Susan Sarich Transcript
Jessie Sheehan:
Hi peeps, you're listening to She's My Cherry Pie, the baking podcast from The Cherry Bombe Podcast Network. I'm your host, Jessie Sheehan. I'm a baker, recipe developer, and author of four baking books, including “Salty, Cheesy, Herby Crispy Snackable Bakes.” On each episode, I hang out with the sweetest bakers around and take a deep dive into their signature bakes.
Today's guest is Susan Sarich, founder and CEO of SusieCakes, the beloved bakery brand known for its classic American desserts. Since opening her first shop in Brentwood, California, in 2006, Susan has grown her company into a community favorite with over 30 locations across California, Texas, Oklahoma, and Tennessee. SusieCakes has an old-fashioned atmosphere and specializes in from-scratch Americana desserts, like classic layer cakes and decadent cupcakes. Susan joins me to talk about her baking journey and how her two grandmothers, Mildred and Madeline, who lived across the street from each other, influenced her career as did their recipe boxes. She tells me about the bakery's beginnings and the obstacles she had to overcome to get it started and how she was able to grow SusieCakes into the nationally recognized brand it is today. Then, Susan walks me through her recipe for Vanilla Celebration Cake, her most popular, best-selling product. It's a six-layer vanilla cake with colorful confetti and the bakery's signature retro blue vanilla frosting, inspired by Susan's grandmother's blue Pyrex mixing bowl. I know you are going to love hearing Susan's story, so stay tuned for our chat.
Peeps, did you know that we have a free, She's My Cherry Pie newsletter that coincides with each new episode? It comes out every Saturday morning and shares insights about the guest, their recipe, and other fun tidbits and baking news like our Cake of the Week. To sign up, head to cherrybombe.substack.com or click the link in our show notes.
Let's chat with today's guest. Susan, so excited to have you on She’s My Cherry Pie, and to talk about your incredible SusieCakes bakeries, your number one best-selling cake, the Celebration Cake, and so much more.
Susan Sarich:
Thrilled to be here. Thank you for having me.
Jessie Sheehan:
You grew up in Chicago, and you spent a lot of time when you were little with your grandmothers. They lived across the street from each other, which is how your parents met, and I just have to say I love, there was something so special and amazing about that. One was Polish, one was Italian. Can you share a particular baked good that each of them made for you that you remember?
Susan Sarich:
So for my grandmother, Madeline, she made a cake for Easter that was a lamb cake. It was a cake in the shape of a lamb. This is a very Midwest Catholic thing. When I grew up and I started talking about a lamb cake, people had no idea what I was saying, but I wish so much I had the mold that she had for that cake, but someday I will find it in a thrift store. Anyway, it's a really dense and buttery pound cake for the body of the lamb. And then she frosted it in a vanilla American buttercream and then loaded it with coconut on top, and then she would put the lamb, she'd use little, I remember the raisins for his eyes and a little maraschino cherry for his nose. And then she'd put him on a bed of that kind of cheap Easter egg basket grass and put jellybeans around it, and it would sit on the center of our table from Good Friday until Easter when we enjoyed it. And that is my most nostalgic cake memory.
Jessie Sheehan:
I love that so much. Was Madeleine your Polish-
Susan Sarich:
She was the Italian grandmother. Yes.
Jessie Sheehan:
Can you tell me about a special Polish dessert that Mildred made and then a special Italian one that Madeleine made?
Susan Sarich:
Yes. Okay. So Mildred made Kolachkis with the jam, the little triangle shape with the jam on the inside. It's almost like a butter cookie, but it's soft. It's pliable. You can fold it. It's a little bit like a dough and a cookie together. It has a flavor of a Mexican wedding cookie, so kind of melts in your mouth, you fold it over tons of powdered sugar, and then she would put Apricot jam was her favorite, and then also did strawberry jam as well.
Jessie Sheehan:
I love that. I love that. And what about an Italian one?
Susan Sarich:
Okay, so Madeleine for sure were her cannolis. So my grandfather was Sicilian, and back in those days, I didn't know this at the time, women baked really for their husband for the desserts he grew up with, right? So my grandfather was Sicilian, the cannolis are Sicilian. And so I remember her painstakingly making all the cannoli shells in the little... She'd fold the cannoli shell around the little metal tube, deep-fry it. She had newspapers on the kitchen table where let the grease absorb when you take it out of the fryer, she put them in a big can of empty Lays potato chips. I don't think they were Lays whatever-
Jessie Sheehan:
It wouldn't have been those that came in a can.
Susan Sarich:
No. It was something in the seventies. Yeah, that came in the can. OJ’s or something, I don't know, in Chicago. And she'd keep them there from Thanksgiving until Christmas and then we'd make them on Christmas Eve.
Jessie Sheehan:
Oh my gosh. I love that so much. Your memories are just mind-blowing.
Susan Sarich:
They're very distinct.
Jessie Sheehan:
Oh my gosh. Both of your grandmothers were baking for you since you were little. Is it fair to say that you developed a voracious sweet tooth early on?
Susan Sarich:
Correct. Yes, exactly. Very early on I associated baked goods with love and comfort and caring.
Jessie Sheehan:
And what about, did your grandmother's baking styles differ? It sounds like they made similar things, but would you be able to kind of pinpoint what was different about the style?
Susan Sarich:
Yes. So it was at a time where people were trying to be not ethnic, and so they did some really funky things. I remember Mildred made this, it was a fruit cocktail pie, which I've actually tried to recreate this. It's fruit cocktail in a crust with Cool Whip on top of it.
Jessie Sheehan:
I love Cool Whip for the record.
Susan Sarich:
It was so yummy. I do too. But they were doing these Betty Crocker-esque recipes and Mildred was more of the cake and frosting, and then Madeline was more like cookies and pies and bars. So they had kind of two disciplines within the Americana discipline.
