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What's a Wreck?

A Cake Wreck is any cake that is unintentionally sad, silly, creepy, inappropriate - you name it. A Wreck is not necessarily a poorly-made cake; it's simply one I find funny, for any of a number of reasons. Anyone who has ever smeared frosting on a baked good has made a Wreck at one time or another, so I'm not here to vilify decorators: Cake Wrecks is just about finding the funny in unexpected, sugar-filled places.

Now, don't you have a photo you want to send me? ;)

- Jen
Sunday
Jun052011

Sunday Sweets: Back to the 80s

I'll admit it: I was a child of the 80s. I'll also admit to telling people my name was Jem, not Jen, when I was younger. (And then I'll admit that when I just said I told people my name was Jem when I was younger, I meant I did it yesterday.)

So, dust off your Power Glove, lace up your high tops, and crank that Olivia Newton John cassette you've kept vacuum-sealed in your storage shed, cuz it's time for Sunday Sweets, 80s Style!

First, we've got to have some My Little Ponies:

 

By Courtney's Cakes

Submitted by Carla M.; Made by The London Cake Company

Did anyone else love that delicious, rubbery kid-toy plastic smell? Mmmm... ponies.

 

 

Remember when it was 1989, and you had a crush on Lance Davenport, so you made him a mix-tape, gave it to him between classes, and then spent all of Science class drawing "Jen luvs Lance 4-eva" on your book cover?

Yeah, me neither.
Remember when Lance Davenport invited you over to listen to the mix tape on his hot new boom box, and then he told you he had a crush on your friend Jerry?
Yeah... me, neither.

 

 

Hey, look! ROBOCOP!

Submitted by Sarah A. and spotted here, but baker unknown.

Part hardened cyborg policeman, part yummalicious chocolate and vanilla.

 

 

Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and appreciate this Ferris Bueller's Day Off sneaker cake, you could miss it!

Made by Stacy W
Bueller? ... Bueller? ... Bueller?

 

 

Check out this totally tubular and (mostly) fondant-free Gizmo cake:

 

Made by CW reader Jessica M.
Aww. I wonder what happens if you eat it after midnight with a glass of water.

 

 

I am in love with this fondant-free Harry and the Hendersons cake.

 

By Carmen Rose - and thanks to Lisa P. for finding it!

It's SO COOL. And it takes me right back to being a kid.

 

Next, you're going to tell me there's an awesome Jem cake out there.

Woohoo! Check out that airbrushing! Truly outrageous.
Ok, next you're going to tell me there's an awesome Weird Al cake out there.
...
No one? Dang.

 

 

Hey, look! Pac-Man!
I wonder if I could eat this cake as fast as I lose at Pac-Man. Probably.

 

 

Ever see a cake go 88 miles per hour?
Great Scott! This amazing 8-foot Delorean was created for the 25th anniversary of Back to the Future.

 

 

(And now I officially feel old.)

 

 

Here's one of my most favorite wedding cakes ever:
Fluorescent splatter paint! I love the 80s rock-star theme. Super cool beans.
And finally, this ode to the 80s wedding cake has it all. Check out Sloth as the officiant in front of Castle Grayskull!
Made by CW reader Alexandra W.

 

 

But, wait! This isn't the whole thing- that's just the TOPPER.

 

Here's the rest:


I pity the fool that doesn't love this cake.
Now, quick, who can name all the 80s references?

Have a Sweet to nominate? Then send it to Sunday Sweets [at] Cake Wrecks [dot] com.

 

« Aaaand...HEADDESK! | Main | I Guess The Butt Was Laughed Off? »

Reader Comments (143)

Greatest Sunday Sweets. Ever. Jem and the Holograms just came back on the cable network The Hub and it makes me so happy! I tell people that I am just like Jem, mild-mannered business woman by day, rock star by night!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commentersusie

O.M.G. that last cake is insane! It makes me want to renew my vows just so I can have one just like it!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterAmanda

As another child of the 80s, I love love love these!

That was a cruel tease about Weird Al, though. We had all his records, which I copied onto tapes and listened to over and over to the point that the song "Lola" is still "Yoda" to me and always will be. I so want a Weird Al cake now!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commentermin

All right, who thought of the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man?

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterGin

I love that there is a giant Rubik's cube and an E.T. flying across a full spherical moon!

And the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man is rad man!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterJenny Allworthy

It makes me feel old that My Little Ponies are back...

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterNYCGirl

Who's the guy in the blue suit? He's the only thing I can't ID, and the bear, though I was thinking Teddy Ruxpin there.

Love the Red Fraggle.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterFalze

The new version of MLP, My Little Pony Friendship is Magic is AWESOME. Seriously, check it out people.

