It’s 2014, Brooklyn, New York. Tony Lanuza, a former costumer, and Chris Poeschl, a former actor, are out of jobs and quickly running out of money. And it’s Chris’ birthday. As Tony couldn’t afford to buy his partner anything, he made him a cake instead. “Chris went to an audition and when he got back I had made the first version of the honey whiskey cake. That would be the cake that changed our life,” says Tony.
After their signature cake was born and it had success at a local restaurant, on a whim, they took them to a taping of The Chew. After the show, every person associated with the show was tweeting about their confections like mad. “It’s kind of amazing. As two guys who started out of our own kitchen, we’ve gone from trying to start a food blog to shipping cake all around the world. We’ve done all 50 states, Australia, Hong Kong, Singapore, Iceland, Afghanistan, and the UK. They’ve been on Air Force One. We’ve been in the running for Oprah and a finalist for Martha Stewart’s American Made.” And now they’re in Nashville.
Why Nashville? Simple. They felt at home here. “In January, [we came to Nashville] and after 5 days we thought, ‘this is where we’re going to move to.’ A month and a half later we moved.” Plus, as Chris muses, “We figured if we can’t sell whiskey cake in Tennessee, then what the hell are we doing here?”