Jessie Sheehan:
Did your grandmothers make your birthday cakes? And if so, did you get a cake from each grandma, and can you describe flavors, et cetera?
Susan Sarich:
Yes. They were always single or double-layer sheet cakes made in the thirteen-by-nine pan. Again, very strong memory of this. They would make them based on what I was doing at the time. I really remember the year I was into ballet and they put those little plastic ballerinas around them and one was chocolate and one was vanilla. So I got both flavors and it was just always what I was into at the time.
Jessie Sheehan:
I love it. And I'm just interested in the family dynamics. The grandmothers got along, but you would still, they would have separate Easter.
Susan Sarich:
Correct.
Jessie Sheehan:
Its not like they got along so well that-
Susan Sarich:
That we were all together. No, it was still separate.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yes. Interesting. And then was it complicated for you which grandma's house to go to after school? You don't make one grandma feel bad.
Susan Sarich:
Somehow it just worked out, but I could see how that could rub one or the other the wrong way.
Jessie Sheehan:
Right. Oh, I love that so much. And then the million-dollar question, were you ever baking with them or were you just eating?
Susan Sarich:
I was. I mean, I was baking with them to some degree. I really like talking about the Pyrex mixing bowls, my vivid memory of the baking part. And they both though, and I still have these dishes, which I'm so grateful for, but they have what I call now Susie Blue on the outside and the white on the inside. And so I was around for the licking the mixer paddle and things of that nature, but not necessarily always involved in all the steps.
Jessie Sheehan:
And then what about your mom or dad? I know they each worked full time. Your dad was a firefighter, but were they also baking and cooking?
Susan Sarich:
No, not at all. They were just working.
Jessie Sheehan:
So would one of their moms make you guys dinner? Who fed you at night?
Susan Sarich:
Well, my mom was at home by dinner time or my dad was like also every third day was home type of situation.
Jessie Sheehan:
You've talked about this, and I'm not bearing the lead here, but I would love to know what you learned from your grandmother sort of sitting around that kitchen table, as you've said, like eating apple pie or pound cake.
Susan Sarich:
So much was about how to be a good person. I didn't know it at the time, but they were teaching me values and they would say big on gratitude, what is something you're grateful for? And that's a great way to start a conversation. And tell me what was good today. Tell me what you didn't enjoy today. What would you do over again? I love the do-over question. I still say that to myself before I go to bed. What happened today that tomorrow I'll do better or I'll change the way I did that. I didn't know it at the time. I was a little girl. I wasn't that forward-thinking. But as I became a young woman and I reflect upon those conversations, that's what they were doing in a way that a five and six-year-old and seven-year-old young girl could relate to, which was really special. Really special.
Jessie Sheehan:
And then I know I'm overly obsessed with you at their houses, but one more question. Did you ever bring... I'm just thinking about this in the moment, it's not something I've thought about before, but did you ever bring friends? Was it just like you?
Susan Sarich:
No. No. It was just me.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. So you never said, "Anyone want to go to my grandma's house?"
Susan Sarich:
And sometimes I bring something back to my house that then I would share with my girlfriends and they would always know there's always going to be something really good at Susie's place.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. I think it was also, I don't know if it was Mildred or Madeline, but one of them also was I think the first person to tell you that you could really do anything you wanted in life and put your mind to it.
Susan Sarich:
Yes. Yes. Yes.
Jessie Sheehan:
Which grandma was that?
Susan Sarich:
Mildred, because she had lost her husband early and she had to go back into the workforce. And again, very unusual for women at time to be raising two kids on her own. And so she really defied what was stereotypical at that time, and I didn't know, again, how strong she was for that time. I just thought my grandma's cool, she had a job and now she bakes for me.
Jessie Sheehan:
We'll be right back. Cherry Bombe's newest issue, the power issue, is out next week. We have four different covers for this issue, and you won't believe our cover stars. Activist and author, Gloria Steinem. Chef Mashama Bailey of The Grey in Savannah. Chef-restaurateurs, Jody Williams and Rita Sodi behind Via Carota and more in New York City. And chef and culinary creative, Sophia Roe. If you're a subscriber to Cherry Bombe magazine, you'll receive your issue very soon. If you're not a subscriber yet, head to cherrybombe.com and sign up today to receive this issue, or stop by your local culinary shop or bookstore to pick up a copy.
Peeps, have you tuned into Radio Cherry Bombe? It's the flagship podcast from Cherry Bombe, hosted by founder Kerry Diamond. Every Monday, Kerry sits down with the most fascinating folks in food, drink, and hospitality from icons to rising stars. Don't miss our conversations with Ina Garten, Alice Waters, Padma Lakshmi, “The Bear’s,” Liza Colón-Zayas, and so many more. Listen to Radio Cherry Bombe on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. And be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. Now, back to our guest.
We're going to talk about your love of hospitality and where you went to college and all of that, but is it fair to say that maybe this love of hospitality was sort of born from these kitchen table conversations?
Susan Sarich:
1,000%. I wanted people to feel as good around me or in my home as I did when I went there. It's like I walked in the front door and there was the box of Fannie May candies on the coffee table, and I just felt like a hug, literal and a virtual hug walking into their homes.
Jessie Sheehan:
Totally. So when they passed, you inherited each of their recipe boxes, and that was because you were the one who had spent so much time with them, so it went to you. But I also wondered, were there other grandchildren? Were you competing with your cousins?
Susan Sarich:
No, there was no-
Jessie Sheehan:
I know I'm obsessed with the competition.
