Meet Diana Yelton: GM at the Aloha Café

Ultimately, it was Macrina’s Greek Olive Loaf that led Diana to our café. A recent transplant to Seattle in 2016, Diana was looking for a job when her boyfriend showed up with a loaf of his new favorite bread—the Greek Olive Loaf. He casually mentioned that he’d noticed a sign saying Macrina was hiring. 

Diana and her boyfriend had moved to Seattle from New York City where Diana had worked in independent film production. Out of college, she had considered a career as a teacher, but student teaching had talked her out of that. Her job requirements were only that she didn’t want to be cooped up in an office. “I’m an extrovert,” Diana says. “Being around people gives me energy. I loved Macrina’s bread and it seemed like a fun place to work so I interviewed.”  

Customers and coworkers alike were quickly impressed with her hard work, kindness and spirited personality. When the Aloha café opened in September 2018, Diana was an instrumental part the opening crew. When the tightly knit community of North Capitol Hill filtered in to check us out, Diana’s product knowledge and bright, lively personality helped introduce Macrina to everyone.  Everyone who has ever opened a new retail business knows just how challenging it is. There’s hardly been a quiet moment since we opened the doors, so strong customer service skills and a good work ethic have been bench tested. “We have so many regulars already,” Diana says. “You know their favorite pastry before you know their name. Seeing familiar faces in line is definitely a great part of the job.” 

When the General Manager position opened up in June 2019 it was clear Diana had earned the nod. “I was honored to be offered the job,” Diana says. “I worked my way up and feel like they saw something in me. Scott and Leslie are at the Aloha café frequently and both are very open and supportive. When I’m hiring it helps to be able to say very honestly that the company culture is really good, and there are many opportunities for growth.” 

 

 

 

Phuong Hoang Bui

Update: 6/14/2019Macrina’s Head Baker, Phuong Hoang Bui, started working at Macrina in 1994. To celebrate his 25th anniversary we gathered with him and his family at Palisade Restaurant to share our gratitude for everything he has done for Macrina and the way he brightens the workplace with smiles and his cheerful heart.

“The best part of the heartwarming dinner was Phuong sharing his fond memories of Macrina,” says Jane Cho, Production Manager. “Behind his kind, respectful mannerisms, he is a comedian and loves to laugh and tell a good story. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to work with Phuong for so many years and to be inspired by someone with such integrity in everything he does.”
To learn more about Phuong’s amazing journey from Vietnam to Macrina read this blog that Leslie wrote about Phuong.

Original: 10/14/2012

Throughout my new book, More from Macrina, interspersed among the recipes and beautiful photography, are stories about the people and partnerships that make the Macrina community.

Phuong Hoang Bui has worked at Macrina for 18 years and as much as anyone, he embodies the spirit of the Macrina community in a way that makes me so proud to have him as a colleague.  I first met Phuong through the International Rescue Committee, where he had been eagerly seeking employment.  At our first meeting, Phuong conveyed a deep desire to work and to learn – I hired him as a dishwasher on the spot. This was in 1994 – just after Macrina first opened.

Phuong

While he worked as a dishwasher, Phuong would always make himself available to help with food prep, to help shape bread, and to watch the bakers load the ovens – constantly seeking opportunities to learn more so that he could grow professionally while supporting Macrina’s growth.

18 years later Phuong manages our entire wholesale production team – fifty employees in all, diverse in age, ethnicity and experience – and Phuong takes great care to help them all develop the skills to succeed in their work, and for many of them, to adapt to a new life in Seattle.

Before starting at Macrina, Phuong had been trying to get to America from his native Vietnam for some time.  His first attempt was as a boat refugee when he was captured and imprisoned for two years.  When he was released Phuong received help and support from friends and family, which led to his arrival and new life in the United States.

Today, everything Phuong does through his work at Macrina demonstrates his gratitude for the help and support he has received. Phuong works with his team to help them develop professionally and embrace new opportunities, just as he did (and continues to do).  Phuong’s desire to repay the kindness he was shown when he first arrived here reflects so much of the culture here at Macrina, and just as Phuong is grateful for the life he has here, I am grateful for the chance to have him be a part of our daily life at Macrina.

Learn more about Phuong and his amazing journey in More from Macrina. 

