We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jelana Canfield a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Jelana, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Crazy stuff happening is almost as certain as death and taxes – it’s technically “unexpected” but something unexpected happening is to be expected and so can you share a crazy story with our readers

We had to close our storefront so my husband could take time to donate one of his kidney’s to my dad. We planned on staying open and I worked dilligently attempting to find a bank, credit union, community bank, lender, or investor to help with capital to cover the staffing to cover us from being gone for 2 months to California for surgery and post op care. No investor even though we were showing financial growth and no bank to refi our current loan for additional funds.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

Jelana’s Bake Shop Jelana’s Bake Shop is a flavor focused bakery established in 2019 in Hillsboro, Oregon. As a family business and 2021 and 2022 Hillsboro’s Bronze winner for Best Bakery/ 2022 Silver for Best Dessert, we strive to provide low sugar high flavor classic American treats in various dietary preferences: traditional, vegan, gluten free, low glycemic, and GF & vegan. Our mission is to keep smiles on our community’s faces while not hurting our bodies.
We are a FIVE star rated bakery providing cinnamon rolls, pastries, signature cookies, custom cakes & cupcakes, dream cookie program, and designer desserts bars. Our services include gift cards, large event orders, corporate branding, wholesale, covid safe pick up, in house delivery, and shipping nationwide.
Learn and see more at our social media platforms and Google search links below. Then, check out our website or come into our storefront to order your sweet desires at 18560 SW Farmington Rd, Aloha, OR 97007. Look forward to baking for you!

About Chef Jelana Ayanna Nkenge Canfield

When I was eight years old, all I wanted was an Easy Bake Oven. I convinced my mom to watch the commercial for the toy oven and her response, while pointing to the kitchen oven was, “there is your easy bake oven.” I’ve been baking ever since. But don’t let growing up helping my mom bake pies and cakes, recipes that have been handed down from my four mothers out of slavery, think this is what I wanted to do as a career.

After graduating from Mills College with honors and B.A. in Theatre Arts, I traveled to Europe, Mexico, Southern Asia, and throughout the United States. While pursuing a career in the performing arts as an actor, dancer, and writer, I lived in various cities where I worked in restaurants for extra money.

Becoming more knowledgeable and passionate about food, pastry, and wine, my side hustle quickly became my main career. As a server and manager, I took on many after work pastry training sessions with chefs at Morimoto Maui, Mala Ocean Tavern, and The Cheesecake Factory. This led to baking positions at The Harvest Bar, Huber’s Cafe (Portland’s oldest restaurant), private events, and Daily Cafe expanding my operational, professional, and technical skills.

Marrying my professional training with my family heritage of baking, I was enlightened with how far baking could take me as an educated and career driven Black American woman. With the support of my family, needing a license to make a cake donation to Memories in the Making for Alzheimer’s research, and my first commissioned wedding cake in New York City, my husband and I knew it was time to start a bakery and share my flavor focused and simply baked treats.

No Easy Bake Oven, but now as a board of directors member of Washington County Chambers of Commerce, Vice-Chair of the Black Business Advisory Council, and a Black Village (Hillsboro School District PAC) member, I’m excited knowing we are uplifting our community one cupcake at a time.

~Jelana Canfield- Owner & Executive Pastry Chef

Can you share one of your favorite marketing or sales stories?

When we started in our house we got a domestic food business license and marketed like a real storefront bakery. We gave ourselves real store hours and days we were open. Put our location on google and listed us as “by appointment only” and offered delivery and pick up.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

We focus on catering and a couple of wholesale coffee shop customers. So even though we closed our storefront we are still an active business and plan on opening our online store again once we relicense our home kitchen.

Contact Info:

• Website: jelanasbakeshop.com

Image Credits
Jelana Canfield