Susan Sarich:
It's really funny. I do sometimes think when I opened SusieCakes, I'm like, I wonder if people are going to be coming after me for these. I really I am not entitled to them. But yes, there were cousins, there were siblings, but when I inherited them, I wasn't really looking to make a business out of them. They just came to me out of nostalgia and everybody knew they were so important to me just because I'm the one who turned them a new business. I think everybody felt like, okay, she's entitled to it. She came up with a plan.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah, of course. And how did the boxes differ, if at all? If you looked at one, I mean, maybe you would see more bars and cookies in Mildred's-
Susan Sarich:
Vice versa.
Jessie Sheehan:
Vice versa.
Susan Sarich:
Vice versa. Yes.
Jessie Sheehan:
But would you say what-
Susan Sarich:
They still had all varieties of all things, and then also the savory food too, which is just a whole other amazing-
Jessie Sheehan:
This is a great segue because it was these boxes and sort of your nostalgia for your Midwest upbringing that inspired your eventual decision to open SusieCakes in the first place. And from the time you were just this little kid from your grandma's influence, I think, you were always drawn to hospitality. Can you tell us the story about the little kind of amenities that you would have for your friends during sleepovers?
Susan Sarich:
Yes, yes, yes. So we were a blue collar family, but we did take vacations to Wisconsin and we'd stay, there'd always be some sort of motel situation with the chain link fence around the pool in the parking lot. And I don't even know how I knew to take those things home. I didn't even know, I hadn't stayed in a hotel that had amenities per se, but I would take the shampoo and the soap home and I'm like, oh, wouldn't it be nice for my girlfriends? And we have our sleepover and we have our Barbie sleeping bags to put this next to their bed, so everybody has their own little shampoo and soap in the morning. I don't know where it came from, but I just love doing it.
Jessie Sheehan:
I love that.
Susan Sarich:
I just love doing it.
Jessie Sheehan:
I love that. So you ended up going to Cornell and graduated from their hospitality program. You were at that point at least much more drawn to the hospitality of food, but not necessarily the food itself, although your favorite classes were the baking classes.
Susan Sarich:
Yes, yes, yes.
Jessie Sheehan:
What about them made them your favorite?
Susan Sarich:
I think it's because it brought back memories of being with my grandmothers. And I remember being there, one was still alive while I was at Cornell, and I remember thinking, how cool is this that I'm taking a class on something they just did. It was just really interesting to me. And I wanted to say to some of those pastry chefs, my grandmothers run circles around you guys. You know what I mean? Yeah. That's what it was for me.
Jessie Sheehan:
And that's how sort of the program worked. It was probably classes about actual hospitality, not so much what it would look like, but also-
Susan Sarich:
Yes, yes, yes. Service.
Jessie Sheehan:
Service, and also baking and cooking.
Susan Sarich:
And also baking and cooking, but also marketing and real estate and human resources and finance. So it was really an undergraduate degree in business, which I think really set the foundation for success for me.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. Yeah. I think this is fair to say that you liked the cooking and baking, but what you really liked was the part of cooking and baking that brings people together.
Susan Sarich:
Yes. Yes.
Jessie Sheehan:
Can you kind of explain the nuance of that?
Susan Sarich:
Sure. I say that baked goods, you're usually making a batch or a whole cake or something. It's not just one piece of something. And so it's like it's naturally made for sharing. And while some people can't eat a cake by themselves, I have, I'm sure you have.
Jessie Sheehan:
We all have.
Susan Sarich:
Okay. But generally speaking, you're sharing a cake and you're usually sharing it over something that is a celebration. So for me, every time I see cake, I literally think a celebration. And that could be celebrating a Tuesday afternoon of us being together and celebrating life. And so that's the, I don't know, the joy that comes to me from baked goods.
Jessie Sheehan:
So you worked in hotels after college and you loved that, and then you ended up opening a French bistro in Portland with your life partner and also your professional partner.
Susan Sarich:
Yes. Yes.
Jessie Sheehan:
Although the French bistro ended up closing, you realized that what you actually loved was being the boss and running your own business, and that helped spark this idea of SusieCakes and these recipe boxes. What about running your own business did you love?
Susan Sarich:
Oh, so many things. As much as there's this risk of downside, which is high, I liked just making decisions and not having to run them by 85 people. It's like, I know that this should be this wear, these napkins should be this color, the glassware should look like this. And not having to go through a committee of people who want to break apart why they shouldn't look like that.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. It's not just knowing how beautiful the cake should look. It's like the branding is... You're good at all of it.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah. And just following intuition, I'm just an intuition person and give me all the data in the world, and I'll be like, this is what I think. This is how I feel. This is right.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yep. Right. So tell us about this recipe box-inspired, professional pivot. How did you go from sort of hotels then to the restaurant, but then when the restaurant didn't work out? How did SusieCakes-
Susan Sarich:
Yeah, I went back into hotels. That was what I knew, and I could ease right back into that after the restaurant not succeeding. I always had the boxes with me. They were usually in a box in the closet, and I had my moment of like, oh, I miss my grandmothers, when I'd unpack or pack it again. But they were in the closet.
Jessie Sheehan:
And when you unpacked or packed, were you baking from them or more just looking at them?
Susan Sarich:
No, no. I was more just like... Well, I would always think... That's a good question. I would think, what can I do with this? I don't have time to bake. I am traveling, I'm moving for work, I'm doing all these things. I'm focused on my career. What can I do with this? But it never really clicked until we were living in San Francisco and I think this story, but we were out to dinner and it was the days in the late nineties, early 2000s with the over-composed or decomposed or however you want to label them. They are not desserts. In my mind, they were not true desserts. And you'd look at a menu and you'd be like, I don't want any of this. I just want to scoop a vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce or a-
Jessie Sheehan:
Describe the pineapple upside-down cake so people know what you mean.
