From taro mochi cake boxes to pistachio cream cheese scones to customized cake designs, Topi Cakes’ soft launch in October brings a selection of perfectly-decorated desserts to 2305 El Camino Real, drawing inspiration from East Asian-inspired flavors such as sesame, matcha and various teas.

According to Tiffany Xing, co-owner and founder of Topi Cakes, she had an extensive history in making cakes before deciding to open a shop, in hopes of serving more people.

“I used to make custom cakes in a home studio as my part time job while I worked as a financial analyst in a big company, but I still really enjoyed making people’s birthdays, weddings, or other special days memorable,” Xing said. “I enjoy making all these unique cakes that not only give people sweetness, but also special memories. I’ve been doing this for a while and then I thought about opening an actual storefront so I have more opportunities to provide catering, special events, and classes, all different types of business and that’s why I got started.”

Xing said that their desserts are inspired by Asian flavors, leaning more towards a light taste. 

“We are an Asian-based, Chinese-based, women-owned bakery, so we really wanted our flavors to be light sweet, healthy, and fresh,” Xing said. “That’s how Asians like the chiffon cake, made with whipping cream instead of frosting of heavy texture. Our cream is very light, and our cake is also spongy and light, so it’s not too heavy.”

According to senior Jerry Yan, the sesame cake from Topi Cakes reminded him of a sweet from his culture, bringing a feeling of nostalgia.

“In China, we have Heizhimahu, which is like sesame soup in a way,” Yan said. “When I was eating that [the cake], it really reminded me of that taste — the sweetness wasn’t too sweet and it also felt healthy. It brought back memories from when I was younger, like the scene in Ratouille.”

Yan said he connects the desserts’ flavors with methods his mother used. 

“Using sesame is more of an East Asian thing to do,” Yan said. “As a Chinese, my mom always puts sesame seeds on rice, so the cake also reminds me of that because they put a whole layer of sesame on top of the box cake.”

According to Xing, many of their cakes emphasize tea flavors. 

“Our specialty is our tea flavored cakes, like jasmine green tea, hojicha, black tea, and we mix those flavors into the cream and the cake filling so it creates a special taste to make it very unique,” Xing said. 

Xing said she wanted to open a store where customers would value the effort she puts into her art, and Palo Alto was the perfect place, where she felt Topi Cakes would fit right in. 

“I used to make custom cakes, so I wanted to have someone that can appreciate my design, not just looking at the price but also thinking about the value behind it,” Xing said. “I really like the vibe in Palo Alto because everyone is very chill, and they really appreciate our artistic work and handmade things, so they’re very friendly. Also, the population here or in the area is our target audience. We also thought about other competitors in similar industries in other locations, and we felt like there’s a room for us in Palo Alto, so I specially looked for a place here.”

According to Xing, said there had been many challenges throughout the operation of creating the store, especially the process before opening

“There had been many different challenges in different stages,” Xing said. “Before opening, when you renovate the place, draw the plans, deal with all the contractors and the city, there’s really a lot of things that you can never expect, so it took us 10 months to renovate this place although it was just a small renovation from the previous chocolate shop … We still needed to pay rent during that period, so the financial pressure was really big.” 

Xing said challenges persisted even after the soft launch.

“After it [Topi Cakes] opened, there are all kind of other issues come up, like our supply chains, the packing, ingredients, materials — all of those are not arriving on time because we didn’t expect that it’d become so popular that quick, so a lot of things were not quite ready. And we had to hire people that had baking experience so they are easier to train, which also takes a lot of effort, and maintaining the management team is also very challenging.”

According to Xing, she hopes to be able to officially announce its opening after everything settles in.

“It’s like a start-up company — you don’t have all the tools set up so you have to figure it out step by step, and there can be a lot of mistakes, which is why we are in our soft opening right now,” Xing said. “Because we’re still trying to improve a lot of the process, the flavors, all kinds of things, that will still take a while. We hope we can officially announce the grand opening to everyone soon and show that we’re fully ready for the business.”

We tried some of Topi Cake’s desserts, and here’s what we found:

Peach Oolong Box Cake ($8.50)

This soft moist cake had a mild and tea flavor to it with a sweet whipped cream in between layers. The cake was topped with clear peach jelly bits, complementing the softness of the cake perfectly with its chewiness. The sweetness was mild and not too sweet, but there was only a hint of peach compared to the tea taste. 

Matcha Swiss Roll ($12.25)

For matcha lovers, this cake is perfect at bringing out a rich tea flavor with its strong matcha taste. The sweet cream in the center compliments the darker taste of the matcha, coming together in a bite of soft and spongy textures. Overall, this dessert isn’t too sweet and is topped with a fresh strawberry that adds a smooth crossover between the earthiness and sweetness. 

3″ Coconut Latte Cake ($14.25)

This mini cake was topped with half a Ferrero Rocher, a sugar-covered freeze dried hawthorn, a slice of dried orange and coconut flakes. In between, there was coconut jelly peeking through each layer of the spongy cake and latte-flavored cream, which had a mild bitter note. The sweetness of the cake is light and the coffee overpowered any coconut flavor, but combination of flavors lives up to its aesthetic appearance. 

Overall, Topi Cakes’ desserts are a go-to for light desserts with unique flavor pairings, especially for those who prefer a mild sweetness over heavy and rich treats.