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Verusca Walker waits in the lobby of a Juhu five-star, looking more athlete, less cake decorator. &ldquo;I am a runner,&rdquo; she confesses while our gaze travel from the blue sleeveless top she&rsquo;s wearing to her toned upper arms. &ldquo;You need strong arms to make structured cakes,&rdquo; she continues in her heavy, Portuguese accent.&nbsp;
The Brazilian, famous for her 3D cakes, was in the city last week to hold a series of workshops, including one that taught participants the art of making her infamous KitchenAid mixer cake.
<img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2015/aug/30cake.jpg" alt="" /> Pic/Tushar Satam
Born in Sao Paulo, Walker moved to Sydney with a degree in Secretary Bilingual 15 years ago in the hope of mastering English. &ldquo;I enrolled in a Fine Arts course, majored in photography and enjoyed sculpture. But things turned around for me when I made a Noah&rsquo;s Ark themed cake for my daughter&rsquo;s first birthday. Friends and family went crazy; they wouldn&rsquo;t believe this was my first shot at baking,&rdquo; says the 43-year-old.
A diploma in baking from TAFE university, Sydney, followed. Six months into the course, her professor recommended her for a job where she worked for three years before branching out to set up her own business. Walker now dishes out 40 cakes a week, priced at $500 onwards.
Walker, who conducts workshops across the world, says because she can&rsquo;t keep up with the travel, she wrote Structure Cakes with Veruska Walker, a guide to baking like her that will be out in November. &ldquo;It teaches you to make a structure cake from scratch, whether a handbag that you can pick up or a guitar you can strum,&rdquo; she says.
Her husband, Shawn has played an important role in the journey career. &ldquo;A 3D cake needs a base to sit on. My husband, who is an architect, came to my rescue, when he made a simple wooden board to place my bag-themed cake. He erected two sticks and attached a leather strap to it. Since then, there has been no looking back. He continues to make all my stilts,&rdquo; says Walker, who recommended that participants use a sunboard for base.
<img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2015/aug/30chapel-cake.jpg" alt="" /> The life-size chapel cake&nbsp;
In 2014, she created a life-size chapel cake for the Australian Cake Decorating Network (ACDN), within which a wedding was held. &ldquo;It took us three months to design, but we had three days and 30 volunteers to put it up,&rdquo; says Walker, who has also designed edible sofas and chandeliers. &ldquo;On the last day of the show, we cut it up into slices and fed it to the attendees.&rdquo; Walker says it&rsquo;s important to gauge ambient temperatures while making giant cakes. &ldquo;In Sydney, temperatures shoot up to 40 degrees. I tweak my recipes accordingly. The base cake is important, and you cannot use fruit or cream. It cannot be crumbly either. You need a moist cake that will hold fort,&rdquo; says Walker.
Fondant is her best bet as it holds the cake together. &ldquo;Brazil has been introduced to fondant only recently, and I plan to go back home to popularise its use,&rdquo; says Walker, who often adds spices like cinnamon and ginger to her creations. Which brings her to her Mumbai shopping list. &ldquo;Indigenous spices is what I must remember to pick up.&rdquo;

On her first Mumbai trip, Verusca Walker discusses the excitement of creating cakes you can walk into, carry and ride

Meet Verusca Walker - The architect of 3D cakes

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Meet Verusca Walker - The architect of 3D cakes

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