Susan Sarich:
Oh my God, it's so funny. So it was said pineapple upside down cake on the menu, but it came to the table and the cake was in one part of the plate, and caramel was in the other part, and pineapple was in the third. And I'm like, this is the most absurd thing. These should all be together and baked together and made together. And I just thought it was so silly. And then I was looking around and I'm like, why did these people not know what a good Midwest dessert is? And then it was like the light bulb moment, those recipes. I need to bring those recipes to life. I need to bring them to California. These people need to understand what a dessert is.
Jessie Sheehan:
I love that. It was 2006, I think, when you first opened in Brentwood, that nostalgia had a moment.
Susan Sarich:
Correct.
Jessie Sheehan:
Americana bakery, you were on it.
Susan Sarich:
And it really wasn't in California at that time. It just really wasn't.
Jessie Sheehan:
Amazing. And in addition to sort of craving not something deconstructed, something very constructed and traditional, you also had this idea about if there was an ingredient in the list of ingredients for one of the items that would've made either of your grandmother's cringe you were not putting it on.
Susan Sarich:
Correct. Yes. That is correct.
Jessie Sheehan:
So talk to us about the five, not five ingredients probably always but-
Susan Sarich:
Sure. And it really, you look at those recipe cards, and it really is butter, flour, sugar, eggs, salt, and maybe a few other things. And I think what makes those things so good is the simplicity of them. Less is more. Always, always. Like in everything in life. And so to just add an ingredient for the sake of adding an ingredient just makes no sense to me.
Jessie Sheehan:
You've also said, this was sort of I think just in your thinking even before you opened, but that there was something about the cake business, SusieCakes, that was going to pay tribute to the women in your life from that generation who had given up everything for their families, like your grandmother's.
Susan Sarich:
And I was so amazed. Again, at the time when we're young girls and we're with our grandmothers, we're not thinking, "Oh, maybe she has dreams and aspirations that none of us know about." But she had a place in society at that time and just served that very dutifully, but also not with resentment.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah.
Susan Sarich:
You know what I mean? They were never victims. They were just always joyous, kind human beings. And there's something really special about that. And when I got older and I started thinking maybe they wanted careers, but that wasn't even an option for them and how cool to do something with what they were doing. I don't know. There's just something so full circle about it. Real full circle for me.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, totally. You ended up going to L.A. to start your business. Why L.A.? Just because you noticed a dearth in the market?
Susan Sarich:
Well, no. We were living in San Francisco at the time, and I couldn't find real estate in San Francisco because everything... I was considered a fast food restaurant, which was totally insane. But because we produced on site, but we didn't have table service, we just fell into this category, fast food. And so we were barred from being in any neighborhood and I wanted to be in Pacific Heights, et cetera, et cetera, you name it. And so it was really an uphill battle there. My partner at the time, Houston, who was down in L.A., he said, "You should come down here and just check this out." I'm like, "I've never really spent time in L.A.. I don't know how I feel about that." And he is like, "Just come on down. I really think this could work as well." And so when I got down there, I'm like, I didn't see anything I wanted to do.
Jessie Sheehan:
I know it was hard to get started. Particularly men with money were not interested in financing you and your idea. And people said, California, it's too healthy. Nobody's going to like this. Tell us about that experience.
Susan Sarich:
Yes. So after I had came up with the idea, I wrote a business plan. It was a viable business model. It took a lot of time, two years probably to write this. And I visited bakeries all over the country, and I'd sit in parking lots and I'd count cars to say, "How many cakes can I really sell?" It was very thorough. I had the experience in the education and I thought, well, you just go into a bank and you get a loan. I was that naive at the time. And every single bank, it was 20 some banks, all male bankers just were like, "This is not a good idea. This is a bad idea, Susie. People are healthy. People don't eat sweets here." There was one rejection after another, but the feeling was so strong to move forward with this, and it almost gave me more gumption to keep going because it was making me angry, kind of gave me the courage and made me lean on what are the lessons my grandmothers taught me. They would not want me to quit now.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. Tell us about SusieCakes, which I've read is a top California destination for satisfying a sweet tooth, which were opened in Brentwood, in L.A. in 2006. So tell us about it.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah. So the bakery, I wanted it to be a place where people, where it would feel like an old-fashioned bakery where you could see the bakers baking. So all of our kitchens are open because I want the individuals who are baking and making the goods to be able to see the guests, see the cake and their eyes wide. It's really nice to have that connection between back of house and front of house. So that's all open and exposed. We have a signature color, which is Susie Blue, which is a color of those Pyrex mixing bowls. So people walk in, it feels nostalgic to them. Again, they don't know why. It doesn't feel old-fashioned or frumpy. It just feels like fresh new. But there's something like a nod back to that era. It's bright and light, and the highlight is the pastry case. It's a pretty neutral space. And then the pastry case elevates when you walk in. So colorful and beautiful.
Jessie Sheehan:
Tell us what we'll see in that pastry case.
Susan Sarich:
Oh, you will see old-fashion layer cakes, primarily six-inch and nine. You can come by the slice or you can-
Jessie Sheehan:
Or you can order.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah. Or you can just go in and pick it up. I think that is a point of differentiation. You could just go in and grab a cake from us. We bake on-site daily, but then we also have cupcakes, cookies, bars, and pies.
Jessie Sheehan:
And tell us about, there was a specific moment with a specific celebrity when you thought, oh, maybe this is going to succeed.
Susan Sarich:
Yes.
Jessie Sheehan:
I think it was Jennifer Garner.
Susan Sarich:
It was Jennifer Garner. That was the first big order. And that was when I was still doing the deliveries myself. So we literally had a cash register and I was doing the deliveries. So it was at Casa Del Mar shutters, one of the two hotels. They're right next to each other. And I was delivering this. I didn't know it was for Jennifer Garner. And the purchasing guy, or the guy at the dock was like, "Oh, this is a very special delivery." And I said, "Well, who is it for?" And he said, "Oh, Jennifer Garner's having a baby shower here today." I was like, "Oh my God. No way."
