It's Hatching Men
January 24, 2012 Well, here's something you don't see every day:
;)
[adjusting spectacles and consulting clipboard] Here we have two neanderthal males with questionable chest hair hatching from watery eggs. As you can see, the one on the right has acclimated to the process, while the one on the left is all "AAAAAUUUGGHH!!"
Which is a paraphrase, of course, since in Neanderthal it'd actually be more like "OokalockahoohooGROOOOOOONK!"
Now when I first saw that picture, I figured some lone baker somewhere had gone off the deep end. Which doesn't seem an unreasonable hypothesis when you look at that icing armpit hair.
Then I saw this next one:
;)
So the neanderthal has evolved into a suave grey fox with well-groomed armpit hair and an outie belly button that will give mothers everywhere a coronary, but the question remains:
Why are bakeries making cakes of men hatching out of watery eggs?
Anyone know? Or will this turn into another lamb cakes smoking cigarettes mystery?
Thanks to Kathleen C. for the egg-cellent wreckporting.
Reader Comments (134)
*Mork calling Orsen, Mork calling Orsen*
The reinforcements from Ork have arrived, but they seem to be missing their spacesuits.
What the what?! Trying to figure out the meaning of this cake is going to bug me all day! I'm going to need some answers!!
Icing armpit hair...there's a phrase I never needed to hear in my lifetime...
I have a confession.. I have not read every single post on this blog so when I saw the words "lamb cakes smoking cigarettes" I couldn't help myself and had to click on it.... OMG I can't stop laughing! I'm at work (in a call centre) and may need to leave the floor!!
But about this post... i'm not sure what the heck is going on....I really don't understand people at all!
Are you sure they're hatching out of eggs? Might the blue in fact be water splashing up around them as they surge to the surfact? They really remind me a lot of that Merman cake (loved that one) so perhaps there's actually a connection there!
Just when I thought it couldn't get any stranger... What is it about cake decoration that draws these people? There's certainly a paper waiting to be written in some Journal of Psychology.
Well poop, now I must subscribe to all future comments to find the answer! This is weird, I was thinking maybe merman, or a sick new years type thing for Chinese new year but other than that I'm stumpted.
I say the wreckorators are being resourceful! Why use the eater cake molds only one time a year!!! Break them out for the invasion of mermen erupting from water eggs! :D
I don't know why these cakes exist... I just know I'm afraid. Very afraid.
Also, is it just me or does the suave egg man look like he should have a British accent? Cause he's just that suave.
I thought the first one was just a couple of really ugly chickens until I saw the second one. I'm not sure if I want an explanation. I love starting my day with Cake Wrecks.
Oh for the love of Pete, I hope SOMEONE can solve this insanity!
could they remotely be ..... mermen? Although i don't think merpeople have belly buttons... ( will look at photos of ariel and said celebrity merfolk)
armpit hair real or icing is totally gross to me.. .
Maybe it has something to do with the "Polar Bear Plunge" that some people do in the middle of winter? i.e. Jumping into a lake when it's freezing outside.
Two questions are posed:
1. if they ARE hatching from eggs, why do they have bellybuttons?
2. It's scary enough that one bakery would make such a thing (figuring that it was some sort of request by a customer), but TWO bakeries thought that it was a good idea? There must be a bakery idea book somewhere that actually has this as a viable cake option... Scary thought, indeed.
Maybe the blue is supposed to be a block of ice... u know the whole frozen caveman thing?? Even so, strange cake theme.
Belly button, is it? Oy, whatever it is, these things are horrible! Do not want!
Anyone but me notice that the "suave" one appears to be, uh, fully functional?
Oh, the polar bear plunge kinda makes sense! It's for charity here and its when people plunge into the ocean for kicks and giggles in the winter, just to see how cold it is. I know its supposed to happen here soon.
I am so glad that you said "watery egg" because I thought they were blue tulips--not that either one of those makes sense unless you are Anne Geddes taking pictures of babies.
Also was relieved to find out the second picture included an outie belly button instead of what my admittedly old eyes saw.
Wendy, I think that might be the answer! Perhaps the menfolk look so shocked because they're jumping into nipply (that's not a typo) water.
I love starting my day here, usually at the crack of 11:00. I have no clue what those unfortunate cakes are, but I just wonder how everytime there is a terrible cake trend every bakery ends up following along. Its like the are big conferences and continuing education courses for wreckerators out there. Jen, you should totally get tickets to WreckCon '12, but maybe lay off on the Find Jen and Win a Prize game...for your own safety.
I think these are from the same bakery. The board, tray, mouth, style and colors are almost exactly the same. Weird!
Oh dear. I had thought the anatomically correct marzepan pig behind would haunt my dreams forever. Alas, armpit hair depicted in frosting has now taken its place.
With the olympics coming up this summer, maybe they are left over Mark Spitz cakes?
As a fan of the show back in the day, I cracked up at the Mork and Mindy ref., I'm just gonna go with that!
I think they're flower fairies.
Belly button? Really? Not my first thought!