Meet our Family: The Brothers Nguyen

Macrina Bakery relies on many highly-skilled bakers. The brothers Andy and Dat Nguyen are two of our best.  

We still make all our bread by the same methods we did in 1993 when Macrina Bakery first opened in Belltown—only now we make much more of it. Long, slow rises, with carefully maintained starters and forming every loaf by hand is a labor intensive way to make bread. But it’s the way great bakers around the world have been making the best loaves for centuries. Making bread this way is who we are 

As we’ve grown, we’ve had to find and train new bakers. Our head baker, Phuong Bui, is one great example. And it was through Phoung, or more precisely, his mother, that we found two other key members of our bread team. Phuong’s mother met Andy and Dat Nguyen in an ESL class at South Seattle Community College in 2003. She mentioned her son was hiring at Macrina. Andy was the first to be hired, Dat followed a month later. 

Phuong trained them both how to shape our various loaves and they joined the forming team. Both brothers were quick learners and showed great initiative. Within a few years, they’d both mastered each of the bread-making steps: mixing, kneading, proofing, shaping, and baking. “Learning each station was difficult,” Andy says. “But now after fifteen years, even the holidays aren’t stressful, just busy.”  

Today, Dat is our Baking Assistant Manager. He oversees a crew of nearly 20, stepping in to help at every stage as needed. Sometimes it’s to speed production along, sometimes helping coach new employees, and making certain he can be proud of each loaf. “I’m thrilled Macrina has trusted me with more responsibility,” Dat says. “I take great pride in making great bread.” 

Andy works the rack ovens, baking hundreds of loaves every day. He ensures that each comes out with that crisp, caramelized crust our customers have come to know. With so many loaves and many types of bread, it’s part craft, part art and takes a high degree of precision and focused attention. 

Andy lives in Burien with his wife who followed him from Vietnam. They have an eight-year-old daughter who attends White Center Heights Elementary, which has a Vietnamese dual language program. On weekends she likes to go shopping with her father, often asking him if they can go out for a very American lunch—at McDonald’s. Andy prefers Thai food but sometimes indulges his daughter. He relaxes by tending the gardens in his backyard. 

Dat lives with his parents who emigrated to Seattle three years before Dat and Andy arrived. Dat has a six-year-old son who also attends White Center Heights elementary and is enrolled in the same dual language program as his cousin. Dat helps his aging parents with their needs. Recently, Dat has also had to contend with some of the skills his son has picked up at school, namely how to research new toys on YouTube. 

Both families remain close, often gathering on weekends and holidays. During football season they get together to root for the Seahawks. Over the years, both brothers have returned to Saigon to visit friends and family in Vietnam. Andy always makes a side trip to Long Khánh, a small city in Southeastern Vietnam to visit his wife’s family. 

At Macrina, we are incredibly proud of these two master bakers who have become part of our family. Without their talent, hard work, dedication, and ability to train and coach new employees we would not be where we are today. Thank you Dat and Andy for 15 great years! 

Meet Natalie Godfrey, Macrina’s Wholesale Sales Assistant Manager

Wholesale Sales Assistant Manager

One of the best ways to audition potential sales managers is to observe them in action—selling products that aren’t your own. That is just how we came across Natalie Godfrey. Leslie Mackie was in Walla Walla to meet with some of the farmers who grow wheat for Macrina Bakery. After a long, hot day, much of it spent in the field, Leslie dropped by the tasting room at Tamarack Cellars. A handful of Macrina employees joined her. At the time, Natalie worked there as a sales associate. 

“When I met Natalie at Tamarack Cellars,” Leslie says,  “I was impressed with her vast and descriptive knowledge of the wines she was selling. She took them very seriously and shared detailed stories about the wines. Her approach was so genuine and enthusiastic that she drew all of us in. We bought a bunch of wine to take home.” 

Natalie attended high school on Bainbridge Island, which is where she first tasted Macrina’s breads. “My mom brought home Macrina bread from Town and Country all the time,” she says. Whitman College and a degree in rhetoric studies had pulled Natalie to Walla Walla, but she entertained the idea of returning to the Seattle area. At the tasting, the whole Macrina team agreed that Natalie had a natural talent for selling products so Leslie left Natalie her business card. 