And can I say Horray for wedding cakes that are NOT white and pastel? I really love that black and neon one though the Best of the 80's is pretty rad too.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterAnonymous

Love these cakes. But now I feel old what with the Delorean having a 25th Anniv and My Little Ponies being back in style.

wv:vestyle-Vestyle zee cake for any decade you vant.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterTari

A-Team and Mr. T aka B A Baracus...i love me some retro a-team!!! and thank you for the harry and the henderson's cake...i was just trying to come up with that title the other day and couldnt. loved that movie when i was a kid!! loved all of these when i was kid, but admittedly dont remember jem

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterAnonymous

A-team
Fraggle Rock
Rainbow Brite
Smurfs
Gremlins
He-Man and the Kingdom of Grayskull
Rubiks cube
ET
Indiana Jones
Teenwolf
Goonies
Ghostbusters
Karate Kid
Cassette mix tape
Care bears
And I'm at a loss for the caped duo? Is the red on Fozzie Bear? IDK.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterDD

Oops! I forgot My Little Pony and Barbie!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterDD

I still have a My Little Pony somewhere. It was made in '83, I think.
It still smells like (false chemical) cherry marmalade.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterSara

The guy in the blue suit is Bananaman. Nickelodeon would show an occasional episode in the same block with Danger Mouse and Count Duckula.

See, to me, that was the absolute coolest thing about the cake, because I thought no one else in this country remembered Bananaman. :)

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commenterjerel

Is the guy in the blue superhero suit Bananaman? If so, that's an amazingly obscure, Nickelodeon 3 minute cartoon reference. Which says something about me....

What an awesomely amazing cake.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commenterdie Frau

OMG I love My LIttle Ponies! I secretly buy them for myself, not my daughter. ;) Just kidding. I would totally have a cake like that for myself NOW.

The teddy in the red suit is Superted!

Occasionally on here it pays to be British :)

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commentericklepeach

SuperTed! And Bananaman!

Awww. I thought no-one remembered them but me! I loved SuperTed so much as a kid (I had a ridiculous number of the tie-in books, and a little plastic model of him that may still be tucked somewhere in a drawer at my parents home...I suddenly feel the urge to go check...)!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commenterhelva2260

I am hoping the ring bearer is the Greatest American Hero. If not he should be there somewhere.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commentercreeandme

I dressed my little boy as Chunk on his birthday last summer (Hawaiian shirt, plaid shorts)-- the adults laughed, then felt old, since the movie was turning 25... :/

So I am taking your challenge to name all the characters on the last cake to be a mind sharpening tool as I approach middle age.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commentercc

Oh, my childhood in cake form! The Gizmo one freaks me out. That movie terrified me when I saw it, and I still scroll past anything Gremlins-related rather quickly. :)

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterKristen

Wow, I believe now that 80s cakes are the only excuse to do airbrushing... on cake.

I want to buy an airbrush... and a cake.

W.V. consters... Not sure if I remember what these are but they were awesome to the max!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterVeggieT

Um...is it just me or does the second My Little Pony have 3 front legs and only one back leg? If I'm right it becomes a little more of a wreck than a sweet. Still,not a total loss. -Elly

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterElly

Ponies. Yummy.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterThe_SprinkleMaster

Aaaahhhh! That's my Jem cake! You just made my life. :)

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commentermegscakes

That first My Little Pony cake was ah-may-zing!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterSarah

I feel like I'm 7 again. :-D This is completely awesome.

*wandering off singing "My Little Pony" theme song*

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterViolaNut

From one Jem/Jen to another: yay, go 80's!! My dad actually found the entire Jem series on dvd and gave it to me for Xmas last year. Not only that, but I still have my My Little Pony collection, which I am passing on to my baby girl... once she's old enough to brush their hair and dress them in their outfits and keep them perfect like I did. Til then, I'll just do all that for her.

I'm not kidding.

Thanks for the totally tubular Sunday Sweets!

I'm trying to figure out what's behind the A-Team van. Are there any other pictures with different angles?

And I also loved Jem! It's hard for me to hear the word synergy at work and not giggle and/or touch my earrings.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterSillyRnti

I DID love the smell of a brand-new My Little Pony... <3

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commenterbohemianbrandy

I'm a child of the 80s too, and embarrass my 16 year old horribly when I start singing Fresh Prince.

But, if you really like cake and 80s cakes you should check out the Food Network Challenge on Food Network tonight. It's all about the 80s, complete with Tiffany judging.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commentertetisheri

Wanna know the freakiest thing? When I glanced at the last cake in detail to see if that is Barbie on a My Little Pony I recognized the curtains - they look like the ones in moms kitchen...

