I am still on the hunt for the best cookbook of Spring 2026. Here’s the latest review (gleaned from lists found at  Bon Appétit  and Forbes). Cake Picnic: Recipes for the Love of Cake & Friends by Elisa Sunga may make you rethink what you put in your basket.

About the Book:

From the founder of CAKE PICNIC―a series of joyful, diverse, and deliciously indulgent gatherings where every attendee brings a whole cake―this cookbook of 50 baking recipes includes a guide to hosting your own confectionery events and encourages bakers to lean into play, connection, community―and lots of cake!

Part how-to guide, part recipe collection, the Cake Picnic cookbook provides everything you need to host your own delightfully decadent cake picnic. Here is practical advice for planning, hosting, and attending: how to choose a theme, prepare your guests, set up the event, encourage connection, transport whole cakes, and more. But the icing on the―you guessed it―cake is the 50 recipes within. 

Organized by theme, from an Autumn Harvest Cake Picnic to an Afternoon Tea Cake Picnic, a Beach Cake Picnic to a Salty-Sweet Cake Picnic, these recipes will inspire your creativity and tempt your sweet tooth. And never apologize for trying ten slices in one sitting―happiness often comes frosted, sprinkled, and cut into generous servings. (From Cake Picnic website.)

About the Author:

Elisa Sunga transforms butter, sugar, and flour into reasons for gathering and celebration. As the creator of CAKE PICNIC and cofounder of Bucket List Bake Club, she has brought thousands of bakers together, turning shared passion into lasting community. Her ability to weave sweetness and connection into memorable experiences has caught the attention of the New York Times, Food Network, Cherry Bombe, Eater, Epicurious, SFGate, The San Francisco Standard, USA TODAY, ABC News, and many other media outlets globally. 

When not dreaming up new ways to bring people together through cake, she can be found in her San Francisco Bay Area kitchen, testing recipes, tending to her flower garden, lounging with her family, and playing with her dog, Ginger. 

Join her on Instagram at @saltedrye, where baking is a creative outlet and every creation is an invitation to celebrate.

What I thought…

While I do have an Instagram account, I rarely (if ever) am on it. I follow maybe two people. Honestly, if an “influencer” doesn’t show up between the pages of a printed publication, I probably don’t know about them. (I do have a work friend who does keep me partially hip. Her most recent share with me is Jimothy. Thanks for keeping me mostly up to date, Jamie!)

While I knew that Cake Picnic was going to be full of cake recipes, I had no idea that Cake Picnic was a trademarked social event. These events seem to be international (but it’s hard to tell from the website how many actually took place.)

Anyway, cool social experiment. Now, on to the book.

Sunga grew up with natural sugary desserts from her childhood in the Philippines, things like “fresh mangoes dripping down our fingers, sticky rice wrapped in banana leaves, coconut candies that melted on our tongues” (9). Then her family moved to America and she discovered everything from sugary donuts to Betty Crocker mixes. She was a refined sugar convert.

This book and the whole Cake Picnic experience is another by-product of the pandemic. Like many, her kitchen became her safe place with Christina Tosi’s cookbooks as her guide. (She baked all of Tosi’s recipes and then reimagined them as donuts to bide her time until the world reawakened.)

The first Cake Picnic experiment was in San Francisco in 2024. 183 people came and brought cake! In 2025, the number had increased to 1,387. Obviously not the intimate experience she first envisioned.

She wrote Cake Picnic to help capture that intimate feeling, sharing the book with us, the readers. Besides the recipes, she shares tips and themes to start your own events. She even includes conversation starters and icebreakers and etiquette for attending.

I love a cookbook with menus and the first few sectionals are seasonal ideas for New Year, Summer, Autumn Harvest, and Winter Cake Picnics. The themed cake section includes floral cake recipes (Lavender & Lemon Poppy Seed, Orange Blossom Chantilly, Chamomile Honey, and Pistachio Sugar Cake with Rose Water Buttercream). Other themes in this section are Color Cake, Afternoon Tea Cake, and Confetti Cake Picnics (with three or four recipes in each category).

Next, Sunga presents location themes for a beach, a camping, and a poolside cake picnic. The beach themed recipes are full of tropical fruits and coconut. Camping themes include s’mores, smoke, and roasted apple flavors. Poolside is both tropical (again) and a bit boozy with an Orange Aperol Spritz Sheet Cake that sounds amazing.

Single ingredients themed ideas follow with chocolate cake recipes (of course), more citrus cakes, a corn cake picnic idea and a “Salty Sweet” theme. This latter one was really inventive with Chocolate Cake with Potato Chip Toffee, Lemon Curd & Saltine Cracker Cake, and Apple Cake with Pretzel Buttercream.

