“Cooking for a living is the worst job on earth… unless you love it,” laughs Duff Goldman, a/k/a “Chef Duff,” owner of Charm City Cakes (CCC), a Monster Garage of baked-to-order confections located in a former art gallery in Remington.

Fortunately for those able to afford Duff’s delectable artwork (prices range from a couple hundred to over $15,000), Duff does indeed love cooking; maybe even as much as he loves playing bass in the experimental indie band soihadto. 
Cake designer, entrepreneur, musician – sounds pretty well-rounded, right?  Well, he’s also a hockey player, metal sculptor, graffiti artist and occasional TV star on the Food Network (Duff has since made his network television debut as a  guest on Jay Leno’s Tonight Show). “It was totally random,” says Duff, as he caresses the surface of a freshly baked cake with a pair of knobby exfoliating gloves.
 
“Somebody filmed one of our guerrilla baking performances – I think the audience was throwing eggs at me, we got attacked by ninjas, crazy stuff – sent the tape to a production company, and the next thing I know we’ve got a crew from Hollywood here filming a reality show about me and CCC.  Pretty amazing.”

than the creations that helped land him the gig.  When asked about his strangest and most elaborate projects, Duff describes a cake containing a working cannon, a cake that doubles as a foosball table, baking 50 identical cakes and hanging them from a ceiling with fishing line for a Rolling Stone party (“Each guest was given a pair of scissors as they arrived”), and a very special cake for Rick Springfield.

“His manager called and said he wanted a cake in the shape of Rick Springfield’s ass,” says Duff.  “He sent over a picture and everything. I have to say, the guy has a really nice ass.”  

So how does a nice Jewish boy/avant garde musician/hockey player arrive at crafting baked goods in the shape of celebrity buttocks?   It all started at home: “My mother, grandmother and great-grandmother were all great cooks,” recalls Duff, “and each worked in fine arts.  Cooking and art – and the joy of doing both – were always a part of my life.”  

Still, Duff didn’t pick up his “chef” honorific from watching his mom bake pies.  After earning undergraduate degrees in physics and philosophy, Duff attended the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) in Napa, California, where he mastered both the art and science of fine baking, or at least enough to land a job as executive pastry chef at a ski resort in Vail, Colorado.  Duff’s next position took him literally around the world, training pastry chefs for a restaurant group with locations in Las Vegas, Seattle, Boston and Tokyo. 

Perhaps his only real bump in the road career-wise came when he returned to Baltimore to assume the duties of personal chef for a prominent family.   “It totally sucked,” Duff frowns, losing his zen-like smile and hipster cool for the first and only time during our interview.  “Five days a week, lunch and dinner for the family, lunch for the office staff, the household staff – the major domo, nannies, housekeeping staff, groundskeepers.  It was all really 19th century, and the family treated me like a servant.  Every time there was a birthday or anniversary, even for their friends, they’d have me make a cake.  I mean, why go to the store for a cake when you’ve got a personal chef?  At some point I got fed up and thought to myself, ‘I can make a living at this.’”

More than just a living, Duff has made an enviable life out of his skill in the kitchen; one that enables him to sleep late, work with his friends, create challenging music, entertain, amuse and delight everyone around him, while bringing well-deserved positive press to Baltimore.  And, having avoided even a single pun thus far, I’ll add that he makes it look like a piece of cake.