Natalie decided to move back to Seattle and called Leslie who was delighted to hear from her. “The sales team is the face of Macrina,” Leslie says. “If Natalie shared a similar connection with our breads and pastries as she did with the Tamarack wines, I knew she’d be a perfect fit.” 

”When I called Leslie to ask her about a job,” Natalie says, “she emphasized how Macrina invests in their employees and offers so many opportunities for them to be nurtured by others and to grow. She was honest, and I felt like it would be a good company to work for—one that I wanted to work for!” 

Natalie started working for Macrina in January as the Wholesale Sales Assistant Manager, joining Amy Bui, General Manager of Wholesale Sales, and Fanny Alvarado, Wholesale Manager, to make up our sales team. Amy has been showing her the ropes. “Natalie has already proven to be a great fit for the role, and I look forward to working with her,” Amy says. 

“I’ve learned so much already—about bread, sales, and hard-working people—and am inspired by it all. I love how Macrina is a community of inspiring, diverse individuals who all seem united by their love of bread,” Natalie says.  

Amy Bui, General Manager Wholesale Sales

Growing Up with Macrina

Few know Macrina’s products like Amy Bui does. She’s grown up with them. Her father is Phuong Bui, our Head Baker and longest-tenured employee. “I remember her running around the café,” Leslie Mackie, Macrina’s founder, said. “She couldn’t have been more than three when she first started coming in.”

Amy remembers those days as well. She didn’t go to work with her father often but loved the experience when she did. “I loved being in the kitchen with Leslie. I’d beg her to give me a task so I could help. I’d stand on a milk crate and stir large pots she had on the burners or she would give me a lump of dough to play with on the forming table to keep me busy.”

Working at Macrina

In 2011, we hired Amy as a Customer Service Representative. She had a knack for building relationships with our customers. She kept a list of all our wholesale customers and made a point of eating at as many of the restaurants as she could. “Over my seven years here, I have eaten at 161 restaurants serving Macrina products,” Amy said, adding, “More to come!”

Soon, Amy moved into a series of management positions, proving her value at every new job. She served as our Wholesale Sales Assistant Manager before we promoted her to General Manager of Wholesale Sales in November of 2018.

“Amy is uniquely qualified for this job,” said Scott France, Macrina’s President. “She has shown tremendous commitment to our artisan bakery and is dedicated to exceptional customer service.”

“We have the best products this city has to offer,” Amy said. “Being able to stand 100 percent behind the products you’re selling makes the job easy.”

Starting as a Customer Service Representative gave Amy a ground floor view of all the moving parts that must operate fluidly so that the many hand-formed artisanal products can be baked daily and delivered early in the morning to hundreds of customers around the Seattle area.

“Fanny Alvarado, Macrina’s Wholesale Manager, has been a great mentor to me,” Amy said. “Fanny also started in an entry-level job here and worked her way up and up. She sets the bar high for expectations in customer service and job productivity and has supported me through all challenges and frustrations I’ve had.”

And how does it feel to spend your days selling so many things your dad has helped make? “It’s awesome. I love that I get to see him every day, since I wouldn’t otherwise.”

Ariel Singh, General Manager, Aloha Café 

Since I opened Macrina in 1993, so many amazing people have helped make the bakery what it is today. In honor of our 25th anniversary, we are spotlighting a few key employees. Each fills an essential role at Macrina. 

Ariel Singh’s experience and talent make her the perfect person to open our new café on Capitol Hill at 746 19th Ave E (on the corner of Aloha and 19th). She’s as wonderful a person as she is talented with customers and crew alike. Managing a café is a big job requiring superb customer service skills, extensive food knowledge, people management, logistics, administrative duties, and more. Ariel does it all with grace, charm and efficiency.

Leslie

Life at Macrina

Ariel started working at Macrina’s Belltown Café in 2012, in the midst of a remodel. She spent much of her first week working side by side with Leslie Mackie, cleaning and scrubbing, before moving into other roles in the cafés.

“Macrina has grown, but Leslie is still present in everything we do,” Ariel said. “The breads, the pastries, and the values are the same. In some ways, I’d say Macrina has just continued to grow into itself.”

After Belltown, Ariel moved to the McGraw Café where she worked as Assistant Manager. She was promoted to General Manager of our Sodo Café in 2016. This was when Macrina’s wholesale production still worked in the space behind the café. About a year later, having outgrown that space, wholesale moved to our bakery in Kent, though you can still watch the pastry team working behind the windows at the Sodo café.

