Carl’s Cakes

I have been going to Carl’s cakes for a long time. They have many flavors to choose from, what I like about his cake’s is that the frosting is creamier, not a granulated sugar overload. My favorite flavor lately is Grasshopper. Ordering and pick-​up has always went smoothly!

So I’m a bit of a foodie and I have what could be called an extreme sweet tooth. I especially have a propensity for anything with frosting or that’s fresh baked goods. I had heard that Carl’s Cakes were fantastic with people getting them for their wedding and other family events so when I saw one at the local grocery store called grasshopper torte, I splurged and bought it.
The description on the cake says «chocolate cake filled with chocolate and mint buttercream, iced in mint buttercream». You see, I have a real weak spot for buttercream, real buttercream.
After dinner the family is pretty excited because we have cake for dessert so I took the lid off, sliced it and took my first bite. It was totally disgusting. At this point, I peeled back the store label to reveal the ingredients.
The ingredients read as follows: flour, sugar, eggs, milk, margarine, shortening partially hydrogenated soybean oil, partially hydrogenated palm oil with mono and diglycerides added baking powder, baking soda, cornstarch, salt, cocoa. The mint filling contains: alcohol, water and oil peppermint. Fudge filling contains liquid sugar, partially hydrogenated soybean and cottonseed oil, corn syrup, cocoa, water.
This ingredient label should just read crap, crap, and more crap with a side of hydrogenated crap and filled with trans fatty crap. This so-​called super duper cake has no butter cream has no butter and barely has anything that’s natural whatsoever.
So Carl, just a word of advice. My dead grandmother could make a cake better than this one that didn’t send me to a cardiologist and actually tasted like something other than plastic.

Needed a last minute birthday cake and found them on Unilocal and gave them a call. Asked if they could meet the quick turn around (one day) and they said wouldn’t be a problem. Cake was ready early and was delicious. It received several compliments from the crowd. I would definitely recommend and my birthday can’t come soon enough.

Got our gender reveal cake from here. It was so fun because they were so exited for us! The cake was delicious, light, moist, and the buttery frosting. It wasn’t so sweet that your teeth hurt but extremely old fashioned buttercream. It was easy to order it and easier to pick it up. I would highly recommend this to anyone!

Best cake I’ve ever had. Staff is friendly and super easy to work with. Can not wait to see our wedding cake in September!

I ordered a cake for my son’s birthday party specifically because the picture I saw of it in their cake catalog looked amazing. It was a three-​tiered cake with half of a layer (or two) cut out to give the illusion of trees for a wild animal themed cake. I was quite impressed with the picture of the cake they previously did and ordered it. I was surprised when I went to pick up the cake to find it all one level and resembling the picture (which was nice but NOT what I ordered). I spoke with the manager and was very pleased with how she handled the situation. In all fairness, the cake tasted wonderful and the cake itself was nicely decorated – I would give another ½ star if I could. However, the disappointment in ordering a multi-​dimensional cake and not getting one, without explanation, is why I am posting this review.

Carl’s cakes really should have more than 3.5 stars. I think partially the problem is a lot of reviews from bridezillas who didn’t get their crazy expectations met. They admit to the great flavor of the cakes but then downgrade the stars because the shade of pink was wrong.
Anyways someone had brought leftover wedding cake into my work lounge. I tried a small bite was amazed! Spent the course of the day trying to find out who brought this amazing cake and where it is from! Turns out Carl’s cakes and the flavor I tried was hazelnut apricot.
I went to see what they offered at the market street diner in terms of variety. I was please that they have 4 or 5 cakes that you can get individual slices from but also a cooler with ready to go full cakes in a variety of flavors. I ended up getting a hazelnut apricot cake good for about 8 to 10 people for only 16 bucks. What a steal! Where can you get a awesome cake for that price nowadays.
They also do cheesecakes which I know will lure me back at some point.

I’ve eaten slices from three different cakes from Carl’s Cakes, and none of them were drop-​dead wonderful. In fact, they were all similar: cake pretty average, all topped with a very strange frosting — buttercream that is TOO buttery, overpowering in both flavor and fragrance, and has an odd, chemical-​like flavor to it.
After I eat a slice of the cake, I’m not tempted to go back for more. (It’s cake! You should be!) Because of the strange buttercream frosting, I’ve really had enough when I’ve eaten just one small slice.
Every instance in which I’ve had a slice of a Carl’s Cakes cake was at my work (someone’s birthday or other event). The cakes sat in the kitchen room at my work, ready for staff people to enjoy. The kitchen room itself smelled like butter with the cake sitting in the room. It is a sickly sweet smell and kind of nauseating, I think. (I’ve never noticed other sheet cakes from other cake bakers that cause the room to fill with the smell of the frosting.)
I hate to be harsh about cakes, but I just have never had an enjoyable experience eating any cakes from Carl’s Cakes.

