Couple brings Japanese layered cakes to Ponce City Market

ATLANTA - To watch Sujith Ratnayake cut into one of his cakes is to watch a master exercise incredible control and precision. And it makes sense; his creations aren’t just any old cakes. They’re mille crêpe cakes, and they’re the end result of painstaking work.

"For me, about three hours," answers Ratnayake when asked how long it takes to make one of his cakes.

Ratnayake and his wife Schanita are the owners of Cake Culture, a pop-up shop that just opened inside Atlanta’s Ponce City Market. Right now, the menu features three different flavors of mille crêpe cakes, which are built by carefully layering 20 paper-thin crêpes with pastry cream.

"One is our Classic, which gives you a hint of kirsch, which is a soft cherry liqueur and almond essence," explains Schanita Ratnayake. "Our Matcha Green Tea…has green tea infused within the pastry cream itself; and then the Strawberry, which gives you chunks of strawberry as well as the pastry cream."

Although crêpes originated in France, Ratnayake says his kind of mille crêpe cake was pioneered in Japan, which is where the Sri Lanka native learned to make them.

"From Sri Lanka, I moved to Japan," he says. "I started baking in Japan like this."

Sujith and Schanita also met in Japan, got married, and eventually baked up a plan to bring the delicate, decadent desserts to Atlanta.

"To the American eye … a number of people don't really know what to think of it. But once they get a taste they're like, 'Oh, wow. This is amazing.'"

Ponce City Market is located at 675 Ponce de Leon Avenue in Atlanta’s Old Fourth Ward; current hours for Cake Culture are 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Wednesdays through Saturdays and noon to 6 p.m. on Sundays. For more information on the business, click here. 

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