Jessie Sheehan:
That's incredible.
Susan Sarich:
That was totally the jump out of your skin moment.
Jessie Sheehan:
That is incredible. I had a question about the menu, which I looked at online. Everything looks delicious. I can't wait to go visit next time I'm in L.A.. But are all the recipes literally from the boxes?
Susan Sarich:
Like 90% of them. Yeah.
Jessie Sheehan:
Holy moly.
Susan Sarich:
And it's the same menu we started with in 2006.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah.
Susan Sarich:
I use this example a lot, but I will use it here, is that it's like In N Out Burger. They just do burgers and they do them really well. I'm not trying to do croissants. I'm not trying to do tiramisu. This is what we do. And so we've kept it really straightforward. I think we have 19 items total. It's really simplistic, but what I found early on is people gravitate to a cake. If you're marble cake, you are getting that marble cake every birthday. Or if your grandfather likes the German chocolate, you're getting the German chocolate. And people don't like to change that up.
People get really attached to these flavors. And so what we do do is we'll rotate in a seasonal cupcake or seasonal cake or seasonal something. But even those now have become, people expect the key lime pie in me. It's like if we take it away, all hell breaks loose.
Jessie Sheehan:
Was it literally Madeleine and Mildred, one of them had a German chocolate cake recipe, and that's the German chocolate cake. One of them had a lemon cake recipe, and that's the lemon cake.
Susan Sarich:
Yes. And we kind of chose the better of the two. And there's been a few things that have come about as combining these things. Like actually the lemon cake is, I took the vanilla cake from Mildred's vanilla cake and the Madeleine's lemon square curd and put them together. And that came about snacking in the kitchen. We're like, oh, this is good. This should be a cake. There are some of those things that have organically evolved.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. This happens to be my favorite frosting so no shame here at all, but were they exclusively American butter cream?
Susan Sarich:
Always.
Jessie Sheehan:
So there was no Swiss meringue butter cream or none of that? No Italian?
Susan Sarich:
Nothing.
Jessie Sheehan:
And that's what you guys use?
Susan Sarich:
Yes. Yep.
Jessie Sheehan:
Love. And we'll talk about that recipe. And then cupcakes. Are those just your cake recipes made smaller or is there anything different?
Susan Sarich:
Yes. Nope.
Jessie Sheehan:
And then cookies and bars were just... I mean, I would die to see those recipes. I mean, oh my. I have my grandmother's box, but she was not just... I mean, there's savory stuff in it too, but just every time I find her chocolate pudding I love, it's just simple with cornstarch set chocolate pudding. I love her chocolate, all of it. Chocolate mayonnaise cake, which I didn't know anything about.
Susan Sarich:
Oh, that's real good. Yeah, that is real good.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah, it's so moist. So I just love that you really use the recipes from the boxes. It's mind-blowing. And you have like-
Susan Sarich:
I did use a food site for clarity. I did not have the skill set to say, this makes one cake.
Jessie Sheehan:
Of course.
Susan Sarich:
I needed to make 50. I'm like, here, please batch this up for me.
Jessie Sheehan:
I was going to ask you that too. So you hired obviously like a head baker when you began and you said, "I want you to use these recipes."
Susan Sarich:
Correct. Yes.
Jessie Sheehan:
Incredible. And then they just tweaked them. I'm a cookbook writer, and the second book I wrote was about vintage recipes. And one thing, you remember those... They're like these little advertising-
Susan Sarich:
Like a booklet? Yes. I have a ton of those.
Jessie Sheehan:
I wrote a book with recipes from those pamphlets, which were advertising tools. And what I noticed is many of them have no vanilla and no salt, depending on the twenties, thirties, definitely not. So was there a little tweaking going on? I feel like we're much more of a vanilla forward generation.
Susan Sarich:
Sure, and some of the... Yes, some of the recipes, their butter did have salt in it, so you got to back it up for that. There was also a number of recipes that either have margarine, shortening, or lard. So I had to work around that to get it back to butter. And so tastes have evolved a bit.
Jessie Sheehan:
So there was no shortening in anything.
Susan Sarich:
No.
Jessie Sheehan:
I kind of like shortening. I'll put it in a cookie because they won't spread and they're chewy. And that way you don't have to chill.
Susan Sarich:
It keeps moist longer.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah, it does. Totally. And I feel the same way about, certain cakes I love to use oil, like a neutral oil.
Susan Sarich:
With carrot cake.
Jessie Sheehan:
Would they have used oil?
Susan Sarich:
Yes. Yeah.
Jessie Sheehan:
They did use oil.
Susan Sarich:
So carrot cake has oil in it. The red velvet has oil in it.
Jessie Sheehan:
And chocolate cakes often will have oil. One more question.
Susan Sarich:
But it just said oil.
Jessie Sheehan:
Of course.
Susan Sarich:
They just had Wesson oil or whatever the brand was. There was only one oil.
Jessie Sheehan:
I think my grandmother used to write like Olio oil.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah, Olio. O-L-I-O. Yeah, yeah. It was a red and blue label and white. Oh my God.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. And then with the cookies and stuff, now everybody wants to rest their cookies for 24 hours before they... Do you guys rest your cookie dough or do you bake it right off?
Susan Sarich:
Depends on the volume.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. But it's a volume decision.
Susan Sarich:
It's a volume decision.
Jessie Sheehan:
It's not a flavor.
Susan Sarich:
It's not a flavor decision. They're good baked fresh or they're good if they're in the fridge.