I really would like to give Carl’s Cakes a 3.5 out of 5. When my husband and I first met with Carl, my husband and I mentioned we wanted a pink cake (as close to fuchsia as possible) with white décor. We understood if it wasn’t exactly fuchsia but just didn’t want a pastel pink cake. Carl explained that he probably couldn’t get the pink to be as deep as we’d like. He showed us some not so great looking pastel pink cakes. I asked if he could go any deeper with the color and he was hesitant. I appreciated that he was being up front at our initial tasting and consultation. But, nevertheless, we loved the taste and decided to use Carl.
I stopped back in several months later to talk about décor and finalize what we wanted. At that time I brought in a sample of the pink color we wanted. He again stated that he probably couldn’t get as vivid as that color and in general talked me out of what I wanted for décor. Instead, he talked me into a white cake with pink décor. I showed him a picture of an IDEA of what I wanted for décor, but explained instead of hearts and vines (such as what the picture had), I wanted vines, piped flowers and music notes hidden amongst the vines. I didn’t have a picture because it didn’t exist.
The day of my wedding came, and when I saw the décor on the cake, I was not impressed. Whoever decorated that cake didn’t listen to me at all. It looked exactly like the picture I gave them as «inspiration» and not like I described. Also, the pink they used for the décor would have been just fine for a pink cake with white décor like I initially wanted. But that one was my fault and I should have stuck to what I wanted. The reason the white frosting with pink décor did not look good is because my cake topper was slightly off white, which would not have been as noticeable with pink frosting and white décor. It looked so bad that I didn’t even print the picture of the cake in color.
To recap, cake color was not necessarily Carl’s fault. I should have stuck to what I wanted. However, the cake décor was just hideous and even though I printed a picture of the cake (in black and white), I don’t have it displayed anywhere. Not even in my wedding book. Unfortunately, it has almost been two years since my wedding and this little wedding cake still bothers me a bit, enough to write a review after the fact. I was at a wedding show today and saw Carl’s Cakes there and the décor I saw on the cakes looked much better than it did two years ago, and spurred this little review. It makes me wonder if they’ve hired new cake decorating talent who could have given me what I wanted in my wedding cake. Oh well, at least everyone raved about how good the cake tasted at my wedding.

Is Carl’s cakes a super-​fancy designer bakery? No. Does he give you 100% honest and helpful information, and good cake at a great price? Yes. I had my wedding cake done by Carl and loved it. He doesn’t do fondant, it’s true… but he says fondant may look great, but doesn’t taste good at all. I believe that too! Our wedding cake tasted great, sweet but without the heavy over-​saturated oiliness of some cakes. It was also delivered totally on time and in great shape at our wedding venue.

I previously wrote a 1-​star review. I was interested in a cake for my wedding last October. While Carl was unwilling or unable to help me, I called the diner that he calls home. They were extremely helpful and willing to help me on last minute’s notice. They were decorated beautifully for a fair price. The frosting was not my favorite but the wonderful service made my wedding so much smoother. Thank you very much to the bakers who saved my day!

Disappointing cakes. The «buttercreams» are made with shortening, and no butter at all. Anyone who has tasted real buttercream knows that it is not as shelf stable or white as shortening frosting and tastes like real butter. The chocolate cake has some kind of flavoring in it. Fake rum, maybe? I really think people buy these cakes because they don’t know any better. Perhaps the term «buttercream» is used loosely outside of Europe, but true buttercream is not a concoction of Sweetex (sweetened shortening, commercial grade) and some other fake ingredients. Carl also is very stuck in his ways when it comes to design. He’s not on the cutting edge, he will only do certain designs that he’s been doing since the 80s. There will be no rolled fondont ribbons or pulled sugar flowers or bright colors. If you want a simple cake, and don’t mind that it is frosted with fake buttercream because that’s what is more shelf stable and easy to work with, then go to Carl’s.
I see that since I posted my review Deb R. from Carl’s Cakes commented. Thanks for your comment and those pictures. I can definitely tell which ones Carl decorated as opposed to other cake decorators working there. The cakes with a very simple piping design and love birds have Carl written all over them. The cakes that are more creative and interesting are done by other people. Oh, and you guys must go through a TON of shortening for all that «buttercream»!

I would probably give Carl’s Cakes 2.5. The lady who dropped off the desserts for my reception was very rude at first. After she found out I was the bride she was a lot nicer but I think she thought I was a wedding planner or something. We traveled for our reception and forgot some things at home. Honest mistake but it was nothing major and she was rude about it. The desserts were delicious but the service was not what I had expected

Recently went with Carl for my wedding cake. The wedding cake tasted AMAZING and the design that Carl came up with was simple and very classy. Carl is very nice and I felt that the cake was very reasonably priced. Thanks so much!

We have been caking it up with fancy cakes from Carl since 2009. The quality of his cakes are absolutely superior. The prices are a bit high but since you are getting the best cake in the Madison metro area, I suppose he kind of gets to determine the market since he has no real competition. The only negative I have is that my daughter’s birthday is in mid June and the city of Sun Prairie shuts down all the streets around the store location for some stupid street festival. Generally I have to park about seven blocks away, usually illegally, and lug two giant cakes back to the car. But I won’t downgrade Carl for that. City of Sun Prairie on the other hand, gets 2 stars our of 5.

