About
In a past professional life, I worked for a manufacturer who produced component parts for things we don’t want “the enemy” to know about. For reasons unknown to me, though if I had to guess I would say it was because nobody else wanted to do it, I was tasked with writing the procedure manual for complying with the International Traffic in Arm Regulations. People could have gone to jail if I got it wrong. I made a PowerPoint. It may have been animated.
I found that task less daunting than talking nice about myself in a serious manner. So, here goes. Gonna go with the extended version. I tend toward loquaciousness, I love to tell and hear a good story, and I have been asked about everything mentioned below a number of times. Continue at your own peril.
I left the aforementioned professional life when I found myself pregnant with my second child and my little family’s circumstances became such that I could stay home and “mom-it-up” as I say. I have always wanted to be a stay-at-home mom and have loved every minute of it. Heading into the stretch of life that would send that kid to kindergarten I began to ponder my options. Never one to sit still well I thought long and hard but didn’t quite land on a decision. Then I found myself all knocked up again. This was unexpected, highly unlikely, a little bit dangerous, and totally wonderful. Plans paused, gratefully.
Here a bit of sorrow enters. But that’s life, right? Sorrow and hardship are guaranteed, happiness and joy are not, but the latter is unknowable without the former.
A month after having my last little baby daughter my mom died. She was such a good Mommy. A bit of a legend in awesome mom-ness and as a cooker.
I don’t recall my thought process, nor could I describe all the things I felt at the time, but within 6 months of her passing I had decided to try this little business I have going on. A month or so later I was renting a shared commercial and a few months after that I officially started taking orders. The plan was to go slow and steady and to have my feet under me, ready and rearing to go big when Little Baby Daughter started kindergarten.
A little baking concern would be just the ticket. I could make my own hours, be my own boss and not have to be a boss (aforementioned professional life). I could make it fit into the nooks and crannies of a family of 5. Mom-it-up and bake it up. Sure, totally do-able.
I have thought, also long and hard, about how to capture the proper weight of the relationship with my mom without spewing forth far too much and not enough. Suffice it to say she brought my brother and I through a surprising amount of sorrow and hardship. And, man, she was so much fun. She was the love of my life. I did the math last night, as I have done many times in the last 7 years, and I am over 5000 phone calls behind our typical pace. That number doesn’t feel big enough.
Just one of the very special things about Mom was her prowess in the kitchen. There are moms the world over with a similar gift. Everything tastes good, a facility and efficiency in the process, and knack for adjustments, problem solving, an intuition. And, typical of those moms, she fed all the people at some point. Riding your bike and feeling peckish, go find Jill. She once iced my best friend’s little sister with royal icing, because Little Sister wanted to know what it felt like to be cake. Mom was an emergency contact at school for this little girl for years because “she is a good cooker”. Many of those 5000 conversations would have been about food in some way.
I imagine her with me when I am cooking for my family or when I am trying to figure out what to make the day before grocery day. I set her in my mind on a stool in my kitchen or the shared kitchen space, chattering away while I putter along battling fudge at Christmastime or test the 25th batch of Dark Chocolate Chip Cookie Mix to make sure it’s just right. She was riddled with arthritis and couldn’t do much, if any, hands-on help, but I can hear her raucously laughing and chasing my kids while the soup simmers. There she is bickering with me about how to season the gravy or whose chocolate chip cookies are better (mine and she grudgingly almost admitted it once). I love it. I carry her with me all the time, but she is mostly there when I am baking.
In keeping with the family theme and my own family, I chose the name Sweet Ace as a nod to my mother, the OG ace of sweets, and to her own daddy, a World War II reconnaissance ace. That logo is a rendering of the plane he flew, a P-51 Mustang. Man, I really do miss the ones who have gone.
Sweet Ace Cakes threw open its digital doors July 19, 2018, the day after Mom’s birthday. Things haven’t gone as planned, gratefully. I had intended to primarily pursue wholesale finished baked goods business. I now focus on Sweet Ace Mixes and Schmallows. Way better for the business and the nooks and crannies.
The mixes are born of the same recipes I use for my family, for swim team or school bake sales, or any time I bake. While there are similar recipes for many of the mixes out there, I have tinkered with all of these and consider them mine. None are taken 100% from anywhere else as far as I know. I use the same ingredients in the mixes and schmallows that I use for my own personal baking. It’s good stuff; Weisenberger Mill flour from Midway Kentucky, Guittard Chocolate Chips, Cocoa Barry Cocoa, fresh fruit purees, and scratch-made caramel. I refer to the baking mixes “as tag team baking”, I have done the measuring and figuring and the mix is passed along to another for 20 minutes of time together with family, mixing and stirring, sneaking chips and dipping fingers in dough. The next day a sweet treat in a lunch box and big smile thinking of each other.