Jessie Sheehan:
So interesting. Oh my gosh. So interesting.
Susan Sarich:
I love that you know Olio.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yes, I know. I just remember, I'm suddenly seeing my grandmother's chocolate cake recipe in my head, and I'm seeing Olio.
Susan Sarich:
And it would just say Olio. I didn't even know what it was. I had to research it.
Jessie Sheehan:
First of all, when you began, you did not have nationwide shipping. Has that exploded the business?
Susan Sarich:
Yeah. Well, it was a way for us to get... I always wanted SusieCakes to be a national brand. That was always my big picture vision. And I knew that opening brick and mortar in every state is just not going to come through to fruition. So folks in, let's take Wyoming, need to get their SusieCakes. And so I knew that we needed to figure out a way to do that. And that I had trouble wrapping my head around because of our whole concept is based on made fresh daily here on site, cracking eggs. How does that translate?
The only way you can get a frozen cake, you have to freeze it to get it across the country. So I wasn't quite down with it initially. And then finally somebody said, let's just think about it as recreating the SusieCakes experience remotely. We know the cake still tastes good. We know that somebody's still going to find joy from it. What will make you get comfortable with that? And that's when I'm like, okay, we have to make the whole box, the whole thing in experience. And when you open it, we include the candle and a little matches and a handwritten note. If someone sends you cake, it's not going to be printed on... Sometimes you get an Amazon gift and you're like, who is this even from? But we're going to hand write the note. So when you get it, you feel that same sense of care as you do walking into the bakery.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. I love that. And then finally, SusieCakes related. I read about marketing campaigns that you like tied to Taylor Swift's Eras tour and “Wicked.” What does that mean? It just means that you're creating cakes and cupcakes that can be current.
Susan Sarich:
And this usually comes from younger folks on my app.
Jessie Sheehan:
I was going to say I would never be able to be current.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah, it's very important. And so I am really surround myself with a wide range of ages in the marketing team because everybody has a very different opinion of what is cool or what will trend and all these things, which weren't even on my radar when we started. But now it's a competitive space.
Jessie Sheehan:
Something you think about. And then finally, before we jump into the cake, I know that you are a breast cancer survivor, and I am as well, and I was undergoing treatment while I was working in a bakery, and I found it unbelievably distracting and perfect to be in a bakery when I was struggling with this thing. There was something about making sweets and obviously doing something you love.
Susan Sarich:
Sure.
Jessie Sheehan:
And I wondered if you had any of those kinds of feelings, if SusieCakes became a, or your work generally became a support for you?
Susan Sarich:
Sure. Oh yeah, because I was first diagnosed during COVID, and so we were going through, I was fighting a battle on two fronts to keep the bakery alive. I really thought we were going to go bankrupt and close. And then my health. What I did to cope, everybody has a coping, I just focused so much on I need to have SusieCakes survive. I need to do everything I can in my power to have this company survive. And it helped me not, I don't know, just focus on what was actually really happening to me. I still don't even think I really comprehended what happened. So that was my coping. I also didn't tell anybody that I was sick. And I kept it a secret. And I would probably do that again because it allowed me to kind of stay in this space of I'm focusing on saving the company.
What was difficult though was keeping the strong face for the team when I have to get on Zoom, call with 40 people and be like, "We've got this. SusieCakes is going to be okay." And inside I'm dying on every level, literally, figuratively. And it was really, that was the part that I found hard.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. Yeah, I remember feeling, I mean, it was different. I wasn't a public figure in any way, so I didn't have to keep it a secret, but I know that feeling of just, I just didn't want people to look at me and feel sorry for me.
Susan Sarich:
Yes, right. I never wanted that. I never wanted that. I'd be like, "Oh, we're so sad you have that."
Jessie Sheehan:
I'm sorry.
Susan Sarich:
I didn't want that.
Jessie Sheehan:
Me either. Me either.
Susan Sarich:
I'm cool. I got this.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah, I can totally relate to that. All right, now we're going to talk about the Celebration Cake. So which grandmother had the Celebration Cake? Or is this a hybrid?
Susan Sarich:
Okay, this is a hybrid. Okay. So the vanilla cake is really a version of that vanilla lamb cake I told you about. Okay. The confetti was never in it. That I did add after the fact.
Jessie Sheehan:
And confetti is the same thing as like funfetti.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah, funfetti. Exactly. It's rainbow. You literally add that in. And that came as about, so that vanilla cake, well, let me back it up. The frosting also was not Susie Blue. So it was just vanilla, Americana, buttercream, just straightforward, whatever, powdered sugar, vanilla, cream. I wanted the cake to be... So originally, that was not a cake out of the gate at SusieCakes, and now it's our bestseller. But as people were gravitating towards it, I thought, I want to make this cake more recognizable as SusieCakes so it becomes something because you always want something to lay your hat on.
I thought it was our best cake. It's my personal favorite cake. I always say vanilla cake with vanilla frosting is how you're going to tell if there's real vanilla and if there's real butter and everything, because any other cake can be masked with all sorts of things. So I thought, if this is what I want to be, our signature cake that people are already liking, I'd love to make this color, Susie Blue, our logo color, the color of the Pyrex mixing bowls. So that is distinctive, and I'd like it to be celebratory. When people cut into, it makes them real happy. And people love funfetti. I mean, they just love funfetti.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. Yeah.
Susan Sarich:
And so we added that probably within the first three months, and that is kind of how that cake came to be.
Jessie Sheehan:
Now at the bakery, it's a six-layer cake. So are we taking three nine-inch layers?
Susan Sarich:
And cutting in half exactly. Exactly.
Jessie Sheehan:
That wasn't part of either grandmother's recipe because this came from the lamb cake?
Susan Sarich:
Correct. Yep.
