Carbs and sugar have been popular pandemic coping mechanisms. Luckily for sweet tooths and bread heads who wanted to eat their feelings, an array of local home bakers have begun selling everything from cookies and cakes to boules and bagels on Instagram. Here are five micro bakeries that look as good as they taste.
Alex Reponen’s life hasn’t taken a routine route. He studied biochemistry at the University of Chicago, ended up in the State Department as a foreign service officer, and then became a case officer with the CIA, before leaving in 2015. “It wasn’t fulfilling me in the same way as when I started,” he says. “When I left government, I was determined to do something that made me happy whether it made me a living or not.”
Baking was always a passion – during his last year at the CIA he whipped up a different batch of muffins for his colleagues every week – so he decided to get serious about it. After two years working for the team that ultimately opened Pluma by Bluebird Bakery, he debuted the Dapper Fox out of his home in the Rosemont neighborhood of Alexandria, taking commissions for cakes, tarts, cookies, and whatever else customers requested.
In April of last year, he decided to make a pandemic pivot to offering frozen, ready-to-bake cookies. He figured people would want chef-level cookies on demand without the fuss of making them from scratch. To keep the production process as simple as possible, he decided he would offer one flavor a week, which would be inspired by his whims, seasonal themes, and feedback from customers.
The first week he delivered 96 cookies to 10 homes, but the business took off quickly. One week last year, he delivered 1,100 cookies to more than 90 homes. His most popular cookies were funfetti, peanut butter chocolate chip with M&Ms, and bourbon brown butter pecan with dark chocolate and sea salt. His lowest seller? Oatmeal raisin. “It turns out there are some raisin haters out there,” he says.
Orders for the week’s flavor go live Sunday evenings and close out on Wednesdays at noon. Delivering to just south of Mount Vernon all the way up to Silver Spring, Reponen usually makes drop-offs on Friday.
Ever wanted to pick up a freshly baked baguette along with a set of vintage tumblers from the same spot? Now you can. Underground Goods is a stylish thrift shop and petite patisserie rolled into one. Founded by longtime friends Erin Melnyk and Amanda Santoro, the new venture is popping up around D.C., and offering their goods online and through Instagram flash sales. Both are passionate thrifters, Melnyk loves to bake, and Santoro is passionate about social media, so the stylish startup unites a few of their favorite things.
The menu changes regularly, but includes breads, cookies, granola, dog treats, and more. On the vintage side, the duo leans towards granny chic finds, including lots of Pyrex and Depression-era glassware.
“We kind of started this because we’d find all these really cool pieces we couldn’t leave behind,” says Santoro. “And our cupboards, kitchens, and homes are already bursting at the seams. There’s a one-in, one-out rule in our houses now.”
Though Underground Goods is only a few months old, they are already considering turning their virtual venture into a brick and mortar effort. “It’s a side hustle we’re trying to make the main hustle,” says Melnyk.
Underground Goods posts a new baked goods menu every other week, while fresh vintage items are added to the website weekly. Items can be picked at pop-ups or in Columbia Heights; delivery is available in D.C.; shipping is available to the U.S.
For her day job, Tammy Saunders crafts exquisite, eye-catching desserts as the lead pastry chef at one of D.C.’s most exclusive restaurants, José Andrés’ Minibar. But in between shifts, in the small kitchen of her one-bedroom apartment in Rosslyn, she bakes up batches of homier treats that recall the pleasures of childhood: oatmeal creme pies, chocolate chip cookies, and brownies.
“I enjoy the nostalgia of pastry,” says Saunders, who previously worked at Fiola Mare and Mirabelle.
Her enterprise came to fruition last December, while she was furloughed from the restaurant, after years of urgings from her family and friends. She began by offering a selection of baked goods through her Instagram account, including gingerbread snowflake cookies painstakingly decorated by hand. “Those were a real hit,” she says. “People loved the look of them.”
Currently, she’s working on her Mother’s Day menu. On top of her regular offerings, Saunders crafts custom cakes and will take requests. Orders can be picked up at her home or may be delivered for a small fee.
When Dorothy Rapeepun worked in restaurants, she was always on the savory side of the equation. Her last post was as sous chef at Blue Duck Tavern, but she left near the end of 2019 to spend time with her newborn daughter. She was just beginning to look for a new job early last year when the pandemic hit.
While she was on lockdown at home in the Cloverly neighborhood of Silver Spring, the first generation American began baking desserts celebrating her Thai roots. Friends got wind of her efforts and started hounding her. She began selling baked goods through her Instagram account last December, offering pickup at her house, which has been partially transformed to accommodate her new venture.
“I had to get some stainless steel prep tables so I have enough space to do everything,” she says.
Though she offers some items a la carte, she specializes in epic holiday-themed boxes packed with a variety of treats. For the Thai New Year, the assortment included mini pandan sponge cakes, ube cream puffs, tamarind caramels laced with Thai fish sauce to add a salty undertone, and guava pate de fruits dusted with prik glua, a spicy-salty-sweet Thai seasoning. Her Mother’s Day box features jasmine ginger madeleines, hibiscus lime shortbreads, and passion fruit matcha panna cotta.
All her work with sweets has improved her savory skills. “There are things I have learned through this that I don’t get to do every day with aesthetics and the way things look,” says Rapeepun, who plans to keep her venture going even after she starts working at a restaurant again.
Emily Pierce was gifted a sourdough starter in 2019. Little did she know it was going to inspire her to start a business one day. Baking was always a beloved pastime for the 30-year-old sustainability expert at the Urban Land Institute, so she quickly learned how to use the culture to make bread, bagels, and cookies.
“You have to read your dough,” she says. “It sounds hippie woo-woo, but it’s true.”
She shared her efforts with family and friends, who often told her she should start a bakery. Early last February, she began selling her baked goods out of her Arlington kitchen, dubbing the upstart effort Kindred Bread Co., because “bread to me is about relationships, family, and connections.”
As the world went into shutdown and people began craving comfort foods, her business took off. People appreciated the handmade goods. “I got some of the nicest emails and outreach from people,” says Pierce, who even spent an hour on the phone with one customer helping them troubleshoot their own sourdough experimentation.
Her sourdough-centric menu includes four types of bread – plain, garlic, chocolate chip (yes, you read that correctly), and all-organic spring wheat – a quintet of bagels – onion, everything, sesame seed, plain, and cinnamon raisin – and chip cookies. Everything is baked to order (requiring 12-72 hours of notice, depending on the item) and can either be picked up from her home or delivered.
