Let Them Eat Cake (of their choice)

My Grandma sold her house right next to mine and moved away from me when I was about 7 years old and I was very sad....until I learned that the new woman next door was a baker. A baker of cakes, cookies, caramels, toffees, and every other kind of dessert you can imagine. So while I was crying about missing my Grandma I could stuff my face with homemade almond rocas.

Every Christmas since that time (even though we don't live next to them anymore) she has brought over a huge tin of 6 or 7 different varieties of cookies. Even better, for every birthday she brought over a huge german chocolate sheet cake. Every time it was german chocolate cake, and every time we stuffed our faces for days. Once when I was moving back to college I had her make me one for the drive, and I kept it in the freezer and ate it for weeks. The cake itself became freezer burnt and nasty, but I couldn't resist picking the frosting off of a little (okay huge) piece each night.

This image is from flickr, but this is how big the cake was, and we only have 4 people in my family!

I was so sad to learn last week that she is having knee surgery in mid-September and will be unable to create her german chocolate masterpiece for our closest friends and family. This means I have to go back to the drawing board in terms of finding someone to fulfill my cake vision.

I am looking for this:

Photo by the always fabulous Punam Bean

But all I can seem to find is bakers who want to create this (charge me $6+/slice for it):

Cake by Pink Cake Box

Let's be honest here, the collection of cakes look much more delicious than the stiff looking (albeit pretty) fondant version. If you disagree, I challenge you to a bakeoff. I will make some buttercream delights, you have to come up with something covered in icky fondant. I want to do a cake buffet of 6 or 7 different options and let guests come up and decide which flavor they want. I wonder if the Avocado's can get away with cutting a slice out of every kind.....

Finding vendors on the internet has been really easy up until this point. Finding bakers who make fondant, tiered masterpieces is also easy but I don't want to pay for that. I am looking for the neighborhood bakery that everyone talks about and those neighborhood bakeries don't tend to have websites.

After all, this is all I want to see on my wedding day:

Photo by Kate McElwee

I think this idea of cake spreads is becoming more widespread. I love collecting inspiration for this little project so feel free to point me towards more photos! Is there a Seattle bakery that's to die for?