The Windy City Baker: A Feature

Author: Charlie Eden

Images from the Windy City Baker Website

As a young girl living in Rockford, Illinois, Sara Jelinek would join her mother in baking for the holiday season. Together, they made Christmas cookies and desserts for their family’s Thanksgiving feast; “normal baking stuff,” according to Sara. And although they were not baking anything nearly as complicated as Sara’s kitchen creations today, it was in those moments that Sara found a love for baking. Since then, Sara Jelinek, now known as the Windy City Baker, has come to own her own Hyde Park bakery business, although there were certainly challenges along the way.

Undergrad

Besides those childhood holidays, Sara was not doing much baking—especially on her own; that is, until her last year as an undergraduate at Michigan State University (MSU). As a student living on her own, Sara found herself in a conundrum. The grocery store was not equipped to satisfy her self-proclaimed “huge sweet tooth”; she often wanted baked goods that the grocery store was not selling.  So, naturally, Sara went to the kitchen; however, without her mother's assistance, Sara discovered that baking was not as simple as it had always been.

“When I first started, it was awful!” Sara exclaims, with a smile on her face. “I burned almost everything I made.” Even when talking about her past failures in the kitchen, Sara cannot help but smile and crack a joke. “I ate it all,” joked Sara. “I didn’t make very much money at the time, so I couldn’t throw stuff out.” It is this positive attitude that makes Sara such a great personality and such a fun interviewee.

However, a cheerful attitude alone does not help someone improve in the kitchen; Sara’s improvement as a baker can be credited to her dedication and persistence. “It was a whole lot of research,” she explained. Sara dedicated many hours to reading up on baking theory and would always try to incorporate her research into the next project. At first, this research was specific to recipes; “how do I [insert step I’ve never heard about]” was a common approach for Sara’s internet searches. Now that Sara is a professional, she spends more time focusing on the science of baking and elevating her own recipes rather than copying other recipes. On top of her research, Sara would take note of anything that went wrong in her baking process, giving extra attention to correcting those mistakes in the future.

Postgrad

In the years after her undergrad, Sara’s baking really leveled up thanks to her continued dedication to the craft. During her time as a graduate student at Binghamton University, Sara took decorating classes at the Wilton School, a prominent cake institution. And she knows exactly how that first class affected her baking career. “As soon as I learned how to do that,” Sara recalls, “I was like: Woah! This is really fun. I definitely want to do more of this!” And if you scroll through Sara’s Instagram page (@windycitybaker), it is quite clear that those Wilton classes paid off.

Around that time, Sara also fulfilled her first orders. At the time, she took orders for friends and co-workers; now, she takes custom orders for weddings and other events. And, more than anyone, Sara appreciates the time and effort that she has invested in her baking; “It’s been a pretty long process,” Sara exclaims with a grin on her face. “There have been plenty of things that have gone well and plenty that have flopped.”

But Sara never backed down after a failed bake. Instead, her flops became learning tools. “One thing that comes to my mind…is the first time I tried to make truffles,” remembers Sara. “I didn’t realize that if you use flavorings…they have alcohol in them. And alcohol makes chocolate seize. I followed all of these recipes and did not realize that they were using oil-based extracts…That one piece made the difference between everything turning out right and everything turning out wrong…Now that I know that, I never use alcohol-based flavorings when I’m using chocolate.”

However, the solutions to a failed bake are not always so simple. But for someone who self-evaluates as “fairly stubborn,” that means never giving up on a recipe. “I don’t like it when things beat me,” explains Sara. “I probably won’t be very happy about the fact that I’ve failed so many times, but I will keep going until I manage to make it the way that it’s supposed to be.”

As Sara continued to share some insight into her stubborn personality in the kitchen, she revealed that before she was a professional baker, she had spent ten years as a psychologist for kids with autism. “It wasn’t until the last two years that baking took more of a front seat.” That’s not to say that Sara was not baking seriously during that time. Sara explained that throughout those years, baking was more of a serious hobby or an outlet after a stressful day. In fact, she would even bake with some of the kids she worked with— “my kids” as Sara calls them.

Yet,  there were certain skills that Sara developed as a psychologist that translated into her baking career. “There are general personality traits or things that people do that make them successful regardless of the field they are in,” argues Sara. “Always trying to learn; I think that is probably the biggest thing I’ve taken from psychology…don’t ever stop.”

The Present

Nowadays, Sara’s baking business is in full swing; she publishes a steady stream of baking content on her website and various social media pages, along with, of course, selling a plethora of delicious baked goods. “Essentially, Windy City Baker started as a website to pretty much share the baking knowledge that I had gotten with other other people…to help other people on their baking journey.” As time progressed, Sara added new elements to her growing business, such as paid baking courses and custom dessert sales. And although her home-bakery “is not quite a storefront,” it still requires a savvy business mind to run, as it is a licensed food operation. For example, As the only employee, Sara must keep track of storage space and budget whenever she buys her ingredients in bulk. “I am the business right now,” she says. 

Winner of Chicago’s Best Baker 2019

And if having a successful business was not enough of a pay off for Sara, she was also named “Chicago’s Best Baker” in 2019. “My husband decided that the stuff I made tasted too good to not go into competition,” Sara recalls. “He really pushed me to join, so I did.” The competition’s rules required that Sara prepare desserts from multiple categories, so she spent several months developing, re-working, and perfecting her recipes–a process she had experienced throughout her baking journey. “I definitely did not think I was going to win,” Sara remembers; in fact, Sara’s husband dropped off her entries, as Sara attended a baby-shower that same day. It was at this baby-shower that she received news of her victory. “I wasn’t there to accept the award.” She laughs as she recalls this detail.

And it seems fitting that, despite being an award-winning baker, Sara understands that there is always room to grow. Even today, she watches baking videos non-stop, constantly learning from fellow bakers. “There are always things to learn,” emphasizes Sara. And it is that idea that has been the major constant throughout Sara Jelinek’s baking career. That and cake, of course.