ABOUT YAHSHI BAKES
Yahshimabet Sellassie, Founder & CEO of Yahshi Bakes, developed her culinary interest at the tender age of four. Born in Oakland as a vegetarian to entrepreneur parents in fine arts, design, bodywork, radio journalism, and the restaurant business, she naturally blossomed into her creative energy field. From an early age, she gravitated towards the arts, drawing, painting, and sculpting and later developing a passion for cooking and baking.
Yahshimabet is influenced by her Jamaican father and her mother's Ethiopian roots, incorporating traditional spices into her cuisine. At age seven, she became seriously interested in learning how to cook and bake independently, making something new for her family to enjoy most weekends. Yahshimabet explored her culinary creativity with her younger siblings Taqami and Wdassae as the first taste testers. She enjoyed making granola, cupcakes, cookies, pancakes, tarts, and savory dishes, some of which became trademark items for her business.
REPPRESENTING HER HERITAGE
Her passion for representing her heritage stems from exposure to spices' medicinal properties and how her ancestors traditionally used them in her parent's culture. Heart-opening cardamom is one of her favorite spices to use. She features it in her orange cardamom coffee cake, almond cardamom shortbread, and chai cupcakes.
Korerima is Ethiopian cardamom which she grinds fresh to infuse into her pastries. Yahshimabet heard about the Kids Baking Championship from Cheryl Lew, owner of Montclair Baking, and encouraged her to apply for the Food Network competition. She was only twelve years young but competed for eight rounds and landed the runner-up position in the series, gaining media attention worldwide. People began to request her products on an international level, desperate to try Yahshi Bakes, "A Taste of Heaven."
Subsequently, Yahshimabet began hosting monthly pop-ups at Souly Body, her mother's massage studio on Piedmont Avenue in Oakland. Crowds gathered in lines out the door with reusable containers to try "A Taste of Heaven." Her chocolate salted caramel cupcakes, mocha chai cake, lemongrass raspberry cake, and almond orange shortbread cookies simply tantalize the taste buds. Yahshimabet's high standards coupled with her devotion to quality naturally led to Yahshi Bakes' growth.