by Dani Ng-See-Quan
Trudging down Dovercourt, the sky is gray and it’s about to snow when the wind changes slightly and I think I smell cakes baking. Indeed, a few steps later, I see the only bright spot on the street, where the sun shines on white wood panels at the front of a building, announcing my arrival at Dufflet Pastries. Sanctuary? I think so.

Even-toned and even-tempered, Dufflet Rosenberg, The Queen of Cake, is petite with short, red, curly hair. Her reign over pastries is less Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland – “Off with their heads!” – and more Marie Antoinette – “Let them eat cake!”

Dufflet was born and raised in Toronto, went to school in North York – a “pioneer” student at alternative school AISP, and is a self-taught baker and cook. She enrolled in a general arts program at U of T, but food kept calling. Not surprising, considering food was always around her. Dufflet says her mom was a good cook, experimental in the 60’s with gourmet cooking. Her father was in the restaurant equipment business, planting Dufflet firmly in a foodie frame of mind. But, she didn’t want to be a general chef – she was not poultry; she was “butter, sugar and flour.” Dufflet began to bake and sell to Toronto Cow Café, and in 1975 opened Dufflet Pastries on Queen Street West.

The bookshelf in the conference room where we first meet is filled to the brim with cookbooks, weathered with time and use: the Art of Eating, the Food Lover’s Guide to Paris, The Great Dessert Book. I like Dufflet’s style. I ask which are her favourites, and she smiles and tells me that these ones are just overflow, and that there are more in her office. Indeed, along with collections of cooking magazines – some that she’s collected since their inception – there is another full shelf of up-to-date cookbooks. Some of her favourites: Maida Heatter’s “New Book of Great Desserts”, Alice Medrich’s “Bittersweet”, and Dorie Greenspan’s “Baking”.

The standout about Dufflet Pastries, and the thing that has made these confections a favourite amongst Toronto patrons and expats alike (check out the New York Times article from October 2007 in which the writer expresses glee at finding a package of Dufflet chocolate crackle in a Manhatten food shop) is that all Dufflet creations are made from scratch. And as with all sweets from scratch, you can taste the secret ingredient – a little TLC – just like mom or grandma used to make.

That’s the other warm and fuzzy thing. Dufflet tells me that there are regular customers and generational customers. She says she’ll have people come into the store for a wedding cake who tell her that Dufflet also made their mother’s and grandmother’s wedding cakes as well. And then of course there are the fundraising initiatives Dufflet Pastries is involved in. Dufflet has supported lots of community organizations for more than 30 years, including the CANFAR gala since its inception. As Queen of Cake, she really does give back to her subjects.

The Queen of Cake’s chariot is, surprisingly, or perhaps not, a bicycle. Dufflet is an avid cyclist, and in explaining her favourite Toronto moment, tells me that it’s exploring Toronto on a bicycle. “You see things with a different perspective on a bike,” she says. Actually, Dufflet was featured in Get Out There magazine in a brief Q & A about her interest in cycling. Whether it’s the east or west parts of the city, gardens in the summer or undiscovered nooks and crannies outside of the triangle of stores that are the framework for Dufflet’s life at the moment, she says that taking a bike ride feels like going on a trip. She also mentions that she and her husband, architect Martin Kohn (of Kohn Shnier Architects, who designed the bright and pretty Dufflet Pastries retail location uptown) take a cycling trip – “only 1000 km” – to explore Europe on a tandem bike for two weeks every year.

So what does the Queen of Cake like for dessert? Anything with warm apples – apple crumble, apple pie, apple tarts…Dufflet says she’ll go out of her way at a restaurant to order dessert if it includes warm apples. It makes me think of a quote from our British literary heroine Jane Austen: “Good apple pies are a considerable part of our domestic happiness.”

And, after meeting with Dufflet, I can only say that I’m a firm believer that Dufflet and her pastries are a considerable part of Toronto’s domestic happiness.

By the way, it’s true – Dufflet Pastries did make a birthday cake for Mick Jagger. She says he ordered chocolate fudge.