By Abby Carella, Multimedia Editor
It is Saturday morning and sisters, junior Elli Mayock and ‘Stoga 19 alum Anna Mayock, roll out of bed and head into their kitchen to pull out the eggs and flour. Back in March, during quarantine, the girls began baking birthday cakes for relatives who later urged them to start their own business. Today, the girls co-run “BakedbyMayock” and have sold over 40 items to families across the Main Line.
“We have always liked (baking) and we would see photos of different kinds of cakes and were like, ‘Oh, let’s replicate that,’ and then it kind of just turned into something more,” Anna Mayock said.
The BakedbyMayock menu is filled with dozens of items, ranging from brown butter chocolate chip cookies to coffee cake muffins to sea salt caramel blondies to funfetti layer cake. During winter, peppermint and pumpkin items were added. When summer rolls around, the girls hope to add lighter and fruitier desserts. Their most popular item, the compost cookie, is filled with butterscotch and chocolate chips, coffee grounds, pretzels, potato chips and graham crackers.
“It’s pretty much an everything but the kitchen sink type of thing,” Elli Mayock said.
While the compost cookie may be their most popular, the sisters always recommend their favorite, the frosted layer cake.
“Oreo or graham cracker frosting is our personal (favorite). If anyone ever asks what frosting to get, we tell them that,” Elli Mayock said.
The girls always loved to bake but have been tweaking their technique the last few months. They started with boxed mixes and have worked their way up, through trial and error, to their current perfected recipes.
“We always watched “Cake Boss” when we were younger. We have always been into watching baking shows. So, seeing some of their techniques and implementing them into our own has been helpful,” Elli Mayock said.
While the girls can currently whip up a cake with little to no incident, the first few weeks were much more hit or miss.
“Sometimes we would be making a cake and it just wouldn’t be going how we wanted and we would kind of have a little break down, but then were like, extra cake for us! So, there are always baked goods in our house and when that happens, we just scratch it, and restart,” Anna Mayock said.
All desserts on the menu can also be made gluten free or vegan, a decision that was important to the girls.
“It’s becoming so popular these days, and we normally don’t eat that much dairy and we know a lot of people that are the same. So, it’s nice always having it as an option when you (can) find good ingredients that you can swap it out with that doesn’t affect the taste or bake. It was just finding those ingredients, which was super easy, so why not,” Anna Mayock said.
The girls, who run a company Instagram with nearly 200 followers, manage orders via direct message. They file all the information into a spreadsheet, such as desired flavor and pick up/drop off date. While both girls bake, Anna Mayock helps with organization of profits and Elli Mayock focuses on taking pictures for their social media accounts.
Currently, the girls are working on expanding their business in terms of finding new customers and figuring out how to mail cakes.
“It is hard to figure out packaging of the layer cake and keeping it cool and paying all the shipping fees,” said Anna Mayock. “People ask us, ‘Can you ship my friend a cake for her birthday’, and that is something we definitely want to be able to do.”
With an overflow of customers and a growing business, the girls always make sure to prioritize time for personal baking.
“I mean obviously we’re not spooning batter into our mouths when we are baking for customers but when it comes to baking stuff for ourselves…” Anna Mayock said
“All bets are off,” Elli Mayock said laughing.
