What started as a family experiment in the kitchen is now landing Santa Cruz resident Hannah Balliet on national television.
Balliet first began toying with gluten-free baking when she noticed that her Lupus symptoms and her young son’s Tourette’s-like face and body tics improved in the absence of gluten. Faced with what she felt was a lack of palatable, kid- and adult-friendly gluten-free options, she started making her own. “And things just seemed to snowball from there,” she says.
Now the co-owner of Melinda’s Gluten Free with another local mom, Melinda Harrower, Balliet’s baked goods can be found at Aldo’s Bakery (where they are baked in a separate, designated gluten-free kitchen), Betty’s Burgers, Erik’s Deli, Verve Coffee Roasters, the Abbey and other Santa Cruz businesses.
On Monday, August 5 at 10pm, Balliet will put her popular Espresso Chai-Whoopie Pie to the test on Lifetime’s food competition show “Supermarket Superstar!” She will duke it out with two other food entrepreneurs in the show’s Natural Foods category for a chance to develop her product and land it on store shelves nationally. The slick reality competition is produced by the same company that brought us Project Runway and Undercover Boss. Debbi Fields, of Mrs. Fields cookies fame, is one of the judges, along with Napa celebrity chef Michael Chiarello.
The whoppie pie was first created for her son’s birthday last year and is now his favorite dessert. “He helped me develop this hand-held cookie cake for his birthday when he was petrified that his friends would not want to eat his birthday treat we were bringing to school once they figured out we were bringing something gluten free,” she explained. “The flavor combo and unique shaped cake stuffed with a velvety cream was different enough to get the kids’ curiosity up enough to try it, and what seemed like a long shot ended up with fingers licked and kids asking for seconds.” (She adds that the caffeine implied in the cake’s title is very minimal, making it kid friendly.)
Given the treat’s quick ascension from classroom hit to hotly requested favorite among coworkers, friends and family, Balliet is optimistic that the whoopie pie will have a similar impression on the show’s judges. She just hopes they can get past the gluten-free stigma first.
“I’m nervous that the judges may not understand the whole ‘gluten-free’ thing,” she says. “But once they taste these whoopie pies, I am confident they will love them as much as everyone else has.”
As the episode nears, Balliet is increasingly excited by the prospect that her wholesome whoopie pies could be the next big snack on supermarket shelves. It could be a big break for Melinda’s Gluten Free, she adds.
“This opportunity to go on this show and make connections in the food industry would be priceless and exactly what this small business would need to grow and compete with the big dogs in the food industry”, she says.
To view a trailer for the show, clickhere!
About the author
Elizabeth Limbach is an award-winning journalist living in Santa Cruz, California. In this fruitful region and beyond, she finds the intersections of food, ag, health and the environment to be the most intriguing realms to write about. A bookworm and vegan foodie, the San Diego native has lived in Santa Cruz for a decade, relishing its redwood forests, fresh produce, delicious wines, and sparkling sea.