“Before wholesale moved, it was so fun to walk back there and see and experience everything being made from scratch, the potatoes boiling for the potato bread, all the dough being kneaded, and teams of bakers hand-forming and scoring every loaf. I miss it and encourage my crew to get out to Kent to see all the work that goes into our products.”

There has been one advantage since Wholesale moved out of Sodo. “Without the huge rack ovens running 24 hours a day, the café stays cooler.” Plus, speaking of cool, Gelatiamo, Seattle’s extraordinary gelato maker, now occupies part of the space. Owner Maria Coassin quickly hit it off with Ariel, so much so that she has been helping Ariel plan her upcoming honeymoon!

Opening a New Café

Ariel worked down in Sodo until this past August. When offered the opportunity to open Macrina’s newest café, there was no hesitation.  “I’m really looking forward to the challenge,” she says.

The location of the café was once home to the Surrogate Hostess. People are still talking about the Surrogate Hostess today, which is a testimony of the impact the bakery made on the tight-knit community. This would be a tough act for anyone to follow, but Ariel is a perfect fit. She is good with her crew, but she truly makes a point to create connections with her customers. “I’ve loved each of the cafés for different reasons,” Ariel says. “Each has a nostalgic feeling for me that I relate to different parts of my life. The best compliment I can get is when a customer from another café comes in and remembers me and say they miss me.” Now she’s ready to make new memories at Aloha and excited to get to know new customers in a new neighborhood.

“Ariel is incredibly hard working,” says Crystal Kitchin, the General Manager overseeing all of the cafés. “She strives for perfection. Working in food service, you can only control so much yourself. The rest comes from training your crew well. Ariel has risen to the occasion and become a great leader.”

But Ariel is just as appreciative of Crystal. “I’m lucky to work for a boss who I really like,” Ariel says. “Crystal is a guiding light. If I’m having a tough time dealing with something, she has an answer. Even to the most complicated interpersonal issues that come up with a big staff. I’ve also learned so much from working with Leslie. She’s the epitome of Macrina and what it embodies, in all the best ways.”

The Married Life

Ariel was married to her husband Narayan Singh about a year ago, almost to the day, on Labor Day 2017. The Corson Building, a gem tucked under the freeway in Seattle’s Georgetown neighborhood, provided the perfect setting for a food-crazy couple. If a flaw could be found, it was only that the day was a little warm for Ariel, about 85 degrees. “I was a little hot in my dress,” Ariel says, “but Narayan was happy. The wedding was perfect.” 

They met in Seattle after both moving from warmer places, Ariel from L.A., Narayan from Las Vegas. Taylor Murphy, a mutual friend, introduced them. She used to work with Ariel. Because of their friendship, and Taylor being the point of intersection, Ariel and Narayan asked her to officiate their wedding. “At work, Taylor was frequently a little late, and I’m a stickler for punctuality. But she was definitely on time for the wedding,” Ariel laughs.

Narayan is a Clinical Psychology Doctoral Student at Seattle Pacific University. This keeps him very busy, which was part of the reason why they delayed their honeymoon until this summer. 

Quy Nguyen, Savory Department

Since I opened Macrina in 1993, so many amazing people have helped make the bakery what it is today. In honor of our 25th anniversary, we are spotlighting a few key employees. Each fills an essential role at Macrina. 

A year after I opened the bakery, I took over an adjoining space and opened the Belltown café. Customers could sit down for a slice of quiche, weekend brunch or a sandwich made with Macrina’s fresh bread. Back then, the savory items we made didn’t require a whole department. Brunch was an all-hands-on-deck affair, but as Macrina has grown and our lunch and brunch crowds have expanded, we had to do something to keep up with demand. Because of this, we now have a Savory Department. They prepare all the sandwiches, quiche, soups, spreads, salad dressings, and meze for our cafés. Quy is one of the stars, a talented cook who is efficient and graceful, two desirable qualities in a bustling kitchen. 