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterNadi

One word... E-P-I-C!!!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterDeb

Shoot. Now I have to make a Weird Al cake. Probably UHF-Beverly-Hillbillies-music-video style...as soon as the baby lets me.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commenteralenxa

Daniel doing "The Crane" on the wedding cake is priceless. I for one would want a Fraggle cake

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterPhoebe Muse

First off, I love that when you google "weird al cake" that Pac Man cake is the third image shown.

Second (and I know that pretty much 90% of your readers immediately thought the same) when I saw the topper of that last cake, before I scrolled down I thought "I pity the fool who doesn't like this cake."

Third, why on earth is there a golf club just hanging out next to the window on Castle Greyskull, and where on earth did it go in the picture of the whole cake?

Lastly, am I reading too much into it that the numbers on the license plate in front of Gizmo are the date of my wedding (31st July '10)??

wv: jawnsi - Hey, jawnsi some cool cakes? Joo know jawnto....

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterSquirrel

Those are Pepsi cans behind the van, you can see a couple of them if you zoom in on the picture of the topper.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterVolcano

Love them all! I'm a child of the 80s as well. My three faves were Jem, Rainbow Brite, and She-Ra!! I wanted to BE all of them.

I made myself a Rainbow Brite cake just a few years ago for my birthday! :)

The last cake is holycowawesome! It even has Fraggles!

I was flipping through the channels 2 or 3 days ago and stumbled onto Jem playing on Hub!! Can you believe it?! And more so, can you believe that I TiVo-es the series? :) Love it!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterDarla

I always hated my name growing up and would tell my my mom that when I got older I was going to change it to Princess Leia. Even though Leia rhymes with Daya, I thought it was a huge improvement!! Rock on Jem/Jen!!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterDaya

You mentioned the "plastic" smell of My Little Ponies, and I pulled that right out of my memory instantly. My sister and I also had the My Little Pony sea horses for the bath. Wonder where those are in my parents house now....hmmm....

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterSaraV

The splatter cake definitely brings back memories of my wedding! LOL LOL My brother showed up to wedding rehearsal sporting the "tux" he was wearing the next day......complete with splatter all over it. Stephen Bishop has a lot to answer for that year. LOL LOL

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterJean

I literally screamed at my husband, "I WANT THAT JEM CAKE!"
Today's my birthday and I am totally loving these cakes, thank you so much, Jen!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterThe Angry Jackalope

What? No MacGyver cake?

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterAnonymous

The pink My Little Pony looks a bit like Tyra Banks. =^@.@^=
This jazz really takes me back: I had two teenagers then.
Miss those days, I do...the innocence, the music...my being in my 30's.... (SIGH)
I love the leg warmer-wearing little Barbie-type thing riding on a My Littler Pony in the last picture, and
the Moon w/ E.T is totally tubular!!!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commentersendingtheclowns

OK, that wasn't fair. It's bad enough to realize how old Pac Man and Back to the Future are. But it's worse to have all these 80s references, and realize that you're *too old* to get some of them, because you were in junior high/high school so kid stuff like My Little Pony and Care Bears was "beneath" you… and you've never even heard of Jem until reading today's post. So, you're young enough to still call yourself an 80s kid (after all, you weren't in university yet), but too old for it to be really "kid"

But oh, do I remember mixed tapes from boyfriends. I still have them!! Need to download from iTunes the rest of those songs. I feel sorry for today's kids… iTunes is awesome, but just not the same as sitting with friends listening to an album play on the record player for the first time (eg Def Leppard's Hysteria). "Drop the needle…"

As for the cakes. That Delorean, Wow!!!! The pac man booth… well, Google's anniversary nod proved that I'm still as hopeless at that game as I was as a kid. And, I'm still using my old Sony boom box… hey, the radio is still good! (It's slightly later than the cake one, so not as distinctive 80s). Ferris Bueller, neon (perfection would have been if they'd made the bands look like headbands!). And that last cake, ok that was amazing. I'm so reposting today's post on FB.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterAliza

To Squirrel:
The golfclub is obviously a reference to "Caddyshack" one the iconic 80's movies. In the large picture, it is behind the ringbearer.
That is all.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterThe RPh

OMG I want to make a Weird Al cake now, in all my non-existent free time...would it be wrong to make one for Weasel Stomping Day? Not very 80s, but suitably disgusting and awesome.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterKimberly Chapman

Ah, I feel old now too. But also super nostalgic!! I'm loving the A-Team van with Mr. T hanging out the window and the itty bitty Gizmo and karate kid and well, everything!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterJabby

I LOVED Jem!! Plus I always wanted my room painted with fluorescent splatter paint! My parents would never let me though.

I love these cakes. Ah - what good times growing up in the 80's!

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterCortney

As a small sop, here's Weird Al WITH a cake.... Scroll down a bit. http://dmdb.org/news/dsn.109.html

wv: revall. You can revall in '80's awesomeness with these cakes.

June 5, 2011 | Unregistered Commenterkayk

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