Carl himself used to kind of be a jackass– I won’t sugar coat it. But it really says something that I still will eat his cake, and appreciate it (I am not a cake fan). He’s great with CUSTOMERS! Generally, if I don’t like an owner, then no matter how good their product is, I won’t go there. But Carl’s has the key ingredient of AWESOME.

Carl did an incredible job on my wedding cake. My husband and I chose Carl as our baker at a wedding show. I had read online to be wary of bakers who use a lot of filling to disguise dry or flavorless cake, and this is what we were experiencing again and again at the wedding show… until we found Carl’s booth. We both tried a different kind, and we both decided on the spot that this bakery would be designing our cake. The prices were very reasonable, and the cake received a ton of compliments at the wedding! Oh, the flavors we ended up choosing were hazelnut apricot and white chocolate raspberry.

Ordered a cake for my daughter’s baptism. I had tried their carrot cake before at Monty’s and loved it and had heard from others that if there’s a special occasion in Madison then we had to have a Carl’s cake. So we did and we weren’t disappointed.
We ordered a half sheet of chocolate cake and raspberry filling. First of all, their half sheet was HUGE. We probably shouldn’t have let ourselves be talked into get it, but we didn’t want to be caught running out. Oh well, you live and you learn. The filling was delicious – it was raspberry jam as well as some chocolate cream. As for the cake it was flavorful and light. I like my cake a little more dense but it definitely didn’t lack flavor. The cake was also decorated way beyond my expectations – beautiful writing and a gorgeous cross to accompany it. The frosting was also very nice – not too sweet or heavy.
We’d probably give 4 ½ stars. We’ll order a Carl’s cake again and if we’re happy with it again we might upgrade our rating to 5 stars. Or I’ll just have to try the carrot cake again at Monty’s. Mmm… cream cheese frosting…
** Oh! And one very important thing about Carl’s Cakes: it has recently moved. It’s in the Market Street Diner on 110 Market Street in Sun Prairie !**

The decisions you have to make about a wedding cake are both surprisingly numerous and surprisingly complex, with certain options you choose early on having a vast impact on the design options you have later. For example, if you choose buttercream for your frosting, it will be smooth and sweet and creamy awesomeness in your mouth — but on the cake, any colors will run and it can’t hold complex shapes, so you’re limiting yourself to very simple designs. Other frosting options exist, such as fondant and rolled white chocolate, and they each have their own set of benefits and limitations as well.
If you’re good at research, you have some time to kill and you know what you’re looking for, you can find a lot of this information on-​line — but when you’re in the midst of the overwhelming task of planning a wedding, it would be so, so much easier to just sit down with a professional who can lay out all your options and explain the benefits and limitations of each one.
Unfortunately, you won’t find anyone like that at Carl’s Cakes. Oh, Carl seems friendly, helpful and optimistic when you first meet him. The samples he gave us at our cake tasting were better than I ever knew cake could be, and when we asked about decorations, he was quick to assure us that he could «do anything you want».
After our initial meeting with Carl, we surfed the Net for examples of memorable wedding cakes and cherry-​picked the ideas we liked best until we had put together the perfect cake design. I’ll admit it was on the moderately complicated side, but nothing exceptional by wedding cake standards; and after Carl’s repeated assurances at the tasting that he could «do anything you want», we thought we were safe.
But once he has your deposit, his attitude changes. He’s difficult to get ahold of by phone, and impossible to get ahold of by email. Suddenly, any design requests more complicated than the average birthday cake are answered with a simple «I can’t do that». Even something as simple as multiple colors will be refused on the basis that the colors will bleed together. He never tries to suggest compromises or alternatives, and if you ask for them, he’ll only tell you to come in and pick something from his generic book of designs.
Why all the limitations? Because Carl frosts his cakes with buttercream frosting — and ONLY buttercream frosting.
I’ve lost track of how many hours we spent on the phone going back and forth with Carl over the cake design, struggling to find something he could do that didn’t leave us cold. Dealing with him wasted a large portion of the limited time we had to plan our wedding, and drastically increased our stress during an already stressful time. If I was rating his business purely on Customer Service, I’d have to give him 1 star.
But I’ll also give credit where credit is due. In the end, he delivered our cake on time, in the flavors, size and design that we eventually agreed to. It was beautiful, if vastly simplified from our original design, and the flavor? To this day, our wedding cake is still the best thing I’ve ever had in my mouth. If I were rating his business purely on taste, I’d have to give him 5 stars. Heck, I’d give him 6 if it were possible.
So if you want the best cake you’ve ever had in your entire life, consider Carl’s Cakes — But consider very carefully. Give him an exact cake design and make ABSOLUTELY SURE he can do it without modifications BEFORE you give him a dime.