As Coldplay frontman Chris Martin once put it — some days you can try your best but you don’t succeed.
Mathieu Bertrand, a father from Mascouche, Que. was having one of those days on Jan. 4 when he went to pick up the cake for his 8-year-old son Jacob’s birthday.
Since he was 5, die-hard Toronto Maple Leafs fan Jacob has been asking for birthday cakes with the logo of his favourite hockey team on them.
Bertrand, who assumed this was a pretty straightforward request (even in Quebec) was stunned to receive a different kind of maple leaf cake from his bakery — it had the logo of Maple Leaf Foods on it, the company that produces packaged meats.
“When she showed me the cake, I didn’t understand what was going on,” Bertrand told HuffPost Canada.
But he realized his top priority was the 15 children waiting at his son’s party, so he went with the cake.
When ordering, Bertrand had requested that the baker google the Toronto Maple Leafs logo for reference.
“I don’t think she knew them at all.”
Unfortunately, it wasn’t the same case with Jacob, who realized pretty quickly that something was wrong with the cake.
When his parents explained it to him, Jacob was pretty disappointed to find out about what he called his “ham cake.”
Bertrand and Jacob’s stepmother, Tania Levesque found the whole thing pretty funny. Levesque posted the off-brand cake on Facebook, where it quickly went viral.
Even Maple Leaf Foods responded on Twitter, promising Jacob a consolation prize: tickets to a real Toronto Maples Leafs game, and of course, some free ham.
In Quebec, the mistake may be slightly forgivable. Jacob is somewhat of an outlier supporting Toronto’s team over the Montreal Canadiens, his father admitted.
Even Bertrand has no idea where his son’s love for the Leafs came from.
“He’s been a Leaf’s fan since the age of 5,” he said. “I have no idea why he chose them, but he loves Tavares.”
Bertrand and Levesque expect that Jacob will ask for a Leafs cake again next year, they said. This time they might consider another bakery.
