Don't go changin'...

This story also ran in today’s OC Weekly

Sorry to break this news to you on the first day of autumn, but The Filling Station in Orange–known for their mile high, shortbread-crusted pumpkin pie–is about to change hands. The legal notice has come down, and the place is in its 30 day escrow.

Current owner Hyun Sook Chung is training the new owner on all the recipes for the baked goods the place is known for. According to management, the new owner, nicknamed “Tippy,” is intent on keeping everything exactly the same–the staff, the menu, everything. I actually want Tippy to improve the savory menu, which I think is meh-at-best, but the pies are holy-shit-amazing.

Hyun’s tired of running a one-woman bake shop, and wants to hand over the keys to someone with more energy for it. During the peak holiday season, Hyun bakes hundreds of pies a day solo, and who can blame her for wanting to stop?

But what about me, dammit? And my holiday pies? Everyone’s been asking the staff about that, and only time will tell if the new owner can really fill in at the Filling Station.

The Filling Station Cafe
201 N. Glassell St., Orange, (714) 289-3714
www.fillingstationcafe.com

So the barbecue competitors’ websites are abuzz with tons of negative feedback on the TV show I appeared on with my teammates Bigmista and Sylvie. Tons of gripes about how unrealistic and contrived this contest format is.

Granted, this is a made-for-TV game show, not a real world contest. If it served to make the American public aware that there are things called BBQ contests, and that real people like my teammates compete in them, then I’m all for the PR good deed we took part in. We had a ton of fun, made new friends and that’s what matters most to me.

But it’s not apparent how well the audience received it outside the fishbowl of the BBQ community. In Nielsen-rated teevee land, it apparently scored well.

TLC’s summer of premieres, dubbed TLC Summer*, garnered more original new and returning hit** series vs. the competition with 17 averaging 1.1M P2+ or more!

Whatever the hell those numbers mean, we (yes, I feel a sense of  ownership in the TV show), were beaten by other TLC shows Little People, Big World and LA Ink, but we kicked the living crap out of Hoarding: Buried Alive and Mall Cops: Mall of America. Which means we might see a season 3 of BBQ Pitmasters before Mall Cops: Asian Garden Mall.

But I don’t really  know anything about the working the TV business, so don’t quote me on that.

This story is also published on the OC Weekly’s food blog, Stick a Fork In It. Difference here is I have more photos.

Sprinkles!!

Let’s say you somehow got talked into baking the cake for your little niece’s birthday party. You were thinking of a Betty Crocker box, and icing from the supermarket. Then you find out Niece would just adore you if you’d bake a cake in the shape of a certain Disney princess. You can’t buy that at Costco, and that luxe cupcakery you indulge yourself with can’t help out either. Now what?

Rent a character baking pan and get it done yourself. ABC Cake Decorating Shoppe in Orange sells and rents scores of cake pans shaped like cartoon characters, and other random molds like a palm tree or a beer mug. Problem solved!

A small bit of the cake pans for rent

Well, problem solved if you know how to bake already. ABC is a large specialty store with a wide selection of ingredients, pans and tools for the expert baker. Candy making stuff? Sure. Need a brown paper cupcake liner so your home baked treats look like the ones at the chichi cupcake shops? Yup. Rental equipment like multi-tiered wedding cake stands? Got that.

The best artificial flavor essences New Jersey ever devised

Wait, you don’t have the slightest idea how to bake or decorate cakes and cookies? Then take a class. In the four decades that ABC has been in business, battalions of Scouts, shoals of schoolkids, and droves of DIY-ers have learned to squeeze colored goo artfully from a piping bag.

Still flustered by your lacking cake skills? Have ABC bake you a custom cake in their production kitchen–and why not use that princess cake pan for your niece. I could have told you in paragraph one that their pros will bake and decorate just about anything you want, but then you’d miss the work fun in doing it yourself.

I've driven past this strip mall a hundred times before I spotted ABC

ABC Cake Decorating Shoppe and Bakery
429 N. Tustin St.
Orange, CA 92867
714-633-2055