For Tatiana Galante, baking is a all-day spree, sometimes lasting until 3 a.m. Galante doesn’t bake the usual two batches of cupcakes and call it quits—she makes sweets for 120 boys.
It all began when Galante, 21, began dating her current boyfriend, Rajiv Asnani. She decided to bake for Asnani and his entire fraternity one day. Her first 120-batch of cupcakes were chocolate chip with chocolate frosting topped with a little strawberry. She got an overwhelming amount of positive feedback and has been doing it ever since.
“I picked up baking after I had someone to bake for,” she says. “If you don’t have someone then you make these great things, but who’s going to eat them?”
Since then, the senior nursing major has baked truffles, cookies, cupcakes and cakes. She has an extensive and impressive Facebook portfolio with mouth-watering captions. Devil’s food cake with dulce de leche filling and frosting. Pumpkin bread muffins with buttercream icing sprinkled with cinnamon. Triple chocolate fudge with dulce de leche filling and condensed milk buttercream icing.
Tatiana says baking gives her a sense of achievement and calm.
“I bake when I want to conquer something,” she says.
Galante says she began watching Ace of Cakes and DC Cupcakes to learn new tricks and recipes. She also used Google… a lot. Learning how to make her own cake fondant was tough. She practiced covering pots and pans with fondant until she perfected her technique.
Although she gets a lot of requests for cakes, nursing school has taken a lot of time out of her baking schedule. She used to have plans to open her own bakery, but Galante says she’s only been paid to bake a cake once.
“I found that I have more joy when I’m not getting paid than when I am,” she explains. “When I’m getting paid there’s a certain degree of expectation.”
Galante loves to cook and bake, but says she’s “anti-cookies.” They frustrate her because they’re either perfect or burned.
“Cupcakes are my favorite things to bake for sure,” she says. “They’re just very forgiving.”
So what’s next for this cupcake boss?
She wants to eventually move to Atlanta with her boyfriend to become a nurse practitioner at Emory, but not before she attempts to make a Boston cream pie cupcake.
She hopes to one day open a tea shop that also sells scones, desserts and of course cupcakes.
“In a life where so many things are uncertain,” she says. “Cupcakes, I’m always certain, will be good.”