Note that most of the cakes presented are not easy bar or sheet pan types (though there are a few of these). Mostly, it’s full-on layer cakes that are meant to impress.

What I made…

I had a veggie drawer full of zucchini so I immediately went to the index. There was nothing under “Z.” One thing that Sunga extolls in “How to Use this Book,” is to experiment. I seriously did not want to mess with frosting and layers, so I decided to try to morph her Apples & Sage Sugar Upside Down Cake (97) and use zucchini. I also baked mine in a square pan (which made lining it easier) and used fresh sage.

I found one typo while reading this recipe. Sunga says to pour the caramel into the pan but it’s not until the next page that she says to preheat the oven AND grease and line the pan (with the cake batter directions). If you’re a baking purist, you will also wonder why the baking powder is creamed in with the butter and why the milk and flour are not added alternately.

Zucchini-Sage Upside Down Cake

Based on Apple & Sage Sugar Upside-Down Cake from Cake Picnic by Elisa Sunga

Ingredients

For the Caramel Bottom

• 1 medium or two small zucchinis
• 1 T. salt (for zucchini)
• ⅓ c. butter
• ⅓ c. brown sugar
• pinch of seal salt (for caramel)
• 1 t. Fresh sage leaves, chopped

For the Cake

• ½ c. butter (room temperature)
• 1 c. sugar
• 1 t. Fresh sage, chopped fine
• 1 t. Kosher salt
• 2 t. Baking powder
• 1 t. Pure vanilla extract
• 3 eggs (room temperature)
• ¼ c. canola oil
• 2 ¼ c. all-purpose flour
• 1 c. plus 2 T. whole milk

Instructions

1. Prepare a 9×9 inch square cake pan by greasing it and lining the bottom with parchment paper, overlapping the sides.
2. Wash and slice the zucchini into ¼ inch slices. Place it in a colander and sprinkle with the salt and toss. Let it drain for at least 30 minutes but up to one hour. Rinse thoroughly and dry with paper towels. 
3. Chop the sage and set aside.
4. Preheat oven to 350  F. While the zucchini is draining, make the caramel. In a small saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter. Stir in the brown sugar and a pinch of salt. Continue to cook, whisking constantly, until the sugar has dissolved and the mixture has thickened, about 1 minute.
5. Pour the warm caramel mixture into the prepared cake pan. Spread it evenly. Arrange the zucchini slices and sprinkle the sage over the caramel mixture. Place in the refrigerator for five minutes only. Then remove and set aside while you whip up the cake batter. 
6. In a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, beat the butter, sugar, sage and salt until light and fluffy (3-4 minutes). Add the baking powder and vanilla and beat for another minute. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and add the eggs and oil, beating until fully incorporated. 
7. Spoon in the flour and mix until just incorporated. Add the milk and mix briefly.
8. Pour the batter over the caramel-zucchini layer. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Remove the pan from the oven and place on a wire rack to cool. Cool to room temperature before removing cake from pan. Run a butter knife around the edge and invert the cake on a serving plate. 
9. Garnish with sage leaves if desired.

Yield: 9-12 (depending on how you slice it)

Final thoughts…

So, when I read that Tosi was her go-to for cake instruction, I was a bit skeptical. The Hubs gave me a copy of Milk after we watch Tosi on some chef-inspired TV series. We loved her there. The cookbook, not so much. I didn’t do a full blown review of Milk but I did give my thoughts on it here. Some of Tosi’s recipes are a bit weird and not practical and didn’t work for me.

I can only speak to a single recipe from Cake Picnic which ended up not being Sunga’s but morphed into one not using apples but zucchini instead. I hate to judge but I think there might a bit of confusion with recipes in this book. (Note the blunder I found in the cake recipe about greasing the pan.) I didn’t dive into many of the other recipes because, honestly, I am not a huge cake person. That is probably why I was drawn to the herbal-ness of the above recipe.

This is a cool book full of beautiful cakes and beautiful photos and is based on a beautiful idea…. I’d like to teach the world to bake in perfect harmony. I’d like to host a cake picnic and keep them company. (Apologies to the Coca-Cola company.)

This is another cookbook I’m glad I checked out of the library. I am glad to know about Cake PIcnic though. Someone hipper than I please let me know if it really is a phenomenon or simply a way to promote yourself on Instagram and publish a cookbook.

I’m linking up with Foodies Read for August.

So, yes, I changed this recipe from an apple cake to a zucchini cake. The caramel bubbled up through the cake and there was just a thin film on the bottom. It was super most cake though. I would love to try this same sage flavoring with lemon. I am glad I did read this cookbook because there are a lot of great flavor combos one could play with.