By their account (and Shuster’s), the retro-hip strategy is succeeding. They still have their day jobs — Willis is a statistician, while Huntsberger is the pastry chef for Spilled Milk Catering and works two days a week at Soupergirl — but Whisked! sales have been strong enough for them to hire a part-time baking assistant. Before the farmers market season ended in mid-November, the women regularly sold out of the dozens of pies and “pielets,” cookies, bars and loaf cakes they took every week.
And they’re looking to grow. They’d like to start saying yes to the frequent requests for wholesale jobs and to sell at more of their beloved farmers markets, but that goes back to the ongoing hunt for bigger kitchen space.
What about their market customers who don’t want to go without their weekly fix? The women are selling a couple of sweets at the Big Cheese truck and are appearing at the Downtown Holiday Market two Saturdays this month. Perhaps best of all, they have set up a pickup spot for their online orders. Every Friday night and Saturday, customers who ordered, say, a banana Nutella pie or a dozen cookies can pick them up at Mr. Yogato in Dupont Circle.
That fro-yo, come to think of it, would be a nice counterpoint to the salty-sweet crackerjack bars, a favorite of Shuster’s.
“The first time I sampled one, it took me right back to my childhood at the movies,” Shuster says. “I was looking for the tiny plastic figures!”
Huntsberger will answer questions about cookies and other holiday baking topics during the Free Range chat today at noon, at live.washingtonpost.com.
To order baked goods, go to www.whiskeddc.com and click on “Shop.” Orders placed by 11:59 p.m. Wednesdays can be picked up after 5 p.m. Fridays or noon-1 a.m. Saturdays at Mr. Yogato, 1515 17th St. NW.
Whisked! will sell at the Downtown Holiday Market, Eighth and F streets NW, Dec. 10 and 17, noon-8 p.m.
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