Altreisha Foster. Photos: Chris Emeott
A baker creates gourmet cakes that defy expectations—and sometimes gravity.
It’s architecture, it’s science and it’s eminently edible.
When Altreisha Foster signed up for a cookie-making class in 2016, she had no idea where that creative outlet would lead her. “It was just something to keep me occupied,” Foster says. The public health practitioner was pregnant at the time and couldn’t travel for work. “I was always used to just going and going because I was always an overachiever at school,” she says. “I never really took the time to find out what hobbies I had outside of the scholastic part of my life.”
But baking came easily to Foster, much to her and her family’s surprise. “My husband tells the kids all the time that he was the one who would make the box cake [for birthdays],” Foster says with a laugh. She began baking a variety of items, drawing inspiration from bakers on Instagram. Six months into posting her creations, ELLE magazine reached out for an article about modern cakes. “I was like, ‘What?’ I just couldn’t understand,” Foster says. “I’m just fooling around here. It’s a hobby for me, and you’re interested in one of my cakes.” Although ELLE ultimately didn’t include her in the magazine article, Foster says this was when she thought she might be onto something, and Sugarspoon Desserts was born.
Foster’s scientific background plays a key role in her wedding cake designs. “I’m very lean. I’m very neat. I’m very meticulous, and it’s all about science,” Foster says. This ethos comes to the fore when viewing the talented baker’s oeuvre, which contains architectural façades, intricate textures and towering tiers. But Foster’s modernist creations also required research in a new field. “I was self-taught for a long time and trying to figure out how people are holding these huge structures together,” she says. She turned to the instruction of bakeries, including Toronto’s LiMa Cakes and Australia’s Marina Machado Cakes, and flying as far as Switzerland to learn about new cake styles and techniques.
As the sole baker behind Sugarspoon Desserts, Foster accepts around two to three wedding cake commissions per month. Once a couple completes the inquiry form, Foster schedules a 30 minute call with them. “I want to learn about you,” Foster says. Some of the questions out of the gate include what drew the couple to her and which Sugarspoon creations called to them specifically, though Foster shies away from doing repeats. “I love to work with color, so once I understand
who the couple is I can make recommendations,” she says.
If a client sends images of a wedding cake as inspiration, Foster asks for six to 10 more examples. “I want to get this person’s personality to see what types of cake that she likes,” Foster says. From there, Foster incorporates elements from each of the inspiration cakes to compose a sketch. “I would say nine out of 10 times, they go along with the sketch that I present to them as opposed to just doing someone else’s cake,” she says.
But Foster is also familiar with one of her own cakes serving as a major source of inspiration for couples. “My big break, I would say, came from when I did this seven-tiered cake for The Bachelorette a couple of years ago,” she says. The towering white cake was adorned with 200 red roses to commemorate the 200th episode of the TV show, which was filmed in Minneapolis during the 18th season. “[Clients] were bringing [me] this cake because it was on the television, it was everywhere,” Foster says. “I didn’t want to keep recreating that cake. For me, I had to be really persistent in trying to bring out the couple’s personality as opposed to this one trick.”
Baker Altreisha Foster is especially fond of incorporating color into her architectural and avant-garde wedding cakes. Photo: Sugarspoon Desserts
Rather than being pigeonholed, Foster has continued to experiment and grow in her artistry, and her cakes have graced the dessert tables of couples across the Twin Cities. One Plymouth couple’s cake served as a particularly challenging but rewarding feat. The design consisted of six tiers of pillows, stacked one on top of the other, each with its own flavor. “That, to me, was one of my favorite cakes to make because it actually tested me; I hand carved those pillows,” Foster says.
Only Half the Story
When Altreisha Foster isn’t designing modern (and edible) marvels, she’s sharing her passion for baking through the Cake Therapy Foundation. “Baking has helped me to center myself,” Foster says. Her goal is to introduce that artistic and therapeutic outlet to girls who have been adversely impacted by the foster care and justice systems through baking workshops. Learn more about the Plymouth-based foundation in our upcoming October/November 2026 issue.
Sugarspoon Desserts
Instagram: @sugarspoondesserts
