New bakery offers something for everyone

PALMER — Neve Michael didn’t consider baking a piece of cake when she started culinary school.

“I used to tell people I was allergic to measuring cups,” she said, bagging up some meringue, buttercream frosting on Friday.

Now that stock phrase — “Piece of Cake” — is the name of the home bakery run by Michael and her mother, Barb Self.

Though Michael has always loved cooking, it wasn’t until two years ago that she started to think baking might not be so bad.

In 2013, a friend of hers with an egg allergy had lamented the fact she couldn’t get anyone local to make her a birthday cake she could eat. Knowing full well the struggle of a person with significant food allergies — her 7-year-old son and mother have dealt with the same issues all their lives — Michael decided to take up the challenge.

Turns out she had a knack for it.

“We did it and it didn’t suck,” she joked.

Word of the women’s specialty baking abilities spread quickly, and in a matter of months they began receiving requests through Facebook from potential customers. They made cakes with themes ranging from Doctor Who to Winnie the Pooh for events like weddings, birthdays and anniversaries. Soon they were cooking up the idea of starting a business.

The mother-daughter duo currently operate out of Self’s Palmer home in the Lazy Mountain area under a “cottage foods” business license, which means they can sell “non-potentially hazardous foods” directly to the consumer without the typical food service permit. Since the ingredients they use — even for the non-allergic — can’t grow harmful bacteria, the women aren’t required to work in a commercial kitchen.

Baking without traditional ingredients can be challenging.

Michael said she’s continually conducts online research to find substitutes for ingredients customers are allergic to, rejecting anything that can’t produce a tasty and visually pleasing product that is worth the cost to her and her customers.

“We’d rather take the time, do the extra work and have quality products to make the most profit,” Michael said.

Chicory root fiber, she’s found, is one example of a sweet, natural substitute for sugar that most diabetics can consume because of its low glycemic index.

But people with diabetes aren’t the only ones who might prefer chicory root to sugar.

Customer Faith Molnar, who came to pick up an order on Friday, opted for an all-organic cake for her 1-year-old daughter’s birthday, simply because she’s “a health nut.”

“That’s how I’ve raised her,” Molnar said. “I make all of her food, I don’t give her anything from the stores.”

In regard to sweets, Molnar said she’s noticed a difference in how her nieces and nephews behave after eating sugary birthday cake and how her daughter responds to desserts made with different sweeteners.

“I just see the sugar coma that they end up in, and it’s almost sad,” she said. “It’s funny to watch ’em be hyper but then it’s like, you think about … such a tiny body eating all that junk, it’s just so bad.”

Not being a professional baker herself, Molnar decided to seek help outside the house for a cake made to her specifications. She found Piece of Cake on the Facebook group, “Mat-Su Valley Who to Use.”

Michael said the bakery’s reputation hasn’t come just from making good specialty cakes, but from making the customers a part of the process.

“We really build everything to the person, and so I’ll find out, do you have a hobby, do you have a favorite color, do you have a nerd passion — is there some way for us to tie you into the cake?”

Self echoed those thoughts.

“We are limited by your imagination, and that’s it,” she said.

The women are now preparing to relocate the bakery to Michael’s home across from Colony Middle School, where theu hope to have a commercial kitchen installed by the end of next summer.

To learn more about Piece of Cake, visit pieceofcakeak.com or facebook.com/PieceofCakeLLC.

Contact reporter Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.