If they're not from the same bakery, then I wonder if there is a bakery magazine somewhere that has a monthly feature, "Repurposing Those Out-of-Season Cake Molds", or something? Because the whole unified-bakery-field theory would just be too weird.
In the second picture, the person holding the cake up has her fingers in the cake and it doesn't seem to be affecting the icing?!?! Are these not cakes?? Quite the mystery we have this morning!
What...the..hell???? D:
Any chance those are not eggs, but raindrops, and it's raining men? Though I'm not sure that's any less disturbing...
"I don't always jump out of blue tulips/eggs/ice water, but when I do...well I am not certain why, either." /dosequisguy
I've never heard of a cake for this before, but, I think it's the Chinese Creation myth of Pan Ku. I'm serious, it's a weird story, check it out. Summary being: Panku being a hairy man with horns and 10 times the size of a normal man, burst out of the cosmic egg with his hammer and chisel. He then used these tools to create the world.
...that didn't sound crazy at all. Go google it, the details to the story are even crazier, but it was the first thing that came to mind when I saw these :)
Uhm yeah guys I'm pretty sure that "outie belly button" is actually a body part located a little further south than that....
*shudder*
The bigger mystery to me is how were these mystical creatures born without any noses.
Hmmmm.
First thoughts:
"Look what Zog do."
Followed closely by "Marshmallow Creeps." (That less-popular Easter treat...)
Then I realized this was actually an example of Great Moments of Historical Significance finding their way into pop culture. Look closely at the side-by-side cakes. These are copies of the famed cave paintings of Lascaux, France. They depict a creation myth of people being born from "Mother Ocean," as envisioned by the indigenous people of the period -- if you look closely, you'll see the cake on the right, with its full, pouty lips, was actually meant to be a female from pre-depilatory times. It also explains why the "egg" is blue -- it's actually a wave.
These cave paintings inspired Botticelli when he painted "The Birth of Venus" (Venus Rising from the Waves,) although he painted his subject to reflect the ideal of female beauty prevalent at the time. Few know it, but Botticelli also painted a companion piece with the male figure. Unfortunately, for the male painting he decided to change the name from "Venus" to something very similar, but reflective of the gender of the male subject. This aroused the ire of the Church at the time, and the male painting was destroyed.
Sadly, the significance of the Lascaux paintings and Botticelli's later works don't translate well in frosting. What was once a profound example of historic art had been reduced to an ugly naked guy hatching from an egg, exposing what I really HOPE is a pretty pronounced "outie." Still, those of us "in the know" can look at these awful cakes, see the beauty beneath, and... go to a better bakery.
Look: http://plungede.org/press/documents/pressreleaseCake-OffJan31.pdf
A polar bear cake contest. I think some of the people above have a point. Far fetched as that may be.
(this is my first reaction, but I'm a looooong time avid reader, thanks for the many laughs!)
That's one of the most acute herniated navels I've ever seen.
... But since these men are just hatching, shouldn't their umbilical cords still be attached?
There's something rather odd about these cakes?!? I could never tell!!
Maybe Humpty Dumpty?
Well, one mystery solved. I guess tomorrow you'll post the Beginnings of Barnacle Boy???
To answer Sue's question, many animals that hatch from eggs do have rudimentary belly buttons - actually scars from the place where the developing animal was connected to its egg sac (equivalent of the placenta).
And I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought Mr. Suave's "belly button" ... um ... wasn't.
Misty K sez:
"I was thinking maybe merman, or a sick new years type thing for Chinese new year ..."
Hey, it's the Year of the Dragon, not the Year of the Chicken Man.
"He's everywhere! He's Everywhere!"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chickenman_(radio_series)
I thought I'd be clever and google the elements of the cake to see if there might be an explanation available. All I got was "How to use a urinal without splashing yourself" so.........................
If they are hatching from eggs, why do they have belly buttons?
Time for a limerick:
EGGISTENTIAL ANGST
Once, some men hatched from eggs,
Disregarding biology’s regs.
They didn’t wear blazers,
And didn’t use razors.
Moreover, they didn’t have legs.
Where are these cakes from? Maybe that'll shed some light on why these were made.
@Cynthia
I don't understand what you mean about the finger on the frosting. The finger appears to be on the shiny gold board.
I think emerging from/splashing into water like some hairy middle-aged Venus in the clam makes the most sense. If anything makes sense here, really.
"I want a piece with the armpit hair!"
??
That first cake picture reminds me of the "Bob's Burgers" characters / style of animation. I have no idea of the reason behind these hatchling cakes though.
Im guessing Orthodox Christian Epiphany cakes which also commemorates the Baptism of Jesus and lots of hairy Orthodox men and not so hairy women and some children celebrate by jumping in a freezing cold lake. The Baptism is also a link to resurection, you die under the water and rise again as a new and cleansed soul, so the egg as the symbol of resurection.
Thye smoking lamb is also an eastern/orthodox paschal tradition as to some smoking is a sign of affluence and so they are showing off their wealth.(I know ,I know but you asked!!)
Google Image Search not particularly helpful, though most images are surprisingly safe for work.