'Next Great Baker' opens new shop
The front door opens and Tucker Aliberti and his mom, Julie, from Avon Grove, Pennsylvania, walk into Dana Herbert's new bakery on Kirkwood Highway.
Tucker is wearing a Carlo's Bake Shop T-shirt, which he bought when "Cake Boss" Buddy Valastro spoke in Wilmington two years ago. That same night, Tucker and his mom bought a cookbook from Herbert, the Delaware baker who won the title of "The Next Great Baker" on a "Cake Boss" spinoff in 2011.
Just a few minutes before they arrived Tuesday afternoon, Julie had realized that Herbert's long-anticipated bakery was finally open.
"I saw it on Facebook and said, 'Let's go,' " she says. Tucker beams at Herbert and then sets about the difficult task of deciding between a creamsicle, red velvet, vanilla or chocolate cupcake ($2.89), or a mango cheesecake ($3.79), or a Death by Chocolate pastry ($4.95, and the most popular item on the menu), or an individual Southern Lemon cake – the cake he invented for "Next Great Baker" after Buddy dissed his chocolate cake ($4.95).
The front door opens and Amy Roedersheimer, who's just been getting her hair done at Trilogy Salon next door, walks in. The staff there told her the bakery was open.
"So I thought, oooooo, a treat," she says.
Then the front door opens again and Stacey Contini, of Newark, walks in.
"Oh, it is Dana! THE Dana!" she exclaims when she spots the black-clad Herbert behind the counter, where he's assigned himself cashier duty for the afternoon. Contini's also a "Cake Boss" fan and watched Herbert win his title. She also saw on the Internet that the store was open.
And the new Desserts by Dana won't even have a full case of goodies until Saturday's grand opening from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Herbert has been saying since he won the baker title that he was looking for a new storefront bakery. His last one on U.S. 13 in New Castle wasn't as visible as it could have been. He's had several possible locations, but negotiations fell through or he pulled back. This new site in Red Mill Square, officially at 1212 Capitol Trail, at the Polly Drummond Road intersection, fit the bill perfectly when a cupcake shop moved out.
He expects it to get neighborhood traffic, as well as sales from Newark and Bear residents driving by, Hockessin and Pike Creek residents coming down Polly Drummond – and, a big surprise to him – the kids from nearby Shue Middle School.
"About 2:30 p.m., you just see this stream of kids come by," he says. "I'm like, oh, my goodness. I had no idea."
With a combination of a bank loan and help from his parents, Herbert set about designing and fitting out the new place, only to discover what many small business owners find: It's a long process filled with many delays related to contractors and inspections, and all kinds of surprises you don't anticipate, including having to pick out the decor. That's what threw him the most: the decor.
"Does it look right? Does it project the image I want it to?" and "Wait a minute – I have to pay for new sconces?"
He settled on a tomato red, ivory and white color scheme that's both cheery and elegant.
"The impression I want people to carry away is that same message that came through on 'The Next Great Baker,' " Herbert says. "Here is a humble man who loves his family, his job and his community and we make pastries, brownies, cakes and desserts right here."
The bakery includes a room at the front window for brides and others to taste cakes and look through his portfolios; a counter and shopping area that abuts a room in which shoppers can watch the staff decorate cakes, especially toward the end of the week; and a nice-sized kitchen in the back, where staff were already baking spicy Mexican chocolate cookies for the weekend opening.
"I'm all about the people," Herbert says. "I like to talk to people, connect to people. Even though the business was doing well in our other location, I felt like that was missing. I'm a community guy. Now I get to see them and talk to them."
He's not surprised that people are interested in what they do and how they do it.
"Food has become such a popular thing," he says. "It's gone from nourishment and sustenance to entertainment. I figured what better way to connect with our customers that to let them see what we do."
The bakery will start the day with muffins ($2.19), scones ($1.79), danishes ($2.49), Chobani yogurt ($1.45) and the croissant-doughnut pastry known in New York as the Cronut (and whose name was trademarked by the creator) ($2.19) and coffee, with flavored syrups available ($1.79 per cup, with 40 cents per flavoring shot).
By Saturday, he and his 11 employees – including his wife, Netesha – will fill the cases with items can could include bread pudding (not priced yet), bacon chocolate chip, sugar, Mexican chocolate and lemon-thyme cookies ($1 each and up,) pecan bars (not priced yet) and tres leches cake ($3.49), among other things.
The tres leches (which translates as three milks) will be made from a recipe just given to Herbert by a friend Carmelo Oquendo, whom Herbert met on the second season of "The Next Great Baker."
"I have become a tres leches snob," Herbert says. "I try them everywhere, and he makes the best."
Cakes will sell for $40 for a 9-inch round with buttercream icing and $55 for fondant icing, and up.
The bakery will also sell UDCreamery ice cream in prepared pints, including vanilla, vanilla bacon, chocolate, strawberry shortcake, Southern lemon and maple corn.
Herbert expects the new bakery to help expand sales, because he didn't have a retail window front at his old location. He believes sales at the beginning of the week will rely on breakfast pastry and general sales in the beginning of the week, and be dominated by weekend event sales toward the end of the week. He makes about 50 cakes a week and hopes to expand that to 100. For the soft opening, he's making about 100 cupcakes a day and expects that to increase as people find the store.
Desserts by Dana is only 2 miles from Bing's Bakery on Main Street in Newark, which also has a "Cake Boss" tie. Bing's was just featured on "Buddy's Bakery Rescue." The longtime Newark landmark was facing steep debts and closure. Valastro advised them to pair back the magnitude of their offerings. Since then, and astride a swell of "buying local," the bakery seems to be enjoying a rise in business.
Herbert says everyone asks him about being so close to Bing's.
"You know I'm friends with the guys down at Bing's, so there's no ill will or anything like that. If they were in trouble or they needed the help, I'm all for Buddy helping them. At the end of the day, they have to take care of their family just like I have to take care of mine," Herbert says.
He expects the two bakeries will continue to refer business to each other, especially when that business feeds to a specialty of one of the bakeries. He believes Bing's will continue to draw a lot of the Main Street and University of Delaware business, and he'll draw from his neighborhood.
"Where we're at is very different areas," he says. "I think we'll do fine."
Herbert says he's delighted that old friends and fans are finding him. Latrelle Watkins, who just got her hair done at Trilogy, drops in for a cupcake. She went to the University of Delaware with Herbert's brother, Jeffrey, and is friends with one of his employees, LaTisha Mays.
She used to buy cakes from Herbert when he sold them out of his house.
"They're very moist," she says. "They, like, melt in your mouth."
Contact Betsy Price at (302) 324-2884 or beprice@delawareonline.com.
IF YOU GO
WHAT: Desserts by Dana
WHERE: 1212 Capitol Trail, which is at the intersection with Polly Drummond Road, next to Trilogy Salon
WHEN: 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday; 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday
FOR MORE INFORMATION:dessertsbydana.com; (302) 721-5798
THE GRAND OPENING: From 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday will feature face painting; cupcake races; DJ Amazing, a friend of Herbert's, spinning tunes in a tent and showing off the latest line dances; the first 100 people from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. get a free cupcake.