From Easy-Bake Oven to Michelin star kitchen: How a 28-year-old launched an online bakery in Toronto
![Table Talk Marchelle Mckenzie. (Photo credit by Tamar Yashooa)](/content/dam/ctvnews/en/images/2021/12/23/table-talk-1-5718686-1640303589963.jpeg)
When Marchelle Mckenzie was five, her parents gifted her an Easy-Bake Oven.
“I’ve been baking ever since,” Mckenzie told CTV News Toronto.
At 28, Mckenzie already has numerous Michelin star restaurants stacked under her apron of experience. Yet still, she glances at that Easy-Bake Oven as she folds tahini and maldon sea salt into enough batter to make 900 brownies every week for her online bakery, Butter and Spice.
“I look at it every day for inspiration,” she said.
Photo credit by Tamar Yashooa
While her baked goods business officially launched in 2020, in truth, the bakery’s roots date back far before the pandemic to when she was a 13-year-old growing up in Mississauga.
When Mckenzie was entering grade eight, she launched M.A.M bakery, an abbreviation of her initials. She baked six-packs of cupcakes for the reasonable price of $2.75 and her brother delivered them. They even created posters on Microsoft Paint to advertise their business.
In high school, the bakery evolved into Mckenzie slipping packages of Betty Crocker sugar cookies into classmates' hands in exchange for cash in the hallway.
“My parents said, ‘You need to stop, you’re making too much money,’” Mckenzie said.
For a number of years, the bakery came to a halt while Mckenzie worked as a pastry chef in world-renowned kitchens like Eleven Madison Park in New York and Restaurant Story in London.
Photo credit by Tamar Yashooa
After her stint in England, Mckenzie planned a trip to Malaysia to visit her parents for a few months. But, while she was set to leave in March 2020, the world had other plans. She was stuck for four months.
When Mckenzie finally made it back to Toronto in June 2020, she found a part-time job at the Rolling Pin, a creative donuts shop in North York.
“I needed something else to compensate for my income,” Mckenzie said. “I was like, I need to do Butter and Spice, again, for real.”
Six months into the official launch of Butter and Spice, Mckenzie curtailed her business into a full-time operation, struggling to keep up with the pace of her top seller, cornflake and OG fudgy dark chocolate brownies.
For the holidays, Mckenzie says she’s been hustling to create Christmas-themed cookie boxes filled with lemon thyme, chai and ginger cookies, along with seasonal brownies like her ginger cookie dough topped with espresso glaze.
Photo credit by Tamar Yashooa
Back in the summer, Mckenzie started developing these holiday assortments. In that same nature, she’s already looking two to three years ahead at potentially moving her online bakery into a physical shop.
One of her first orders of business will be hanging the poster she created with her brother for M.A.M. bakery in Butter and Spice.
“When I actually have a storefront, I’ll put that up to show where I’ve come from,” she said.
Background
Table Talk is a weekly CTV News Toronto series that explores the people who shape Toronto’s food scene, published every Friday at CTVNewsToronto.ca
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
![](https://www.ctvnews.ca/polopoly_fs/1.6943007.1719487483!/httpImage/image.png_gen/derivatives/landscape_800/image.png)
NEW You might live to be 100 years old. But will you be able to afford it?
Retirement has historically lasted about two decades, but for some Canadians it is now extending to twice that amount of time as more live well into their 90s and beyond. That's making some rethink their investments, savings, expenses and when to retire.
NEW Unknown First World War soldier who died in battle in France to be honoured in Newfoundland and Labrador
Millions are celebrating Canada’s 157th birthday this year – as they do every year - with fireworks, food and family. In Newfoundland, it is a day of mourning for one of the bloodiest battles of the First World War.
Cup Noodles wants to rethink the way you eat ramen with new s'mores flavour
Ramen isn't the first food to come to mind when you think of sweet treats. Cup Noodles is trying to change that — with a new s’mores-flavoured instant ramen.
Deal reached in WestJet mechanics' strike, but travel disruptions still expected
WestJet has reached a deal with its mechanics to end a strike that had disrupted the travel plans of tens of thousands of travellers over the Canada Day long weekend.
50-year-old Halifax church hall coming down at end of summer, forcing daycare, non-profit to move
A nearly 50-year-old church hall in Halifax is coming down at the end of summer, prompting a daycare and a non-profit organization using the space to find new accommodations.
Eight 'tow truck-related' shootings in Toronto, no injuries reported: police
Toronto police are looking for a stolen vehicle in connection with at least eight separate shootings in the city over the weekend.
Neighbour on the hook for $3,675 in damages due to 'nuisance cedar': B.C. tribunal
A B.C. man who reneged on a deal to split the cost of removing a tree with his next-door neighbour is now on the hook for the whole amount, B.C.’s civil resolution has ruled.
NEW How to exercise when it's too hot outside
How hot is too hot for exercising outdoors? Is it safe to exercise outside at some times of the day? Should younger or older people take more precautions in the heat?
Hurricane Beryl takes aim at southeastern Caribbean as a powerful Category 4 storm
Hurricane Beryl began pounding the southeast Caribbean on Monday as a powerful Category 4 storm after becoming the earliest storm of that strength to form in the Atlantic, fuelled by record warm waters.