Leslie

Quy Nguyen, Savory Chef

On weekends, our Sodo Café bustles with brunch customers. In front of the stove, Quy Nguyen keeps her focus on the pans of eggs, sizzling applewood smoked bacon, herb-roasted potatoes, and heaping plates of French toast. Her hands quickly dart between the knife and pan. New orders come in and servers deliver hot dishes to tables. The kitchen heats up, but Quy stays cool. She churns out one pan of perfectly-cooked over-easy eggs after another and beautifully garnishes the plates. 

The rest of her workweek is just as important, but less intense. 

As a critical member of our Savory team, Quy preps and makes savory items for all of the cafés at our Kent bakery. After ten years, she knows all of the recipes and techniques. She works with the same precision and focus she employs on the brunch line, but she has time to share stories and chat with the other staff. “I like to joke around with them,” she says, through a translator. “They are like a second family.”

Still, nothing tops those busy mornings at the Sodo Café. “The favorite part of my job is working brunch. I find it very rewarding,” she says.

More about Quy

Quy moved to Seattle from Dalat, Vietnam, in 2003 with her husband and teenage daughter. The climate in Seattle is very similar to that of Dalat, whose temperate climate stands in contrast to Vietnam’s otherwise tropical climate. The region’s valleys are cloaked in mist much of the year, leading to its name “City of Eternal Spring.” For the first five years living here, she stayed at home while her daughter went to school. When it came time for her daughter to graduate from high school, she thought about working again. A friend recommended Macrina, so she interviewed and was hired and she’s been an essential part of the team ever since.

Quy does enjoy cooking at home. She primarily cooks Vietnamese food for her family, but has developed quite a taste for the diversity of cuisines in America, especially those of the French and Italian influence. Macrina’s Mac & Cheese is her current favorite dish to eat. 

She returns to Vietnam every two to three years to visit her mother, along with her sister and brother. She likes sharing with them recipes that she’s learned, and has begun teaching them how to make soups and salad dressings similar to Macrina’s. 

Marilyn Mercer manages the Savory Department. She says, “Quy amazes me. She’s willing to do any task needed to support our success. She’s quick and efficient, sometimes under hectic and stressful situations during brunch. Her food is always on point. Everyone at Savory and the Sodo Café appreciates her skillful teamwork. I truly enjoy working with her.”

Alfredo Machorro, Steward

Since I opened Macrina in 1993, so many amazing people have helped make the bakery what it is today. In honor of our 25th anniversary, we are spotlighting a few key employees. Each fills an essential role at Macrina. 

To those who deliver our supplies, Alfredo Machorro is the face of Macrina. His kindness is genuine. But he’s no pushover. If something isn’t right about an order, he straightens out the invoice or refuses product that doesn’t meet our high standards. With his rare combination of rigor and sweetness, Alfredo has earned the respect of our suppliers and admiration from all of us at the bakery.

Leslie

Alfredo Machorro, Steward Lead

Most of our customers never see Alfredo Machorro, but without him we’d have a hard time making a single product. Alfredo is our Steward Lead and Receiver. He greets each of our suppliers at the loading docks, checks in their deliveries and carefully ensures the quality and contents of each order. 

Alfredo takes great pride in his work and the knowledge that, indirectly at least, he has a hand in everything at the bakery. He ensures that the fruits and vegetables that arrive are of the highest quality and that the meats and cheeses have been refrigerated properly. He also manages an extensive inventory of various flours, sugars, butter, and all the different items we use for bagging and packaging our baked goods. 

“Each day is a little different, but each day is very busy,” Alfredo says. “I’ve been here seven years now, and with each new year I’ve taken on new responsibilities. I like everything about my job.”

Blake Gehringer, Alfredo’s supervisor, says, “Alfredo works hard to make sure that every single product Macrina orders is correct, gets dated and rotated appropriately one hundred percent of the time. I really appreciate how thorough and organized he is. I also guarantee that he is the nicest receiver in the Pacific Northwest, even when he needs to turn away product.”

This quality of kindness and thoroughness, both in his work and his relations with co-workers, has endeared Alfredo to everyone at the bakery. Not to mention how many rely on his knowledge of exactly where anything is. 

During the week, Alfredo arrives at 6 a.m. and works until 2 p.m. Incoming deliveries, rotating stock, taking inventory, and ordering new supplies take up most of his time. “Moving to the bigger space in Kent has made my life much easier,” he says. “The Sodo space had gotten too small for us. Now I can manage the inventory much better.”

