Chapter 8: The Accidental Baker

Raspberry Cake with cream cheese filling

I am the kind of person who should never be applauded. Tell me I’m good at something, and I will do it relentlessly until you’re absolutely sick of it. A friend once told me I looked great in a pair of jeans that I had just bought, so I wore them until she finally begged me to stop. And that, my dear reader, is how VeeNessTreats came to life. I’ve always loved baking, not so much for the fancy decorations, but for the joy home-made cakes bring.

Every time I joined a new workplace, I would casually mention that I bake, hoping someone would take the bait. And oh boy, did they every time, who does not want a sweet treat! Soon enough, an avalanche of cakes engulfed the office. One time, a colleague even joked that his wife might have a word with me because his waistline was expanding. To be fair, I wasn’t baking every week, just “seasonal” cakes to welcome the new weather (if such a thing even exists in Britain).

In the summer of 2012, I moved to Portsmouth, a place I would call home longer than anywhere else I’ve ever lived. I settled into the loft of a wonderful lady who, over time, became my aunt (because in Zimbabwe, if you’ve known someone for over five years, you’re basically family). She let me bake to my heart’s content, and to this day, I suspect I owe her a small fortune in electricity bills, but we’ll cross that bridge when I’m rich. One time, I baked a graduation cake for a nearby family, soon-to-be cousins, of course. They decided not to cut it at the venue, wanting to save it for a more intimate gathering. So, we all headed back to their place, and naturally, they asked me to do the honours. I sliced into it, only to discover the middle was raw, a whole Chimodho (Zimbabwean corn bread). Bless them, they just sat there, eating around the doughy bits, not saying a word, maybe out of kindness, maybe because they genuinely didn’t realise what a properly baked cake should taste like. Either way, I appreciated their commitment. Did that stop me from baking? Not a chance. If someone so much as whispered the word cake in my presence, I was already preheating the oven.

The Cake That Changed Everything

Winter 2018. I was doom-scrolling Facebook when I stumbled upon a post that claimed to be The Best Chocolate Cake Recipe of All Time. The person went all out with Adobe edits, the cake looked rich, velvety, like something from a Michelin-starred kitchen. Obviously, I had to try it. Christmas was approaching and my colleagues who had always praised my cakes certainly had room for one more slice. I bought the ingredients, baked the cake on Saturday, and spent all of Sunday failing spectacularly at decorating it. Then a fork came to the rescue, I scrawled some random swirls, and there it was, my best chocolate cake of all time. My colleagues devoured it like it was the last cake they will ever eat. Even better, the cake aged like fine wine, by Friday, it was even better. Feeling proud, I posted it on Facebook.

Then came the message from Grace, my twin sister from another mother (same birthday, same month, same year, same country), happened to live five minutes away. She slid into my DMs in January 2019 and asked, “Are you a baker?” That made me laugh. I had been baking for years but never once considered myself a baker. In Zimbabwe, titles had to be earned. You didn’t just wake up and call yourself something unless you had the credentials. My mother cooked for us daily, but had she called herself a chef, the neighbourhood aunties would’ve whispered louder than a rock concert. But in recent years social media has changed the game, if you can bake as well as someone trained in a Swiss academy, then you are a baker. It doesn’t make the other person any less of a baker, it simply validates talent. Grace needed a cake for her son’s birthday. I told her I wasn’t a baker; she insisted I make it anyway. The gift of people who recognise your greatness before you do, TREASURE THEM! She became the pedestal on which I now stand. We agreed she would buy the ingredients, and I would bake the cake.

Coincidentally, I had planned to visit Bristol to meet a guy I had been speaking to for a few months that same weekend. Feeling fancy, I casually told him I was a baker right after Grace’s DM. When packing for the trip, I threw in my baking ingredients. But then I remembered, I had told this guy I was a baker and my £5 no brand hand mixer wasn’t going to cut it. So, in a moment of pure financial recklessness, I rushed to a local department store and bought an overpriced stand mixer, a fancy apron, a turntable, and a cake scraper. Now I was ready. The cake turned out fine given my abilities at that time. Grace was happy. Bristol boy? Not so much. He ghosted me after that visit, probably because I used too much of his electricity, maybe I didn’t spend enough time with him while I was busy baking, or possibly I didn’t look like any of my Instagram photos. It’s anyone’s guess, but the boy turned out not to be the one. As I am writing this, my toxic trait says I should send him this blog post, since he was, in fact, part of the story… ironically, we are still friends on X.

The Birth of VeeNessTreats

Late Spring 2019. my friend wanted another cake. She didn’t care about the design; she just wanted my vanilla cake because it reminded her of home. And I knew exactly why. This was my mother’s recipe, the one that left my arms numb from whisking sugar and butter just to be rewarded with a single cupcake. Over the years, I had tweaked it to perfection. That call from Grace led to my first profitless sale. I put my heart and soul into it. If you pay me, I make sure you get your money’s worth, even if it costs me my own sweat and blood. Soon after, her neighbour Chichi called. “We ate the cake you made for Grace’s daughter, and we want exactly that.” And just like that, VeeNessTreats was born. From then on, orders started coming in. I even booked my first “nepo” wedding gig that summer, and I was convinced I didn’t need marketing, just a well-baked cake that made all the nostalgic Zimbabweans ask for my number. (Spoiler: That strategy didn’t really work.)

The Covid Plot Twist

Christmas 2019, I decided to learn every cake recipe I could. I stocked up on flour and sugar like I was about to feed the 5,000. But the world had other plans. Covid hit. Shops ran out of toilet paper (thanks, Australia), and people fought over cans of baked beans. Next time you judge a habitant of poor country for scrambling over aid, remember Covid. In scarcity, we all become very human. And here was my Eureka moment, I was one of the few bakers in Portsmouth with a stockpile of flour. Even better, I was furloughed. And dear Lord, I baked. I baked so much that the new boyfriend I was isolating with basically became an upside-down chocolate cake from eating my scraps. Side note, I married him in 2024 :-). The best part! He works in media, so my cake photos now had that Adobe magic. My skills improved. People noticed. Suddenly, I wasn’t waiting for the odd order, I was baking for them.

The Business Boom

Fast forward to January of 2024, when the Gregorian calendar reminds us to rethink our life choices, and so we practice this ritual called new year’s resolutions, I realised something: waiting for customers wasn’t enough. I had to run this like a real business. So, February I turned VeeNessTreats into a limited company (with a grand equity of £1). And guess what? It worked. I started marketing, actually paying to promote my products. And for the first time, I baked almost every weekend I was available during winter, something that I never used to do. Turns out, people do buy cakes in winter, I just wasn’t reaching the right customers before. Even better? I’m now booked for weddings in 2026. Yes, you read that right, next year’s cakes are already hitting my sales ledger. Mama, I made it! Looking back, I see how everything seamlessly led me here, to a place where I can proudly call myself the owner and director of a company. In my “minion job,” I’d probably never become a director, but here? I built this.

The Journey Continues…

It’s been five years since I officially started VeeNessTreats, and even longer since I picked up a whisk in my mother’s kitchen. I don’t know if God had another purpose for me, but I do know this, bringing people a slice of joy was definitely part of it.

Watch this space. We’re just getting started.