20 Time March 15/March 22, 2021
baker of choice for her friends—even crafting
a wedding cake for a former boss—but had
always resisted committing to another creative
(and potentially financially risky) pursuit. But
quarantine was a game changer. “I was like, O.K.,
well, the one thing I can do is focus on my baking,”
she says. “I had time.”
After six years of working multiple jobs in
New York, the free time was itself a novelty. The
other surprise: demand for desserts. Crowder
started adding to her recipe arsenal and experi-
menting with more intricate designs. Orders for
her sweets— cheesecakes frosted to look like oil
paintings; towering chocolate cakes flecked with
gold leaf— tripled in a month. The short film, in-
tended as a proof-of- concept project for Crowder
and her partner, Adam Hardman, to take to Hol-
lywood, fell by the wayside. And when the couple
moved to Long Beach, Calif., last summer, Sugar
and Bite went too, and through a virtual inspec-
tion, they received a government certification to
make and sell goods from their new home’s kitchen.
They adapted as the demand shifted: when the
local farmers market was looking for a bread seller,
Crowder and Hardman started making bread. The
operation has continued to grow. Their farmers-
market stand sells out weekly, no matter how much
bread—and cake— Crowder brings. Custom orders
are pouring in through a recently launched website,
and they just opened a pop-up stand in a local shop.
“We’re going to have to expand soon to a com-
mercial kitchen,” Crowder says. The couple has al-
ready maxed out storage in their apartment; bags
of flour and cooling racks fill the linen closet, and
the fridge is “jam-packed with doughs resting.”
They work in shifts, with Hardman waking up at
5 a.m. to bake bread, sometimes just an hour afterWhen Tui TuileTa lefT honolulu for college
in 2016, he was renowned for his skills in volleyball,
not baking. But these days, the 6-ft.-2-in. former U.S.
national volleyball team member, who has since re-
turned home, is best known around his native Oahu
as the Kuki Man, thanks to his delectable cookies,
which have soared in popularity in the past year.
Tuileta, 25, lost his job as a fire-knife dancer
performing at luaus when the COVID-19 pandemic
prompted shutdowns throughout the service in-
dustry in 2020. While he’s the first to admit he’s no
kitchen whiz, Tuileta turned to baking in his new-
found free time to satisfy his own lifelong craving
for cookies. “If there’s one thing I can make, it’s
cookies,” he says. His friends, who followed him on
Insta gram when he started posting about the des-
serts he was baking for himself last spring, quickly
caught on. Soon, requests to buy his chunky, gooey
creations rolled in.
Tuileta made his first cookie deliveries on
April 1 last year. Now he is baking up to 400 cook-
ies a week out of his parents’ oven, and deliver-
ing them all locally on the same day with the help
of a friend. He insists the cookies, which come in
limited- edition flavors like 3-in.-thick S’mores and
Reese’s-topped peanut butter, taste best when they
are fresh. Responding to popular demand, Tuileta
will launch a website this month making stateside
shipping available. And looking ahead to the end of
the pandemic, Tuileta sees no reason to step back
from his baking business.
“I’ll make cookies during the day,” he says, “and
fire-knife dance at night.”
TuileTa is noT The only one turning to the
kitchen to feed more people than just himself.
Across the U.S., some have found time and oppor-
tunity amid the upheaval caused by COVID-19 to
create sweet new entrepreneurial ventures.
Actor Whitney Crowder was in the midst of pro-
ducing and starring in a short film in March 2020
when the pandemic prompted shutdowns across
New York City, putting her plans on indefinite
hold. Her jobs as a bartender and pastry chef at a
restaurant disappeared. Crowder was left with a
500-sq.-ft. apartment in Queens and her side proj-
ect: baking cakes and taking custom dessert orders
through her Instagram account, Sugar and Bite.
A self-taught chef, Crowder was for years the
‘Everyone
wants
to feel
connected,
and the
best way
to do that
is through
social
media and
bread.’
Ashley CoiffardHome bakers
find sweet
success in
tough times
By Raisa Bruner
TheBrief Business
LADY AND THE CHOCOLATE
Sara Armet delivers chocolate
bark by bicycle