Power Up the L’Oven: Interview with Bakers Holly and Jackie Hutchings |
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| Written by An Nguyen |
| Thursday, 23 April 2009 19:00 |
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Tasty, quirky, and delectable are just some of the words used to describe the impressive selection of treats produced by Holly and Jackie Hutchings, the owners of L’Oven bakery. Started in 2008, L’Oven desserts have become known for the freshness of their ingredients and their explosive taste. After the inaugural Capital Cupcake Camp event on March 29th, 2009, I had a chance to interview the baking sister duo to see what inspires them to create such delicious treats.
(Cult)ure: First off, congratulations on winning the award for ‘Best Chocolate Cupcake’ at the Capital Cupcake Camp. How did you feel when they announced that you were winners, and how did the idea to create this style of dessert come about? Holly & Jackie: Thank you. We didn’t come here to win contests; we just wanted to have fun experimenting with new recipes and check out the Ottawa cupcake scene. Winning was just the icing on the cake. We had a lot of fun with this one. The actual recipe used for our winning cupcake is a regular item on our menu, called ‘Before 9’. It’s a chocolate mint cupcake, but for this event we thought we’d experiment with something new; we took these cupcakes, rolled them with chocolate mint buttercream icing, put them on a stick, dipped them in dark chocolate and topped them with Junior Mints. (Cult)ure: You two are sisters who share a common bond when it comes to baking. Was it only natural that you both would start a business together? How long were the ideas floating around before L’Oven was started? L’Oven: We’ve always loved the idea of being entrepreneurs, and we’ve always loved to bake -- ever since childhood, playing with bowls and mixers at Grandma’s. Putting the two ideas together was easy, like it was meant to be.
(Cult)ure: I notice that your desserts are made from scratch and that you don’t use artificial flavours, colours, or preservatives. You also use real butter -- not shortening -- unbleached flours, organic cane sugar, and other top quality local or organic ingredients. Aside from the product tasting a lot better, are there other reasons why you choose to be organic in your approach to baking? L’Oven: We do pride ourselves in the quality of our baked goods – everyone wants a great-tasting treat! But the recipes we’ve put together are both delicious and nutritious (ha ha – well, at least they are much better for you than store-bought junk full of preservatives and dyes!). (Cult)ure: Aside from the unique names and interesting cupcake designs, what do you think sets you apart from other bakers? L’Oven: Well, besides covering all the basic cupcake ideas that are already out there, we’ve added some really interesting combinations to our menu. We absolutely love experimenting (and taste-testing), so we started a line of cupcakes that are infused with tea – we actually call them the ‘tea cups.’ And then we have other cupcakes that have vegetables ‘hidden’ in them! One of our favourites uses fresh puréed beets instead of butter and milk – it’s awesome – and so much better for you! In another one, instead of buttercream or cream cheese icing, we use chocolate avocado icing – no dairy - just puréed avocados!
(Cult)ure: When one reviews your menu of cupcakes, some names that jump off the page include: Stud Muffin, Green with Envy, Dirty Monkey, Nacho Libre, Before 9, Devil in Disguise, and Just Beet It. How did you come up with some of these fun names for your cupcakes? Are there any funny stories behind some of these cupcakes? L’Oven: Part of what we love about experimenting with recipes is coming up with creative names to go with the cupcakes. Most of the names we came up with ourselves, but before we really started L’Oven, we had a group of friends come over for a night of taste-testing and brainstorming. We decided to have a contest to see who could come up with the best name for our chocolate mint cupcake. So, our friend Scott is actually the creative genius behind ‘Before 9’. And our friend Crys, who was super pumped to try our new Earl Grey 'tea cup,' also came up with a fitting name for it – “London Fog”. We come up with new cupcakes and fun names almost weekly! We love it!
(Cult)ure: Some of your cupcakes have really obscure ingredient combinations. For example, your Nacho Libre cupcake contains salsa cake with cream cheese, guacamole and nacho. Are creations like this just stumbled upon by fun experimentation, or are they created through fierce cravings? How do you decide what ingredients to put together, and by doing so break conventional thinking when it comes to baking? L’Oven: Nacho Libre was a completely random experiment that we came up with while we had already started baking for Cupcake Camp. We’d had so much sugar that we craved something salty. These aren’t your typical ‘cupcakes’ – they’re more of a savoury appetizer. A few other fun combos are Cocoa-Merlot (who doesn’t love red wine and dark chocolate?!), Earthcake (vegan zucchini, lime and walnut with the chocolate avocado icing), and Cosmo (like the drink – cranberry, OJ and lime). We don’t really research each combination – it just sort of comes to us and we try it out! (Cult)ure: If you could invite six people (dead or alive) to a private tasting party to sample your treats, who would you invite? L’Oven: Funny question. It might be fun to have ‘The Two Fat Ladies’ (do you know them?!) because we don’t actually use three pounds of lard in our recipes; Oprah just because we think she’d appreciate our healthy spin on cupcakes; a Brit (e.g. David Bowie) to try out our ‘tea cups’; our brother Davis, who isn’t into vegetables at all; and why not add a little Richard Simmons to bounce off the wall?! (Cult)ure: As bakers, who would you say are your favourite people to bake for? Are there certain events which get you more excited than others? L’Oven: We have a girlfriend who recently had a baby, and she and her husband have been our biggest supporters since day one. So now that they’re a bit more house-bound, we really like bringing sample cupcakes over to them. As for events, we like them all, but we prefer not to use artificial dyes and we don’t really like using marzipan or fondant (because we aren’t fans of the taste and we prefer to sell things we personally like). (Cult)ure: What can we expect next for L’Oven? L’Oven: Our dream would be to open a shop in the next year or two, but given that we are both working two jobs, we’re just going to see what happens. You can be sure to find our cupcakes at the April 30th (Cult)ure and Ecology Ottawa Fundraiser. Also, this spring/summer we plan to be at the markets, cater a few weddings, and do some charities. We might look into providing baked goods to some local cafés or shops.
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