Family, Food and Travel

Alfredo moved to Seattle almost 20 years ago from the historic city of Puebla, located in Central Mexico. Puebla has a climate quite similar to Seattle, so the rain and cool nights weren’t a hard transition. Eager to start his next chapter in America, he worked a variety of jobs, building a robust skill set. Before Macrina, he worked as a forklift driver, which is a tool he frequently uses at Macrina. 

Three of Alfredo’s sisters followed him to Seattle, settling near Burien, where Alfredo lives. They get together on Sundays, “After church on Sunday I visit my sisters,” Alfredo says. “I live alone, so it’s nice to play with their kids and enjoy time with family.” On special occasions, they make make Alfredo’s favorite dish, Mole Poblanos.

Alfredo also enjoys visiting his favorite restaurant, Azteca. The original location for the regional chain is near his home in Burien. It started out as a small mom and pop place in 1974. “The food is great,” Alfredo says.

When he’s not spending time with family in Burien, downtown Seattle has always been one of his favorite places to explore, though he does like to make it out of the city. “When I have a little vacation time, I like to visit the Oregon Coast, or sometimes I go to Wenatchee. I like all the apple orchards.”

Mike Johnson, Delivery Assistant Manager

Since I opened Macrina in 1993, so many amazing people have helped make the bakery what it is today. In honor of our 25th anniversary, we are spotlighting a few key employees. Each fills an essential role at Macrina. 

Mike Johnson is a devoted and passionate member of the delivery team. He arrives at work while most of the city is asleep, gets the orders together, helps pack the delivery vans, and often drives one himself. Mike and his team are on the streets well before daybreak so that Macrina’s bread and pastries are at the many groceries, cafés and restaurants when you arrive.

Leslie

Mike Johnson loves to drive. So much so that he spends as much of his free time as he can watching the races at Skagit Speedway. “Dirt racing is my passion,” Mike says. “I just got a car that can race in the tuner class, the slowest type of cars. I hope to start racing soon.”

Fittingly, when he joined Macrina in 2013, it was as a delivery driver. If Mike wasn’t so observant of company policy, we might worry about him screeching around corners. “Mike is a man of rules and likes to run a tight ship, he works by the book enforcing company policies,” says Sergio Castaneda, the Delivery General Manager. “He is very thorough and organized, which helps ensure that orders aren’t missing items.”

From the beginning it was clear that Mike was ambitious, had a positive attitude and wanted more responsibility. Impressed with his work, Sergio promoted him to lead driver and then soon after to assistant manager. 

“At my previous job, I dealt with a lot of angry customers,” Mike says. “Here, our customers love our bread and pastries, so I’m mostly dealing with happy people.” 

Except for the one time he nearly got clobbered with a frying pan. 

On an early morning delivery, he had to use the bathroom. “I went toward the back looking for it, thinking I was alone,” Mike says. “What I didn’t realize was that a girl had just started her shift. She was half asleep, and for some reason she was carrying a frying pan. As I come around the corner, the frying pan goes up in the air. I screamed ‘Macrina.’ It was all I could think to say. Fortunately, she lowered the frying pan. After we recovered our wits, we laughed. Most deliveries aren’t so exciting.”

Mike talks about his time at Macrina, “I’ve been handed a lot of responsibility as the company grows, but I have lots of support. Sergio, my supervisor, is a great teacher and listener. I’ve developed more internal strength from this job than any other because the owners and management have been so supportive of me.”

Seeing Mike’s success at Macrina, his sister Kelly followed and now works with him in the delivery department as a packer. Raised nearby with his two sisters, Mike has stayed close to his family. “My dad is my number one mentor,” he says. His parents host the occasional weekend family gathering at their house in Kent. 

Mike and his sister Stephanie Johnson at a Mariners game

Treating people in his department like family is part of Mike’s success as a leader. He often arrives at 1 a.m. and works with a team of packers to load the delivery vans. With so many routes to prepare the bakery is bustling throughout the middle of the night. “We drink a lot of coffee and the occasional Red Bull,” Mike says. “And while we work hard, there is a lot of teamwork and laughter.”