Jessie Sheehan:
And then the buttercream recipe, which grandmother was that?
Susan Sarich:
That was Mildred.
Jessie Sheehan:
That was Mildred. And the lamb cake is also Mildred?
Susan Sarich:
That was Madeleine.
Jessie Sheehan:
Oh, I love, love, love. So yes, it's a vanilla and vanilla cake, basically back to that sort of thing about just like five ingredients, high-quality butter, sort of the most important thing to you. And then this pantry-friendly ingredient idea. And nothing that would make Madeleine cringe. No, no, no, no. I also loved this. Just before we get into the instructions for the cake, you've said that you eat something from the bakery every day. So I wanted to know. Tell us what you eat.
Susan Sarich:
Everything, so it depends on what my mood is. And sometimes I'll just go in and the stuff that's next to the oven on the sheet pans, that's like a cracked in half or whatever, and you're like, "What is this?" Whatever. And just have a half of a peanut butter cookie. Or sometimes I like the snacks that the teams kind of create in the back. They'll dip the sugar cookie in butter cream. And that's how we came up with our sugar cookie sandwich. There's just some things again that you kind of create just hanging out in the kitchen. And sometimes I'll bring a whole cake home and we'll have cake for dessert, and then I'll eat it with a fork. I leave the fork in the box and eat it out of the box for the next seven days.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. Of course.
Susan Sarich:
And everything in between. Sometimes if we're doing a seasonal special, I'll bring home six different strawberry shortcakes and eat them over the course of a couple days.
Jessie Sheehan:
So first thing first, we're going to heat our oven to 350 degrees and we're going to take our three nine-inch cake pans. Or you spraying them?
Susan Sarich:
We're spraying them and parchment. Yes.
Jessie Sheehan:
We're going to spray them and then we're going to line them with parchment.
Susan Sarich:
I love that you know this, even though it did not include that detail on the recipe, my friend. Exactly.
Jessie Sheehan:
Then we're going to add to the bowl of our stand mixer. We're going to add some cake flour. And so I had two questions. What brand of cake flour and also why not all-purpose?
Susan Sarich:
Okay. Really great question. We used to use all-purpose.
Jessie Sheehan:
And was that what was written on the recipe?
Susan Sarich:
That's what was on... Yeah. I'm not even sure cake flour was around then, to be honest with you.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. I don't know when it came to be.
Susan Sarich:
We would sometimes get, for people who are used to cakes, vanilla cakes with shortening or oil, the cake can have a firm appearance. People say the cake was hard. Oddly hard. Because comparing it against their knowledge base, which would be a grocery store cake or Costco, whatever, you know where I'm going with this. And so I thought, well, let's just try the cake flour to see if we can get a finer crumb on it and it will not appear as dense as a pound cake consistency. So that was really what came about with the change.
Jessie Sheehan:
Amazing. And then were there lots of other tweaks you made when you added the cake flour?
Susan Sarich:
No, actually it was one for one.
Jessie Sheehan:
Incredible.
Susan Sarich:
Interestingly. Yeah.
Jessie Sheehan:
Incredible.
Susan Sarich:
We didn't have to really adjust anything, which is a really good thing.
Jessie Sheehan:
So we're going to add cake flour, granulated sugar, baking powder, and salt. Are you guys using kosher salt or a fine sea salt?
Susan Sarich:
No, just regular. Yep.
Jessie Sheehan:
To a stand mixer with the paddle attachment. And we're going to mix until blended. What speed at this point?
Susan Sarich:
Oh, it's medium speed.
Jessie Sheehan:
Medium, yeah.
Susan Sarich:
This whole recipe is like a never over-mix. That's when it gets tough.
Jessie Sheehan:
Tough. Yep.
Susan Sarich:
You got to be really careful.
Jessie Sheehan:
Now we're going to add our room temperature, unsalted butter. Always a European style.
Susan Sarich:
Always European style. That is key.
Jessie Sheehan:
So we're going to add the room temperature, unsalted butter into the dry ingredients. So I know this technique to be called reverse creaming, something that I think Rose Levy-Beranbaum made famous. Did your grandmother's recipe have reverse creaming?
Susan Sarich:
No, it didn't.
Jessie Sheehan:
How did you know?
Susan Sarich:
You know it was, it said put the butter in with your fingers. So you kind of break the stick of butter apart with your fingers.
Jessie Sheehan:
But that's still reverse creaming in the sense of dry ingredients.
Susan Sarich:
Look at me. I know.
Jessie Sheehan:
That's fascinating.
Susan Sarich:
So it did have that, which is really a funny step, right? It seems weird, right? But you break it apart with your fingers.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah, but it's the same thing.
Susan Sarich:
Same thing. And then add the-
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah, you're just adding a softer butter. Fascinating that there was reverse creaming in their recipes. I love that. Or a version of it.
Susan Sarich:
A version of it.
Jessie Sheehan:
Almost like the way you would make biscuit dough.
Susan Sarich:
They didn't really quite step it out that way, but that's how it was written.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. So interesting. So we're going to add the butter and then kind of mix until it's-
Susan Sarich:
A little crumbly. Probably not quite sand, but more small pebbles.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yep. Yep. And then we're going to add some sour cream and mix that into the batter until it's smooth or-
Susan Sarich:
Just combined.
Jessie Sheehan:
Until it's just combined. Then we're going to add some eggs and some yolks. Why both, and were yolks in the original recipe?
Susan Sarich:
That could have been a tweak.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yep.
Susan Sarich:
I think that was a tweak.
Jessie Sheehan:
Which is great for moisture and unctuousness.
Susan Sarich:
That was a tweak.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah, love that. So we'll add eggs and yolks and vanilla. And it says Madagascar because they're a brand of vanilla.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah. I love Nielsen-Massey. It's just the best.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. I love that too. So we're going to add eggs, yolks, and vanilla. And we're going to mix until just smooth.
