October 2024

Frenchmen Street bakery owners Kelly Jacques and Samantha Weiss have created an in-house incubator, educating and encouraging employees taking first steps toward entrepreneurship.

– by Kim Ranjbar

photos by Ellis Anderson

This Saturday and Sunday marks the 4th weekend of Bella McDow’s new pop-up at Ayu Bakehouse. After normal hours every weekend this October, the bakery is under the guise of Semita Mamita Baking Co., a Latin American-inspired panadería serving tastes of McDow’s childhood in El Salvador. Pineapple pastelitos and colorful, crunchy-topped concha stuffed with an apple cheesecake filling will share a pastry case with chocolate chip pecan cookies and chicken boudin empanadas. 

McDow came by this opportunity through a unique project dubbed the Ayu Schoolhouse, an employee benefit program recently launched by Ayu Bakehouse owners Kelly Jacques and Samantha Weiss. 

“It transpired because members of our staff asked us practically from day one, telling us that they want to open their own business someday,” says Weiss. “What books should they read? What classes should they take?”

It’s a progressive management perspective for the Marigny neighborhood bakery that opened its doors only two years ago. Located on the corner across from Washington Square Park, many remember when the space was home to Santa Fe, a restaurant which now lies on Esplanade in Bayou St. John. 

The building underwent a lavish, historical renovation in 2016, but the commercial space sat empty until Kelly Jacques spotted it in the early part of 2021. “There's no way we're gonna be able to get this space,” she thought. “It's too perfect.”

Both Weiss and Jacques traveled convoluted paths on their way to opening a corner cafe and bakery on Frenchmen Street. After graduating from Northeastern University, Weiss was working at a New York financial services company when she decided to take night classes in pastry at the ICC (International Culinary Center) – which is where she first met Jacques. 

Though it took her several years to pull away from finance and move towards a career in the hospitality industry, Weiss knew she wanted a change. 

“I didn't like talking about what I did for work with other people. I wanted to feel proud of what I'm doing.” As it turns out, combining her knowledge of business and finance with her culinary skills learned at ICC was the answer. 

Weiss honed her skills working as a pastry cook at Manhattan restaurant Ai Fiori under renowned chef and restaurateur Michael White and later Jacques Torres – French pastry chef and Dean of Pastry Arts at ICC – as Operations Manager for his retail shops in New York. Then, right as the pandemic was taking hold, she moved to Oakland, California to support her partner’s career in software development.

Much like Weiss, Kelly Jacques initially envisioned a very different career path. Originally from Annapolis, Maryland, Jacques relocated to New Orleans to attend Tulane University as a pre-med student. 

“I was in the thick of studying organic chemistry when I thought ‘I don't like this at all.’” Baking became therapeutic, making quick breads and cookies for study groups helped relieve stress and when Jacques realized she was baking more than studying, she knew it was time for a change.

After talking with her parents, Jacques switched her focus to major in glassblowing. “Much more practical than medicine,” she jokes. 

“I stumbled onto it while taking painting classes. All my friends are writing these ten-page term papers and I'm lighting things on fire and welding molds together.” Jacques quickly recognized she felt most at home working with her hands.

Post graduation, Jacques started her own pop-up called The Bikery, delivering baked goods for pets and their humans on her bike. 

“It was such a blast but I underestimated how much work it is to do it alone,” she admits. “It turns out certain cookies just should not be biked around the city for 45 minutes.”  

She later spent a year working as a pastry cook at NOLA, a now-defunct French Quarter restaurant owned by Emeril Lagasse. It was then Jacques decided to jump in with both feet and left to study pastry at the ICC in New York. 

“I thought If I don't leave, I'll only ever learn bread pudding!” she quipped. 

Jacques expected to return to New Orleans after culinary school, but ended up staying in New York for 9 years, working her way from bread baker to operations manager at Breads Bakery. “I really love making a system out of baking and production, making the whole thing run.”  

At last, unable to resist the pull, Jacques returned to New Orleans and settled in Bywater just before the COVID shutdowns began. Her friendship with Weiss remained strong over the years and she lured Weiss away from California with her plans to open a bakery.

Weiss was an easy sell and understood her friend’s motivations. “Kelly is a work-a-holic and New York City will take advantage of those personalities.” 

“New Orleans balances me out in the way that New York just swallows me whole,” admits Jacques. “It’s a place that I associate with community.” 

Together Jacques and Weiss built out their plan – renting the space on Frenchmen Street; hiring local architectural firm Farouki Farouki to create the interior’s soft, adobe-like, art deco design; and launching Ayu Bakehouse (Ayu translates to graceful or beautiful in Malay) – all at a time when the city was re-emerging from the pandemic and struggling to repair the damage caused by Hurricane Ida.    

Since it opened, the Marigny bakery has been lauded in many local and national publications including New Orleans Magazine, Adore, Garden & Gun and Bon Appetit.  A poll conducted by NOLA.com, gathering input from over 300,000 locals, named their “Croissant City Classic King Cake” as the best in town for the 2024 Mardi Gras season.

Just this past June, Weiss returned to town invigorated after attending FAB, a three-day workshop for women in the hospitality industry held in Charleston, South Carolina.  

“It was refreshing to be around people in the business sharing knowledge and making connections,” she confessed. “I felt like this is what I've been looking for.” 

Inspired by open book management practices and creating transparency in the workplace, Weiss and Jacques decided to set up an in-house business incubator called the Ayu Schoolhouse, offering to teach their employees the skills needed to launch their own businesses. 

“We let them come up with their own business idea, and we take them through the steps of creating a business,” explains Weiss. 

Within a month they launched the Ayu Schoolhouse, offering their staff classes with a wide range of subjects, from the Science of Bread and the Art of Hospitality to Leadership and How to Make a Budget. They also invited guest speakers to talk about their experiences and knowledge in the industry. 

Towards the end of September, the participating staff presented their final ideas, and after being reviewed by Weiss and Jacques, guest judges and a public Instagram poll, the Semita Mamita pop-up pitch by Bella McDow was greenlit and ready to go. 

“She'll keep all the profits. At the end we’ll do a full financial analysis, and present a big Publishers Clearing House check,” says Weiss, laughing.

McDow, who grew up in El Salvador, has been working at the Frenchmen Street bakery for almost two years. Before the 21-year-old started her bakester education at Ayu, everything Bella learned was either self-taught or from her Abuelita. 

“I would sneak into her kitchen and bake a new recipe while blasting music in my headphones” confides Bella. “I would bake for comfort, de-stressing, and just for fun.” 

“I attended almost all Ayu Schoolhouse classes either virtually, or in person,” says McDow. “I learned a lot! Business, marketing, finance, recipe testing – I've been enjoying my pop-up and plan to continue after this month at Ayu.”

While the incubator helped McDow off to a successful start, not everyone has the time, energy or desire to run their own business, and that’s okay. 

“If you go through this whole process and decide I don’t want to open a business, that is a great conclusion,” explains Weiss. “It’s easy to jump into it because it's exciting, but once you really consider things like costs, how much could be left at the end, and oh - I forgot to pay myself, and how tired I am…” some students decide they’re happier without the additional responsibilities. 

“We’re trying to give everybody a little piece of this glamorous reality that we live.” Weiss says with a smile. 

Bella McDow’s Semita Mamita Baking Co. is popping-up Fridays and Saturdays from 4:30-7pm until November 2nd at Ayu Bakehouse.    

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