Since covering the grand opening of the Hickory Ridge solar landfill, I've received several inquiries about the amazing cake that was the centerpiece of the festivities. Bearing an uncanny resemblance to the solar-panel bedecked landfill mountain it was comemmorating, the cake was a big hit with all in attendance.

But its resemblance wasn't just frosting-deep. The interior of the cake was painstakingly constructed to further replicate the landfill upon which it was based. It contained strata of different colors indicating layers and cells. Further, gray and black fondant icing pipes ran through the interior of the cake (perhaps connected to the tiny black well heads on top). And the coup de grace was a gray ribbon of frosting near the bottom, because every good landfill cake needs a sanitary liner to be in compliance.

How did Republic find a baker capable of producing a pastry of such remarkable verisimilitude? According to Republic environmental specialist Andy Keith, it was somewhat of an inside job. The cake maestro in question was a former Hickory Ridge employee who left to start her own bakery. Which makes this cake possibly the most unlikely intersection of job skills in history.