A Kingston, N.Y., bakery that hoped to earn some new kitchen equipment by making “John Oliver Cake Bears” had one more surprise for the host on the latest episode of his “Last Week Tonight” show Sunday night on HBO.
Deising’s Bakery and Restaurant — which sold thousands of the cake bears in recent days, with the proceeds going to a local food pantry — created an extra large “cake bear” in Oliver’s likeness, right down to the glasses and tie.
Oliver brought the cake out at the end of Sunday’s show and was downright giddy over it.
“I am humbled, shocked and, as this cake bear suggests, slightly terrified,” Oliver said. “But I’m also impressed because Deising’s, you clearly heard my challenge and sent us something that looks somehow both like me and the version of Arthur the Aardvark that’s been through 14 divorces.”
The whole saga started a few weeks back when “Last Week Tonight” bought, at auction, the contents of a recently closed Red Lobster in Kingston. Oliver used the equipment to recreate the restaurant in the show’s studio, serving the chain’s cheddar bay biscuits to the audience at the end of the episode.
The end of that show wasn’t the end of the story, though. Deising’s owner Eric Deising taped a note to the door of the closed restaurant, asking if he could buy some of the kitchen equipment to use in his own establishment. That note got back to Oliver, who answered Deising on the next week’s show.
“I’ve got good news and bad news for you,” he said on air to Deising, “The bad news is we actually already donated the Red Lobster kitchen equipment. And even if we hadn’t, it didn’t have the 36-inch flat-top oven/grill or kitchen convection oven that you were looking for. The good news is, though, we’re willing to buy those items for you on one condition. All I want in return is a baked good with my face on it on sale in your bakery, specifically a cake bear with my face on it. I wanna be a cake bear.”
Deising answered the challenge, and within days the John Oliver “cake bears” were the hottest baked goods in Upstate New York. Deising’s sold thousands of the bears at $8 each, and donated the proceeds to People’s Place Food Pantry in Kingston.
HBO host of "Last Week Tonight," John Oliver made Deising's Bakery & Restaurant in Ulster County a deal — make a cake bear in his likeness and he would buy them new restaurant equipment and the local establishment rose to the occasion. Deising's Bakery | Provided photoDeising's Bakery | Provided photo
That windfall for People’s Place got even bigger. On Sunday’s edition of “Last Week Tonight,” Oliver announced that the show would also be donating $10,000 to the food pantry.
And, as promised, the show delivered the new kitchen equipment to Deising last week.
Oliver finished off the saga in an appropriate way — with a mouthful of cake.
“Thank you to everyone that bought the bears,” Oliver said. “I can really only think of one way to end this, and that is to eat this bear, that I love so very much, in the only universally acceptable manner — and that is by taking a bite out of its sumptuous ass.”