From roasted chickens to designer bags and a pair of breasts, Taiwan's novelty cake industry is creating a bakery boom.
Increasingly outlandish "creative cakes" -- made in the likenesses of people, cartoon characters, animals and other objects -- are becoming more popular among young people.
Bakeries and shops touting novelty cakes are flourishing, particularly in Taipei, where the latest trends from Japan, the US and Europe are quick to catch on.
PHOTO: AFP
"In the past, cakes all looked alike and they were not special enough to satisfy younger people, who are willing to spend extra money to have cakes made from their ideas," says Lin Yu-an (
Lin takes more than 200 orders -- all made to designs from her customers -- each month for parties, weddings or corporate meetings, and during festive seasons such as Valentine's Day, Mother's Day and Christmas.
The most popular requests include cakes in the shape of designer bags -- purchased by male clients who can't afford the real ones for their girlfriends -- as well as parents ordering cakes of cartoon characters for their children and pet owners buying dog-shaped cakes, she says.
Not surprisingly, erotic cakes such as breasts and sex organs are in demand for Valentine's Day, while cakes in the shape of gingerbread houses, Father Christmas and roasted chicken are big at Christmas.
A tailor-made cake can fetch more than NT$10,000, compared with NT$400 to NT$500 for a simple one. The price of Lin's cakes starts at NT$700 for a standard creation.
There is no estimate of how big Taiwan's cake market is, but there are now at least 10,000 bakeries and cake shops in the country, according to the Taiwan Gateaux Association.
"The market is growing as dining habits change in Taiwan and people are influenced by the West and Japan where the pastry cultures are prosperous," association director Ron Lin (
He says that more young people are willing to become bakers because they can apply creativity to their business and enhance the value of their products.
Lee Rung-fu (李榮富), 32, who runs Ri Chin Fa Bakery (日進發糕餅) in Miaoli County, is one such example. He took up his grandfather's baker career seven years ago after losing his job at a car repair factory.
"At first I didn't want to inherit grandpa's bakery but gradually I found the job interesting," he says.
Lee has applied his fascination for adventure books and movies to cake-making and recently won a contest organized by the Taiwan Gateaux Association for his cake, "The Lord of the Rings," featuring a golden ring, swords and a dragon.
His other prized creation is a cake of a miniature bakery called "My Home" based on his shop, displaying a chef, colorful cakes, customers and a wall decorated with pumpkins and books.
But Lee says these elaborate cakes are only made for competitions because of cost effectiveness and taste, as it takes up to two months to make such a cake.
Lin, however, said that no matter how fancy a cake looks, it has to taste good to lure customers back for more.
Her cakes are usually made of a lightly textured sponge with sweet fillings such as fruit jam, chocolate or coffee cream, or red beans, while the decoration is made from colored cream and fondant.
"Over 30 percent of our customers are regulars because they find our cakes delicious too. Novelty design alone is not enough," she says.
Apple Inc has closed in on an agreement with OpenAI to use the start-up’s technology on the iPhone, part of a broader push to bring artificial intelligence (AI) features to its devices, people familiar with the matter said. The two sides have been finalizing terms for a pact to use ChatGPT features in Apple’s iOS 18, the next iPhone operating system, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the situation is private. Apple also has held talks with Alphabet Inc’s Google about licensing its Gemini chatbot. Those discussions have not led to an agreement, but are ongoing. An OpenAI
INSATIABLE: Almost all AI innovators are working with the chipmaker to address the rapidly growing AI-related demand for energy-efficient computing power, the CEO said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday reported about 60 percent annual growth in revenue for last month, benefiting from rapidly growing demand for artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing applications. Revenue last month expanded to NT$236.02 billion (US$7.28 billion), compared with NT$147.9 billion in April last year, the second-highest level in company history, TSMC said in a statement. On a monthly basis, revenue surged 20.9 percent, from NT$195.21 billion in March. As AI-related applications continue to show strong growth, TSMC expects revenue to expand about 27.6 percent year-on-year during the current quarter to between US$19.6 billion and US$20.4 billion. That would
‘FULL SUPPORT’: Kumamoto Governor Takashi Kimura said he hopes more companies would settle in the prefecture to create an area similar to Taiwan’s Hsinchu Science Park The newly elected governor of Japan’s Kumamoto Prefecture said he is ready to ensure wide-ranging support to woo Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to build its third Japanese chip factory there. Concerns of groundwater shortages when TSMC’s two plants begin operations in the prefecture’s Kikuyo have spurred discussions about the possibility of tapping unused dam water, Kumamoto Governor Takashi Kimura said in an interview on Saturday. While Kimura said talks about a third plant have yet to occur, Bloomberg had reported TSMC is already considering its third Japanese fab — also in Kumamoto — which would make more advanced chips. “We are
Huawei Technologies Co’s (華為) latest high-end smartphone features more Chinese suppliers, including a new flash memory chip and an improved chip processor, a teardown analysis showed, pointing to the progress China is making toward technology self-sufficiency. The inside of Huawei’s Pura 70 Pro was examined by online tech repair company iFixit and consultancy TechSearch International, finding components made by Chinese suppliers. The firms also found that the Pura 70 phones run on an advanced processing chipset made by Chinese chip foundry Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯) called the Kirin 9010, which is likely a slightly improved version of the advanced chip