Baklava baker prepares for the holidays with new products and kitchen

We’ve been speaking with Rita Magalde, owner of baklava bakery Sheer Ambrosia in Utah, since 2020. Since we last spoke, Magalde has moved her business out of her home kitchen in Draper and into a commercial kitchen in Salt Lake City. It includes a pickup area for customers who would prefer to get their orders in person.

“It’s great,” she said. “It’s 600 square feet, and originally I thought, ‘Wow this is going to be really small,’ but the truth is when you compare it to a home kitchen, it’s quite large. It’s just enough space for me to work in here comfortably with at least three other people.”

Moving out of her home has allowed Magalde to hire someone to help her with the baking.

“Her name is Meena, and she is from Afghanistan,” Magalde said. “She’s amazing. She doesn’t speak a lot of English, and I thought, ‘You know what? It’s really not that big of a deal, because I learned to make baklava from someone I didn’t understand.’ Remember that little Greek lady? I basically watched her make it, and so that’s what Meena did.”

Magalde taken out two loans totaling $70,000 to complete construction on the new kitchen.

“There was no money left over for marketing or anything else,” Magalde said. “That’s why it was so important for me to come up with some other ideas, to start launching some other products besides the baklava.”

She’s now selling granola, chocolate chip cookies and Greek butter cookies called kourabiedes. She’s launched a gift crate for the holiday season. Christmas is the busiest holiday for Sheer Ambrosia, followed by Thanksgiving.