Ball State students faced off against each other with frosting in hand to create the most creative cake.
This year’s Cake War, which has been running on campus for three years, featured seven teams of three or four students designing cakes based on the theme of “Under the Sea" Saturday in Woodworth Complex.
Teams were given blank, pre-made chocolate and vanilla cakes, colored fondant, sprinkles and frosting to complete their task, and were told to make a plan and execute it in two hours.
“We’ve kind of sketched out some ideas and we each assigned a role, so that hopefully when the time starts, we can split up and do things at the same time so that we can put it together and make it a quicker process,” said freshman advertising major and Team Sprinkles member Mary Brand.
Featured among the team names were “Sprinkles,” “The Cookie Cutters” and “Suite Lyfe.” Some names, like “Friendship Bundle” were inspired by inside jokes between team members.
“Every time we go through [the Woodworth revolving door], we’re all like, ‘Aw, friendship bundle!’ so we all smash into [one section of the door],” said freshman education major Jenna Powell.
Team Sparkles ultimately came out on top, winning the favor of judges, followed by teams Paris Brest and Suite Lyfe in second and third place, respectively.
Sparkles’ winning cake depicted a large pink octopus made of fondant and cake sitting atop an island covered in smaller sea creatures. Going in, they had limited cake-making experience.
“What sets [our cake] apart is that we are complete underdogs. If we win it would be a complete miracle,” said criminal justice and sociology major and Sparkles team member Payton Drefcinski.
The styles of art and cake-making varied greatly between the different entrants.
The second place team took a different angle on the “Under the Sea” theme than the victors. Paris Brest, which had two French international students as members, created a more minimalistic blue cake with fondant seashells.
Christiana Mann, a third-year Cake War judge and faculty member of Hospitality and Food Management and the Miller College of Business, said she judges on a combination of different factors.
“There’s a lot of elements: creativity, execution, time management and communication, making sure that you’re working together as a team for that one unified vision,” Mann said.
Formally, the cakes were judged on their creativity, design, theme, execution and an overall grade. The three judges only reached a conclusion on the winner at the end of the event.
Park Hall Director Colten Ingram, who has run the Cake War since it started, said he hopes the contest continues for many more years.
“This is my last year as a hall director, so hopefully the hall councils keep it going,” Ingram said.
Contact John Lynch with comments at jplynch@bsu.edu.
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