Making it big by baking!

They left their corporate lives to start their own baking businesses and couldn’t be happier. With scrumptious cupcakes, cakes, brownies and cookies to serve, these city-based entrepreneurs aim to make it big.

Mohena Aluwalia

Mohena started baking at the age of 19 by making cupcakes and chocolates for friends and family. Having studied retail, she joined her father’s shop and also gave guest lectures at design colleges like FAD and IMS. Mohena has now started a full-fledged baking business and serves some of the finest made cupcakes online simultaneously acting as a guest lecturer on the side. When we asked her why she bakes she said, “Baking makes me happy. It is as simple as that. Why would I not do something that gives me happiness?” The cupcakes and cakes she makes are both of the traditional flavours and innovations that she loves doing.
Once Upon A Cake: www.onceuponacake.com

Adil Desai

Following in his father’s footsteps, Adil Desai, 23, has set up his own bakery, ‘Super Hott’. His father was his biggest inspiration he says, “I have seen my father bake since I remember during my childhood and that is when I decided that baking is what I wanted to do as well.” He also said that he used to help his father bake as a child but the first time he baked a cake on his own was when he was 13. Adil has also attended a baking course in the US, while he was studying there. He currently is fully occupied with his baking business and helps his father in the same as well. Even before his bakery, ‘Super Hott’, Adil had started a cafe, ‘Hott n Chill’ when he was 19. His bakery offers everything from customised cakes to everyone’s favourite chocolate cakes along with some mouth watering cupcakes.
Super Hott: Coming soon in Wanowrie

Babita Karkaria

After working in the corporate world for 13 years, Babita made up her mind to take a break from it. She flew off to France for six months to learn under Chef Jerome Langiller and mastered the art of baking the traditional French cakes only to come back to Pune and open a patisserie. Babita was driven towards baking because of her love for croissants and baked her first cake when she was 15. “Baking is a scientific process where every measurement needs to be accurate and this in some odd way acts as my stress buster.” She calls her patisserie the ‘French Window’ as she believes that everything she prepares is her own interpretation of the French delicacies.

French Window: Lane 5, Koregaon Park

Rayvti Bhatnagar

At the age of 20, Rayvti decided she wanted something different out of life and her love for sweets drove her to a baking class. A few months of classes later, she opened her own cake venture and serves an array of cupcakes and cakes at really affordable prices online. Rayvti said, “I have big dreams and will accomplish them all soon. I want to start my own cafe.” She started baking at the age of 12 with little things she would make for herself and her family. The interest soon caught up. Rayvti is currently studying alongside her baking business and says that she loves the balancing act.
Frosted: http://vash1812.wix.com/rayvtibh

Let’s hear what these well-known faces from Pune have to say about baking...

It lets your creativity flow

Baking is both an art and science. It is a fascinating concept and helps one explore their creativity to the fullest. I started baking when I was about 15 years old, and to my surprise got my first cake right. It’s a simple process and once you get the basics right you can then let your creativity flow.
Kiran Bhat, owner of an advertising agency

Baking means friends & family

I relate baking to special occasions and to my friends and family cause it is for them that I bake and they eat it no matter what has gone wrong with it. I baked my first cake under my mom’s supervision when I was in school. Now, I use my own measurements and they come out quite right somehow. Christmas cakes are my favourite, to bake and to eat.
Priya Jacob, Marketing VP

Mom baked my birthday cakes at home

As a child and even now, the best part of baking for me is eating the cake batter. I am a vegan, so most of the cakes I make are eggless. My mom was a baker and I have had almost all my birthday cakes made by my mom and this made my birthdays happier. The first time I made something on my own were brownies around seven years back, but they were not how they are supposed to be. They became all gooey but were delicious nonetheless.
Tanvi Kulkarni, Business Woman

I learnt baking for my children

I love the art of baking and everything attached to it because of my mother. She was a wonderful baker and made the most delicious rum and blueberry cakes. We never knew where she got all the ingredients from as they were hard to get when I was a child but she managed them somehow. I learnt baking for my kids and it is a mother thing. My mother would often wait for us to have the first bite of the cake she made and tell her how good they were and well she deserved every bit of it. Cinnamon roles were another thing that she would make often.
Riyona Biyani, Owner of a spa

I baked a surprise cake for hubby on our anniversary

I baked my first cake, a chocolate cake when I was in school, it was a part of our curriculum. The fun of baking is in the accuracy that goes into it with all the detailed measurements. And the process too. I baked a mango cheese cake for my husband on our one-month anniversary and he was very surprised. There is a joy in baking no matter what it is.
Bhargavi Chirmule, Actor

Our baker friend from Calcutta

I started baking when my daughter was born because I did not want her to eat from outside. The online videos and trial and error was my only help. After a while, I started loving the process so much that I started baking often and my friends and family encouraged me to work on it as a business. I stared to bake from home under the name, ‘Cakewaali’ and receive most of my order from Facebook and word of mouth. A chocolate cake with extra chocolate ganache is my favourite, but my two-and-a-half-year-old daughter loves the cream cheese pound cake .
Esha Kak, Home baker