Susan Sarich:
Just smooth. Yeah.
Jessie Sheehan:
Don't overdo it. And then we'll fold in the confetti, sprinkles or funfetti or rainbow. Are we folding in by hand with a spatula or-
Susan Sarich:
By hand.
Jessie Sheehan:
By hand. You're going to transfer it to your three prepared pans. You're going to bake for 30 minutes. And then I assume you'll let cool before you even begin to slice them.
Susan Sarich:
Correct. Very much so.
Jessie Sheehan:
Then obviously after that frosting. But is there a slicing technique? Are you guys using a long serrated?
Susan Sarich:
We used to do just by hand with a serrated knife holding it. Few accidents later, we got a blade that sits on the table that keeps everything really exactly the same.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yes. Yes. Yes.
Susan Sarich:
So for more of a consistency. And I always on the cake, I encourage the teams to under bake, under bake, under bake this, because it still keeps baking when it's sitting and cooling. And you just don't want this cake dry.
Jessie Sheehan:
I have to say, I always, when I write a cake recipe, when I make a cake, well, this is true of all my bakers, but I want the tester, whether it's a toothpick or a skewer, I want it to come out with moist crumbs. If it's clean, in my opinion, I've overdone it.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah, you've overdone it.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yep. Always.
Susan Sarich:
And it should have very little color on the bottom when you flip it out. Some people just-
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. No, it's hard to do that. And then are we looking like, well, sort of the edges just beginning they just begin to come away from the side to the pan.
Susan Sarich:
Coming in. A little bit of color, just a tiny bit.
Jessie Sheehan:
And then is your team using a skewer?
Susan Sarich:
No. They do a timer.
Jessie Sheehan:
They do do a timer, and then they just pull it by the timer.
Susan Sarich:
Yep.
Jessie Sheehan:
So now we're going to let those cool. And then we're going to make the frosting. So we're creaming together that same sort of room temp European style butter with some powdered sugar and some salt. At this point, speed is low, medium, pretty high?
Susan Sarich:
Pretty high.
Jessie Sheehan:
If you're trying to-
Susan Sarich:
We want air in it because we want it to be smooth.
Jessie Sheehan:
So whip that all together for however-
Susan Sarich:
For a while.
Jessie Sheehan:
You're probably using a Hobart so the timing is going to be different for you, but we're doing that until it's sort of light and fluffy, probably like three to five minutes. I thought it was interesting that you put it all together. Often people will start just creaming the butter, and then they're... My American buttercream, I add a little bit of the powdered sugar, incorporate a little bit. And I too use cream. A little bit of the cream. This is a dump, which I love. Now we're going to add some vanilla and some heavy cream. This is what I put in my American buttercream, but a lot of people just do milk. Tell me about the heavy cream choice. Was that you guys or was that the original recipe?
Susan Sarich:
No that was original recipe. Yeah.
Jessie Sheehan:
Love. I think it's a great tip.
Susan Sarich:
And I think it's why it's so good. People are always like, "Why is this so good?"
Jessie Sheehan:
Because you whip the heavy cream, and so you're adding a lightness to the frosting. I think it's like absolutely brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. And do you know after you're adding the heavy cream or you're kind of going for a long time?
Susan Sarich:
If you leave it there for half an hour, it's still going to be okay.
Jessie Sheehan:
I know.
Susan Sarich:
It's a foolproof recipe in a way, if that makes sense.
Jessie Sheehan:
I find that if you go a little longer, it's like you're whipping even more air into it because I think people complain about American buttercream because they find it to be too sweet. And I think the combination of that heavy cream, which whips it and lightens it, and then the longer whipping time also contributes to making a less sweet buttercream. When do we add our food coloring? Did you create the blue or is it a blue that you buy?
Susan Sarich:
No, we created the blue. It's a combination.
Jessie Sheehan:
Oh my gosh. Is there a brand of food coloring or is it just in restaurant supply?
Susan Sarich:
It's just Restaurant Supply pack.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. And then each time you make it-
Susan Sarich:
And it's a certain amount of drops depending on the size of the batch.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yep. To get the color right. I love that. I love that. You've cut your cake into the six layers and you're going to frost the cake. Assume people are using an offset spatula.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah. We do offset. We do a portion scoop.
Jessie Sheehan:
Portion scoop.
Susan Sarich:
To get the right amount of filling for each one.
Jessie Sheehan:
In between each layer.
Susan Sarich:
Yeah. Yeah. Just spread it with the offset.
Jessie Sheehan:
And then the decorations kind of depend on if somebody's buying it for a birthday.
Susan Sarich:
Correct.
Jessie Sheehan:
You'll write something on it. But if it's sitting, if I come in and I want a slice?
Susan Sarich:
So we have a signature frosting, which is the sides we do with a small offset spatula. It looks like a crown, like its small narrow strips coming up with a little tip coming over the top of the cake.
Jessie Sheehan:
Totally. And anything on top like sprinkles or anything?
Susan Sarich:
It's guest choice with the sprinkles. Yeah.
Jessie Sheehan:
Yeah. Oh my gosh, I love that. Well, thank you so much for chatting with me today, Susan. And I just want to say that you are my cherry pie.
Susan Sarich:
Oh, thank you.
Jessie Sheehan:
That's it for today's show. Don't forget to follow She's My Cherry Pie on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. And tell your pals about us. She's My Cherry Pie is a production of The Cherry Bombe Podcast Network. Thank you to CityVox Studio in Manhattan, our producers, Kerrt Diamond, Catherine Baker, and Jenna Sadhu. Thank you so much for listening to She's My Cherry Pie and happy baking.