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Baking to perfection
By Kalea Hall
HUBBARD
Inside a quaint country kitchen is an artist consistently working on her craft.
Jill Beck wasn’t much of a girly girl growing up, her mom says, but she’s a natural in the kitchen.
A flip through of Beck’s cake creation book will show anyone that.
“A lot of people don’t know about me,” Beck said.
But the ones who do brag and bring more business to Beck’s boutique-style bakery, Jill’s Mixing Bowl.
Her kitchen she shares with her family in their Hubbard home on Pothour Wheeler Road is her bakery.
On the fridge is a calender filled with orders – she’s booked until November. On the counter are the flour, sugar and salt bowls. On the table are examples of Beck’s talent with turning homemade marshmallow fondant into 3-D characters, creating the perfect cupcake and building unforgettable wedding cakes. Hidden in the orderly kitchen are the tools of a baker: pans, mixers and recipes.
Beck is a perfectionist who doesn’t mind waking up at the crack of dawn to mix up some fresh cupcakes or get ready to be a part of someone’s big wedding day.
She markets her small business by word of mouth and makes it known: Smaller is better.
“That’s what’s great about a home business because, yes, I can’t take that many orders, but I promise it will look great because I am the only one decorating it,” Beck said.
Beck got started as a baker as a young girl. When she wasn’t being out with her brother playing with worms and toads like every tomboy, she was in the kitchen with her mom, Pamela Haggerty.
Haggerty also is a baker and used to bake specialty cakes with a help from her daughter.
“She would always help me,” Haggerty said. “We work really well together.”
Beck remembers her mom making her birthday cakes, including a Cabbage Patch Doll cake and a My Little Pony cake. Haggerty also would bake cakes to make some money on the side, but the pressure of baking for money wasn’t for her. So, she started baking for free.
“I would do it as a blessing to people who couldn’t afford it,” she said.
Beck’s grandmother and Haggerty’s mother, Sharon Waldschmidt , who lives in Illinois, also passed along the baking trait to Beck.
Her grandmother had a commercial kitchen in her home and made wedding cakes for 30 years.
Both grandma and mom were happy to see Beck turn her baking for family into baking for her own business. Beck has been baking full-time since 2014. She started with Facebook to promote her cakes, and from there, the business just blew up.
“It got to the point where my customers advertised for me and I didn’t have to advertise,” she said.
Her baking family gave her some insight on making the perfect cake. For example, most people bake cakes at 350 degrees, but to get the cake even more moist, Beck bakes at 325 degrees.
She’s also learned what works for her and how to not overwhelm herself with orders.
She doesn’t bake cakes the day before an event. They are actually baked a couple of days in advance, and the buttercream icing has to sit overnight on the cake so when the fondant is placed, the cake has those “nice sharp edges,” Beck explained.
“I have had so many compliments on my icing and definitely have the decorating skills,” she said. “I just look at a picture and create it. And the funny thing is, I was horrible at art in high school.”
Beck knows her expertise in baking is with fondant sculpting and not carved cakes, and she tells her customers that.
With fondant creating, it’s all about practice and more practice, she says.
“It took me a long time to get down,” she said.
For her customer Mariah Vazquez, Beck has created eight cakes over the last two years. Vazquez always puts in her orders for her three children’s birthdays.
The first cake Vazquez ordered was “Walking Dead”-themed and topped with a zombie missing an arm. The arm even came with a little exposed bone.
“The cakes are just so detailed, and it’s amazing,” Vazquez said. “She’s the best.”
Beck also made a Wonder Woman cake for Vazquez’s daughter’s birthday that wowed everyone.
Her family loves not only the art of the cake, but the flavor. Vazquez is happy with the affordable cost.
“They pick what they want and how they want it, and she delivers, and they are amazed when they see it,” Vazquez said.
Haggerty, who works as Beck’s assistant in delivering cakes and working farmers markets, is amazed by her daughter’s work.
Her favorite cake is one Beck designed for a friend. The wedding cake came with piano keys, and to top it off, Beck used edible paper to make notes of the customer’s own composition and put it on the cake.
“I am so excited for her and the business she has,” Haggerty said. “She’s a perfectionist. She wants to do things right.”
Beck has more than 20 cake flavors on her list, and she says that keeps growing. Her filling list is up to 17.
One day, Beck would like to move her bakery out of her kitchen, but staying small to keep it perfect is what she always wants.
“What I do is [make] high-end cakes,” she said. “It’s art.”
You can find Beck’s cupcakes Friday and Saturday at The Shop on Liberty Street at 20 W. Liberty St. in Hubbard. The local handmade shop is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Friday and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday.
For information on Jill’s Mixing Bowl, follow the business on Facebook.