Mini Cakes Big Hit

By Marlene Lucas, The Gazette, Cedar Rapids, Iowa

Feb. 17–CORALVILLE — Many reasons make mini cakes a good idea.

They’re so small, nine square inches, that they momentarily wreck your diet and then they’re gone. You won’t have half a cake calling to you in the middle of the night.

Or, you can buy a variety of flavors, so your dinner guests can have their favorite cake, though one prefers Chocolate Raspberry Royale while another swoons over Almond Marzipan.

For Jill Dahlstrom of Packwood, owner of Yummy’s Gourmet Cakes in Fairfield and Coralville, the little darlings have proved a good marketing ploy. She wholesales the mini cakes to southeast Iowa retailers, including Hy-Vee and Fareway stores.

“They are a way for me to expand my business, to have my cakes in some more retail outlets. One location is great, but you need more exposure,” Dahlstrom said.

Five years ago, Dahlstrom had been reading about starting her own business when she noticed the “For Sale” sign at Yummy’s Bakery, 110 W. Burlington St. in Fairfield. She bought the bakery and two years later opened the bakery at 89 Second St., Suite 2, in Coralville.

The two bakeries employ four full-time and seven part-time workers.

Dahlstrom said she was prepared to handle the business because she had been the bookkeeper for years at her father’s Middlekoop Seed Corn Inc. in Packwood. Also, her mother had sold decorated cakes from home.

“I grew up around that. It wasn’t foreign to me. When a friend heard I’d bought the cake business, she said it was a perfect fit for me,” Dahlstrom said.

The little cakes are popular.

“I have a customer who lives in Chicago and does business in Fairfield who brings a cooler for the minis. She says she can’t go home without the minis,” Dahlstrom said.

The cakes are more than cake and icing. They have fillings of mousse or pudding, sometimes fruit preserves, and are topped with butter cream frosting.

“My theory is these cakes are what you would like to make at home but don’t have time to make. They are rich, specialty things,” she said. “I don’t see anyone else out there doing what we’re doing.”

The mini cakes cost about $4. An eight-inch cake costs $22.95 and serves eight to 12. The bakery also sells cookies, pies and cakes decorated for special occasions, including weddings.

Beth Richter of North Liberty visited the Coralville bakery for the first time Thursday.

“An out-of-town friend was here and needed a cake and she came here.

I thought, ‘Why is she going to that expensive place?’ But the cake was beautiful and delicious.”

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