Dreams of Sweet Success

A master cake decorator, who holds a Guiness record, now grows buttercream gardens in South Tampa.

By JAY CRIDLIN
© St. Petersburg Times
published September 27, 2002

[Times photos: Stefanie Boyar] Cake decorating pro Danny Julian adds finishing touches to a cake at the Publix bakery on S Dale Mabry Highway where he has worked for two years. Julian has decorated cakes all life, learning the trade from his father, starting at age 6.

MID PENINSULA -- Danny Julian is no gardener, but you can't tell by watching him work.

"I love making American Beauties," he says, as a rose blooms at his fingertips.

"Ever seen an apple blossom?" he asks.

Within seconds, he produces one, pink and white, out of thin air.

There's no magic involved when Julian persuades a flower to grow in less than a minute. Just a whole lot of buttercream frosting.

Julian has been decorating cakes for nearly 50 years, so squeezing confectionary sweet peas or lilies of the valley onto a birthday or wedding cake is a snap.

For the last two years, he's been working at a Publix bakery in South Tampa, where his cakes are popular purchases.

"Our business in the last year, year and a half -- like, on wedding cakes -- has really taken off," Julian says. "There's so many referrals, we've got people coming from St. Pete."

Bakery manager Christopher Ford says Julian is a pro.

"He knows the ins and the outs of his profession," Ford says.

Julian has been practicing since age 6.

He learned the trade from the very best -- his father, Harold -- a man he calls a "genius." Harold was an early supermarket guru who founded a chain of combination markets and bakeries near Evansville, Indiana. He even had a TV show.

At first, Harold would stand his little son on an overturned bucket to reach the counter and make buttercream roses. At 14, Julian joined the union. "You either join the union, or you don't work," he says. "Back in those days, that's the way it was."

In 1960, he and his father worked together on "The Fellowship Cake," a mammoth project designed to help unite the country during the Kennedy presidency.

The 40-foot by 38-foot cake was assembled with two 40-foot tractor trailer loads of 18-inch by 25-inch cakes, frozen and stacked together like bricks, with butter cream serving as mortar.

Julian's specialty is sculpting flowers, especially American Beauty roses.

Julian keeps an old photo of the cake in his wallet, like another man might keep a shot of a girlfriend.

In his early years, he helped build cakes for Lawrence Welk, Hopalong Cassidy and Chuck Connors from the TV show The Rifleman.

Julian once did a cake shaped like a 12-foot-long soap box derby car, and he put together what he calls "the world's largest strawberry shortcake."

"I've been all over the country and I've had people ask me to build all kinds of wild cakes," he says. "Somebody would fly me from here to Kansas, and I'd be there for a week and build a cake, or I'd fly into D.C. and do someone's wedding cake."

For years, he trained bakers for supermarket chains and helped design deli and bakery programs at companies such as IGA Stores.

For a time in the 1990s, he left the food business to sell real estate and luxury automobiles.

He still baked, and a few years ago, the kitchen called again.

The bakery, it turned out, was one of the few places he could comfortably call home. He married four times and fathered seven children, but his relationship with his family was strained. He says, simply, "It's hard to talk about."

A couple of years ago, he moved from Orlando to Tampa. Publix needed a cake decorator, and after a 20-minute interview, Julian had the job.

He's quick to point out that he's happy at Publix, but he'd love to open his own bakery. "Absolutely," he says. "A man could make himself a very, very good living."

He's been tinkering with one bakery concept for some time, but he admits it may remain only a dream. His age, 55, and money are powerful factors, and neither is in his corner.

He spends most of his days decorating wedding cakes, though he has a taste for big projects. He'd like to reclaim the world record for largest cake, which has been broken several times since the Fellowship Cake.

[Courtesy of Danny Julian] As a teenager Danny Julian, second from right, joined his grandfather Harold Julian Sr., far right, and a team of bakers to create what was at the time the largest cake ever made. "The Fellowship Cake" fed 10,000 people, and achieved a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records.

According to the Guiness Book of World Records, the largest cake on record weighed in at 128,238 pounds.

For years, Julian has been tinkering with plans. Back in 1987, he figured that even a 110,000-pound cake would require $50,000 worth of icing -- or nearly $78,000 worth in today's marketplace.

"It is a monster," he says.

Julian figures such a cake might bring people together.

"We live in a world in turmoil right now," he says. "I wish there was a way that somebody could do something to put the peace back and make people understand we're all alike."

His solution: Let us eat cake.

NAME: Danny L. Julian

• AGE: 55
• OCCUPATION: Baker, cake decorator.
• CURRENT JOB: Publix, 1313 S Dale Mabry Highway
• HOMETOWN: Evansville, Indiana.
• HOME: Horatio Street.
• LARGEST CAKE: "The Fellowship Cake," the world's largest in 1960, decorated by Julian's parents. He helped.
• HIS PROOF: A certificate from Guiness.
• DIMENSIONS OF CAKE: 40 feet by 38 feet.
• WEIGHT: 12,800 pounds.
• PEOPLE FED: 10,000 plus.
• PRICIEST CAKE: $18,000, for a now-defunct car dealership.
• BRUSH WITH FAME: He helped build an accordion cake for Lawrence Welk.
• HIS DREAM: To attempt a new world record.

-- Jay Cridlin can be reached at 226-3374 or cridlin@sptimes.com.

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