{"id":17323,"date":"2012-10-08T16:16:19","date_gmt":"2012-10-08T20:16:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=17323"},"modified":"2012-10-08T16:16:19","modified_gmt":"2012-10-08T20:16:19","slug":"her-passion-for-food-leads-to-bakery-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=17323","title":{"rendered":"Her Passion For Food Leads To Bakery Business"},"content":{"rendered":"

BY IRIS B. HOLTON<\/strong>
\n Sentinel City Editor<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mrs. Michelle Aiken<\/strong> admits that she has always had a passion for food. However, after graduating from the University of South Florida, she entered the business arena.<\/p>\n

After experiencing many changes in the field, she decided the time had come to nurture that passion. She said the changes in corporate America forced her to pursue her first love — full time.<\/p>\n

So, three years ago, Mrs. Aiken<\/strong> opened the doors of Michelle\u2019s Cakes Galore Baking and Caf\u00e9. The first year, she operated out of a commercial kitchen before she was ready to open her own shop.<\/p>\n

Mrs. Aiken<\/strong> relocated Michelle\u2019s Cakes Galore Baking and Caf\u00e9 to 12029 E. U. S. Highway 92, in Seffner and has operated from that location for the past two years.<\/p>\n

\u201cComing from a family of 9 kids, we all learned to cook because we shared chores. But food is my passion. I love to eat and I like different foods. That\u2019s why my cakes have lots of flavor,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

In the beginning, she also offered sandwiches, but now she dedicates the bulk of her time to her cake creations. However, she does cater events.<\/p>\n

When it comes to food, she feels that not only must it taste good, it must also have eye appeal and look good. After all, presentation can be very persuasive when a person is considering purchasing desserts.<\/p>\n

Ms. Aiken<\/strong> applies two stages to her creations. The first is she adds special homemade flavor and lots of love. And then, she steps into her element of creation.
\nHer decorations range from the traditional to the odd, with one requester wanting a cake that symbolized a man on fire. She made it happen and has a photograph to show for it.<\/p>\n

Mrs. Aiken<\/strong> also works by inspiration and said her greatest enjoyment is making people happy.<\/p>\n

Established in the business with 2 employees and her daughters helping out, Mrs. Aiken<\/strong> is turning her attention to her next venture.<\/p>\n

She refers to her creations as \u201cworks of art\u201d and she doesn\u2019t mind helping others to be creators in their own right. She hopes to open a cake and design school. \u201cMy vision is to help and inspire low to moderate income individuals to help them.\u201d<\/p>\n

A native of Port St. Joe, Mrs. Aiken<\/strong> moved to Tampa to attend college and made it her home. She is married and the mother of two daughters. She is a member of First Missionary Baptist Church of Seffner, and enjoys spending time with her family, tasting and trying new food, and she loves to dine at new places.<\/p>\n

And, she still considers her cake creations as a hobby. For additional information about the shop visit\u00a0www.michellescakesgalore.com.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BY IRIS B. HOLTON Sentinel City Editor Mrs. Michelle Aiken admits that she has always had a passion for food. However, after graduating from the University of South Florida, she entered the business arena. After experiencing many changes in the field, she decided the time had come to nurture that passion. She said the changes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":210,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","pmpro-has-access"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/210"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17323\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}