Ordering a custom cake in Bengaluru

The top step buys a cake designed with you, in a sit-down with the patisserie, at more than double a bakery chain's fondant price a kilo, by our sum.

Ask what comes on top of the per-kg rate: the design, a special filling (Say Cheeze adds ₹200 for tropical fruit), the delivery (question 9), and whether a knife, candles and a topper come with it.

The same Black Forest is ₹1,100 at one home baker and ₹1,600 at another. Both prices are for a 1 kg Black Forest with no design: Enza's from her menu card of 31 May 2026, Say Cheeze's from her website, read 27 October 2026. The menu Say Cheeze sent us on 15 October said ₹1,500, so ask which price holds.

Cakes And Kremes By Enza

₹1,100 a kg

Say Cheeze Cakes

₹1,600 a kg

A 1 kg Black Forest, no design

A 1 kg Black Forest, no design

Eggless, like all her cakes

Chocolate sponge, cherry compote and fresh whipped cream. Eggless at the same price

Delivery at the cab fare. If it breaks on the way, she pays

Pickup, or a cab at your cost. If it breaks on the way, that's yours

Paid after delivery. Cancelling is case by case (what she told us, May to September 2026)

Half paid at booking, and no cancelling or refund after that (her website, read 27 October 2026)

What neither price covers. The design. Enza prices it once she sees your reference photo. Say Cheeze adds a fixed charge for each design (question 2). Ask each whether the box, candles and a knife come with it, and whether you get a GST bill.

Who they are. Both bake at home. Enza works alone, takes one order a day and bakes only eggless. Paulin, who runs Say Cheeze from Narayanapura, says she has 10 years in the trade, and makes fondant and wedding tiers too.

What the extra buys. Paulin puts her higher price down to her ingredients and the work in each cake. Nothing in their terms explains the rest of the gap. Taste both with a small cake before a big order (question 6).

Who works each way. For an eggless cream cake: Enza, from ₹950 a kg on her card, or Glyka Patisserie, who quotes against the budget you give her. For cream, fondant and tiers from one baker: Say Cheeze, from ₹1,600 a kg. 7th Heaven, a franchise outlet in Indiranagar, makes cream, photo and shape cakes. Ask 7th Heaven for the price.

The extra buys design work. The plain cake has cherries and chocolate shavings. The Spider-Man cake adds a printed picture, a skyline and stars cut from fondant, and the name.

At Say Cheeze, each design has its own fixed charge. It goes on top of the cake price. Each design has its own listing on her website, and each listing names its weight:

A set of modelled figures costs the most. Her first-birthday teddy cake, with a fondant teddy, a toy car, alphabet blocks and a gift box, is ₹1,200 for the design. We hold no photo of that cake.

Ask which finish a quote is for. Two quotes for "a jungle cake" can mean printed card animals or animals modelled in sugar. Enza uses card cut-outs and piped cream, and prices the design once she sees your reference photo:

On a small budget, say so. Glyka Patisserie quotes against the budget you give her.

Check the smallest size first. A "1 kg two-tier unicorn cake" may not be possible:

A dummy tier gives you height without the kilos. It's a decorated thermocol block that's never cut. Enza makes them.

For a big crowd, pair a show cake with a plain one. The show cake gets the photos, and the plain one is cut in the kitchen. Tiers needn't be premium: at one bakery chain, a two-tier 5 kg cake is ₹6,750 and a three-tier 13 kg cake ₹17,550.

Cream

₹1,600 to ₹1,700 a kg at Say Cheeze

Fondant

Price on request

Soft, and most children finish it

Say Cheeze prices fondant when you ask

Piped borders, rosettes and card toppers

Smooth finish, sharp shapes and characters

Softens fast in a warm car

Many children peel it off

Fridge until the cutting

Can sweat out of the fridge in a humid room

Pick the baker by the finish you want.

Many figures aren't food. Card and paper cut-outs aren't, and sugar figures often have a toothpick or a wire inside. Take them all off before a small child gets a slice.

Ask for lighter colours on a small child's cake. In 2024, Karnataka's food safety department found too much artificial colour in 12 of 235 cakes it tested from Bengaluru bakeries. Planning the whole party? The first birthday guide has the rest.

The heat. Take the cake out of the fridge as late as you can. One baker here, Glyka Patisserie, says to finish it within a day. In summer, ask whether your design will hold up, and for an air-conditioned cab.

Eggless is easy to find. All four cake makers here bake eggless, and Glyka Patisserie bakes Jain too. At a bakery, check first:

Check what eggless means. Under FSSAI's labelling rules, egg makes a food non-vegetarian, and milk, butter and cream don't. Ask what's in the sponge, the filling, the glaze and the fondant, and whether egg cakes share the oven.

With sugar-free, ask which sweetener she uses, since it changes the taste. Enza makes sugar-free, vegan and nut-free cakes if you ask at the start.

Taste first. A half kilo of Black Forest is ₹750 at Enza and ₹900 at Say Cheeze, so a trial cake costs little next to a big order. Small cakes cost more a kilo.

Look at her real work. Ask for photos of her last few orders, straight off her phone, or a short video call to see the kitchen. Before a cake maker gets mytribe's tribe-approved badge, we check that their photos are their own.

A bakery isn't automatically safer. The 12 cakes with too much artificial colour (question 4) came from bakeries. We found no inspection drive aimed at home bakers.

Short notice sometimes works. Four of the 24 people who wrote to mytribe for a cake wanted it the same day or the next. The cake at the top of this page was made in six hours, in the rain, for a father who rang Say Cheeze at 11 in the morning for a first birthday at 5. Her rule is 2 days' notice.

Send a reference photo, even another baker's. Enza won't fix a design or a price without one. Put the weight, the flavour, cream or fondant, the name spelled out and the delivery time in writing too.

If it goes badly wrong, your photos and messages count. In 2023, a Bengaluru consumer commission made a cake shop refund ₹3,590 and pay ₹3,000 in compensation and ₹3,000 in costs, for a rotten birthday cake that made guests ill. The buyer had photos and emails, so photograph the cake when it arrives.

Who pays if it breaks depends on who carried it. Ask for the fare as a number when you order.

Plan for the wait. Someone has to be there to take it, and a 3 kg cake needs a whole fridge shelf. A cake can sit in a chiller for about six hours after delivery, one bakery chain says. At a venue, ask for fridge space.

A long trip can go fine when the baker packs it. Say Cheeze on one delivery: