Cake picnics have been going viral and people in Toronto are obsessed
Published October 2, 2025 at 11:09 am
Cake picnics have been going viral around the world, and Toronto is majorly getting in on the action.
People have been obsessing over a new trend of throwing picnics where the main rule is “no cake, no entry,” but how did this phenomenon come to be? And how has it made its way to Toronto and Canada?
The concept was originally dreamed up in the United States by Elisa Sunga out of a desire to eat a lot of cake surrounded by friends. It turned into a full blown event where everyone brings a cake, and all attendees sample slices.
“In my earliest daydreams of this event, it was a small and intimate picnic of maybe 15 new friends forming a circle at the park,” Elisa Sunga says on the Cake Picnic website.
“Once we’ve formed our circle, we would take turns introducing ourselves and what cake we brought to the picnic. I had no idea this would draw such a crowd and that everyone would share my dream so passionately.”
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The cake picnics have grown into a global tour with stops in places like San Francisco, London, New York, Chicago, Austin, Seattle, Paris, Dubai, Melbourne and Manila.
The official cake picnic tour even has plans to eventually stop in Vancouver and Toronto, but while no details have been officially released yet, we’ve had our own local homegrown versions of Canadian cake picnics to attend.
Le Dolci Culinary Classroom has been spearheading Toronto’s own version of cake picnics, and tickets have been selling, well, like hotcakes. Thousands joined the waitlist for their second ever picnic.
“We have over 8,000 people on our waiting list and we only had 200 spaces. People love cake! The thing that’s grown is that people are craving community and connection,” says Lisa Sanguedolce, Cake Picnic TO organizer and Le Dolci Culinary School owner.
“We had so many guests come solo on Saturday and when we went around and talked to groups on picnic blankets who we assumed had known each other forever, they all said that they met just that day in the line or met just while browsing cake. It made our heart smile that they created these bonds of friendship just only a short time before.”
They even had participants come from as far as the United States, as well as Barrie, Hamilton and Ottawa.
“Everyone is just happy. My husband said he didn’t get it. He asked, what do you do?” says Sanguedolce. “I said, we just meet and eat cake, and after his first picnic, he said, ‘I get it, people are just happy!'”