Love Plus Flour has been a dream of mine since I was 5 years old helping my mother bake cupcakes for my dolly’s birthday parties. The fact that I got to eat everything we baked was not lost on me even at such a tender age. However, there’s a vast distance between cooking in my mother’s kitchen and opening a bakery. At 16, I found work at Lax & Mandel bakery. Initially hired to help with the daily production, I soon found myself running the baking aspect of the business while the owner was recovering from cancer. Arriving at 4am to light the ovens, I would start the recipes, oversee production, and then head to my school classes for the morning, coming back at noon to check inventory and plan out the next day’s work. After the owner recuper