Le Gourmet

Le Gourmet Baking, 5601 W. Lover’s Lane, Suite 110 is a neighborhood gem offering a delightful experience every time you walk through the door.

Kids as young as five years old produced some remarkable cookie designs at a recent Estate Life event at Le Gourmet Baking.  Moms and kids arrived for the first class which was completely packed with eager young cookie decorators.  A class just for adults was held immediately following.  Halloween cookies were the theme.

Our resident reporter, Linda Alexander, wrote the story about this Estate Life sponsor, for Old Preston Hollow/Bluffview Resident Recipe section in the October issue.

Becky inherited her mother’s gift for exceptional baked goods, her grandmother’s style of delicious southern cooking and a grandfather’s entrepreneurial spirit for running a business. This unique combination of talents has helped to both inspire and encourage her since she was a little girl.  After graduating from SMU, getting married and starting a family, Becky discovered an adventurous way to use those creative influences. In early 2000, Becky fell in love with a shortbread recipe that satisfied her desire to produce the ideal cookie. Becky’s yearning for “a softer more cake-like shortbread with a crumbly texture and, yet, still soft in the middle” has been instrumental in fulfilling her goal of offering a cookie that tastes as good as it looks.  She describes her shortbreads as cookies that have personality.

Her new business was launched as “Le Gourmet Valet.” Working from home, Becky perfected her unique three-quarter- inch yummy shortbreads with the help of Lisa Staffelbach. Not only was she baking shortbreads, other kitchen savories became part of the menu, also. She was selling primarily to friends at first; then they word spread to others.

Her first “store front” type experience came next at the St. Michaels Farmer’s Market. People began ordering and the business experienced a growth spurt. A few years later, Becky recognized the need to have her own kitchen space and to get in front of a larger market. A successful search brought her to the Lover’s Lane area in 2018. With shortbreads as her signature item, the name changed to Le Gourmet Baking.

Filling orders today includes corporate clients like Neiman Marcus where she has sold over 15,000 personalized shortbread cookies since 2015. They currently offer 7 different designs online which can be ordered at neimanmarcus.com. As her business continues to grow, she is now baking shortbread cookies for corporate events, weddings, birthdays, schools and non-profits.  Future expansion of the business will offer more savory options and hosting privates parties and classes in their chic commercial kitchen.  Cookie decorating classes, offered at the bakery for parties at your home, have become a hit with all ages.

The Le Gourmet team, which includes Mackenzie Johnson, Shelby Morriss and Sid Gray are wowing customers with their endless selection of creatively designed shortbread cookies. The convenience of a neighborhood location gives them the ability to offer a 24-hour turn-around time for orders in addition to occasionally doing some last-minute decorating while you wait. And yes, yummy savory items can be found at the bakery, too.