favorite
[12:28]books to look at.
[12:29]Like we have all these cookbooks here and they like visually, it's so appealing to them.
[12:33]And they'll like paw through it, like, you know, in dinner, like, oh, I let me just look
[12:37]at the cake book and I was like the cake book lady's coming today, so anyway, they were
[12:40]really excited about that.
[12:41]And now they have cupcakes and cookies, yeah, which is like, oh my gosh, even better,
[12:46]even better.
[12:47]So if you could go back to the beginning of the whole book writing editing publishing
[12:51]process, is there anything you wish you had known at the beginning, haven't gone through
[12:54]it?
[12:55]Oh my god.
[12:56]Everything.
[12:57]I mean, you know, from like the deal memo, I mean, like all the stuff that no one ever
[13:03]tells you, like, you know, when the publisher comes back with the deal memo, how important
[13:10]that is to get all that stuff, you know, by the time I took it to my lawyer, he was like,
[13:16]well, you already agreed to half the stuff, like, it's, you know, down to, you know,
[13:21]working with the photographer and, you know, I mean, the two books are so different in
[13:26]so many ways from the first book was still photography and the second book was digital
[13:33]photography.
[13:34]I mean, it's almost like, even though they weren't created that far apart, they were just
[13:39]made so differently, but no, I mean, I look at them.
[13:44]I'm proud of them, but of course now, looking back, I wish I could do another book with,
[13:50]you know, it's sort of like being any kind of artist, your work evolves and probably as
[13:54]a writer too, right?
[13:56]So I just feel like I should write another book, something to kind of just evolve.
[14:02]One thing I like about your book is how you casually kept mentioning people in your
[14:05]family throughout, like your grandma Pearl's cookies and your mom's little duck and your
[14:10]brother, I almost wanted more to hear about more about your family and like your other
[14:15]friend, you would reference friends throughout.
[14:17]It was really nice.
[14:18]Like here.
[14:19]Oh, that's nice.
[14:20]Yeah.
[14:21]I mean, really, who do you bake for, right?
[14:22]Like you, I can't around the holidays, maybe you bake for some strangers, but really
[14:27]you're baking, especially if you're going to spend all this time, it's for your friends
[14:31]and family.
[14:32]And I do think like what else, you know, people don't need another scar for gloves
[14:37]or, you know, in general.
[14:38]And so I feel like, I mean, even to this day, I mean, I made a little TV for my brother
[14:43]in the book because he's a TV producer, but then I remember for his 30th birthday, I
[14:49]made him a pizza burger because he loves pizza burgers and it has a little Mexican flag
[14:55]because he was actually born in Guadalajara, Mexico and many people don't know.
[15:00]And so it's just such a way of personalizing something to someone that, you know, it could
[15:05]just be like a tiny cookie, but.
[15:07]And for those people who can't bake as well as you, even the cookbooks will be a nice
[15:11]gift.
[15:12]Yeah.
[15:13]Yeah.
[15:14]It's like this holiday, if you can't manage to, you know, start rolling out fondant
[15:17]yourself.
[15:18]Right.
[15:19]But I think people are pleasantly surprised like more than anything, it's not difficult,
[15:24]but it's time consuming, right?
[15:26]Right.
[15:27]So just like if you're making a quilt or something else, it's just, it's perishable.
[15:30]But if you're an organized person, you can do it.
[15:34]And what I love, whether you know, it's the cookies or in the kids book, I have a delicious
[15:38]brownie recipe.
[15:39]I mean, how many people make brownies from scratch?
[15:43]It's so easy.
[15:44]And who doesn't love getting brownies?
[15:46]We made your frosting the other day, we bought like store bought I have to say, just like
[15:50]a mix.
[15:51]It's fine.
[15:52]And then we, but we did your frosting and it was like out of this world, the chocolate.
[15:54]Yeah.
[15:55]It was really good.
[15:56]So what else do you have coming up?
[15:58]You weren't you just in Mexico for a, I saw an Instagram, you were in some like mixed
[16:02]masters.
[16:03]Yes.
[16:04]Tell me about that.
[16:05]You had cake and bake masters Mexico, which it was so great.
[16:08]I did two demos, live demonstrations in this stadium, which was great, got me out of my regular
[16:15]routine of dropping my kid off at school, to entering a stadium where people were asking
[16:20]for your autograph.
[16:21]Like so cool.
[16:22]That was a great feeling, you know, and people coming up with the books to sign.
[16:27]and I also judged two cake competitions.
[16:30]So it is interesting to think of myself at this point in my life, like people want me to
[16:34]give, you know, I was in so many cake competitions that it was nice knowing how they feel
[16:40]and then also being on the other side and also being able, not just giving them cake
[16:45]advice, but saying, you know, like not to be so hard on yourself or, you know, one of
[16:49]the people in the competition made a horse and one part was cracking and, you know, it's
[16:55]like anything.
[16:56]We've all been there, you know, it's only cake.
[17:00]Well, for only cake, you're a true artist and really comes through and it's like one of
[17:05]a kind.
[17:06]So it's really neat to see.
[17:07]Do you have anything, anything else coming next, any advice to young writers or somebody
[17:11]out there or maybe who wants to do a cookbook?
[17:13]Oh my gosh, I was a practice practice practice.
[17:16]You know, one of the greatest things that I teach a lot and I see, especially with, you
[17:22]know, all these great shows out there.
[17:24]A lot of young kids are really getting into cake decorating and I just love it.
[17:28]I think it's such a healthy way to be in the kitchen and you're using science and math
[17:33]and, you know, and art and just being able to use all those things together.
[17:38]Now I just, I think people should just keep practicing and, you know, try it before you
[17:43]think it's too difficult.
[17:44]Love it.
[17:45]Oh, thanks.
[17:46]Thanks for coming.
[17:47]Thanks for the whole day.
[17:48]Okay.
[17:49]Thanks.
[17:50]Episode has been sponsored by Bookhampton Bookhampton dot com.
[17:54]Thanks to Ryan and Steve at Texture Sound for the audio editing and mixing.
[17:58]Thanks for listening to momstone have time to read books.