A few months back, several members of the pastry packing department were out sick. Mike saw they were in trouble. If something didn’t change, the delivery vans would be forced to leave late, meaning many cafés would be missing their Macrina pastries when they opened. Despite the fact that Mike had his own work to do, and it wasn’t his department, he donned an apron and gloves and began boxing pastries. Sergio says, “Mike has strong problem-solving skills. He finds solutions to problems and does so much for the delivery department. He is passionate, cares about getting things right, and holds his position with a lot of pride.”

As Macrina grows, new challenges arise. Mike has helped develop better organizational plans for getting our various products out of the oven and delivered to our customers. “We’re growing exponentially as a company, which brings opportunity,” Mike says. “The management team values my input. It’s nice to feel like you’re an important part of the changes that are happening.”

Rebecca Gutierrez, Pastry Lead, Belltown

Since I opened Macrina in 1993, so many amazing people have helped make the bakery what it is today. In honor of our 25th anniversary, we are spotlighting a few key employees. Each fills an essential role at Macrina.

When I interviewed Rebecca Gutierrez I had a hunch she would be one of our best. She had recently graduated from pastry school and was eager to learn more. She trained with one of our finest pastry chefs, Jane Cho, who is now our production manager. Rebecca has become a first-rate pastry chef. Not only does she head the pastry team at our Belltown Café, but she also does all our specialty cakes. We’re lucky to have her.

Leslie

Rebecca Gutierrez, Pastry Lead, Belltown


Nothing beats a pastry still warm from the oven, or the smell of fresh baked goods that permeates the café. Our cafés in Belltown, Queen Anne, and Sodo each have a team of pastry chefs preparing baked goods specifically for that café. Rebecca Gutierrez is not only one of our most talented pastry chefs, but she has also become a great teacher of the craft.

She grew up in Bellevue and went to pastry school at South Seattle College. After a short stint at a small wedding cake company, she discovered Macrina. Over the last seven years, she’s worked at all of our cafés at one time or another. If you’ve ordered a custom cake from us, chances are she made it. She also helps develop new products for our pastry case.

“When I interviewed for the job, I was impressed with how cool and down to earth and nice Leslie was,” Rebecca says. “If I didn’t already know, I never would have guessed she was the founder. Since the first day, I’ve liked Macrina a lot. The people are the main reason. I’ve made a lot of friends and management takes really good care of us.”

Erica Olsen, Macrina’s head pastry chef and Rebecca’s supervisor, says, “Rebecca is one of the hardest working people I know. She’s a phenomenal mentor. I enjoy working with her not just to witness her mad skills, but because time goes by so quickly when you’re working with her because she’s super funny.”

Because the pastries must be ready when the café opens, the morning pastry shift starts early. Rebecca often arrives at 4:30 a.m. She enjoys the relative calm in the kitchen before the café staff shows up. “It’s a pretty fun way to start the day,” she says. Working when others are sleeping means that sometimes you’re sleeping when they’re still playing. “I’ve had to say no to things my friends invited me to do, but they understand. They know my job comes first.”

But starting early means getting off early. And Rebecca lives near Discovery Park where she loves to go running with her dog while most others are still working. If the weather is beautiful, she likes to take an adventurous hike. 

Rebecca with her sisters and her dog

Rebecca is also very close to her family and her Mexican heritage. Her parents were raised in Eastern Washington. “My parents are both one of eight, so I have a ton of family,” she says. “Family is super important to me.” Both sets of grandparents came to Washington State as migrant farmers. Her mom and dad, born in Arizona and Texas respectively, grew up in the nearby towns of Sunnyside and Prosser. They met at Yakima Valley Community College. About the time Rebecca was born, her family moved to Bellevue.

She sees her parents at least once a week and often her brother and sisters are around, too. “There’s always something going on,” Rebecca says. “My nephew will have a recital, or one of my nieces will have something.” The family also gathers for Seahawks games. “I’m not really into sports, but I go for the food and to see everyone. My mom is a great cook.”

And her family looks out for her. Burns are not uncommon in a kitchen with so many hot things, and Rebecca has gathered her share over the years. “One of my sisters does makeup,” Rebecca says. “She jokes that if I ever get married, she’s going to have to do my arms to cover up all the scars.” 

Humor is an essential part of her family life, and likely where she picked up her great sense of humor. “They joke around a lot. They’ve started picking on my boyfriend when he joins me, good-naturedly of course. That’s how you know you’re in. They must like him because it didn’t take too long.”