Rachel Liu Martindale wasn’t a natural-born baker. Growing up, she said, her family’s oven was largely used to store pots and pans. Yet Martindale has cultivated a unique brand at her Ann Arbor bakery, Q Bakehouse.
Every week, the display case features an array of pastries that blend European form with East-Asian flavor. Her current bestseller is a chili crisp scone. The recipe is a riff on a cheddar, bacon, and scallion scone that she had offered at the bakery in the past. The bacon-free version is meant to accommodate customers who are vegetarian, or who don’t eat pork, Martindale said.
“And so I was trying to figure out a way to take out the meat, but also kind of incorporate some of that umami flavor,” Matindale said. “And so I think there was just one day I was in the shower and was like, ‘You know, I think chili crisp would taste really good in that scone!’”
Past menus have included other successful experiments: black sesame snickerdoodles, mochi brownies, scallion sesame bread buns, and lemon yuzu ricotta cake. Rachel’s creative cycle is fast paced, and constant.
“We really strive to have different stuff on our menu pretty much every single week, which sometimes is a tall task, and we run out of ideas and run out of steam,” Martindale said. “So I think at this point, honestly, I am just trying to figure out what new stuff we can make, because it feels like we've already made so many new things every single week.”
A journey of trial and error
While Martindale loved watching Food Network with her grandmother after school, she didn’t do much of her own baking until college. It was her way to “de-stress” as she worked toward an engineering degree at the University of Michigan.
After earning her diploma, she worked in the engineering industry for 9 years before realizing it wasn’t quite what she wanted to do, and quit her job.
“I worked in coffee, actually, and was a barista for a while … but then also worked in a startup for a little bit,” Martindale said. “I was kind of soul-searching and figuring out what I wanted to do, and I started baking in the evenings at home.”
Her evening hobby grew into a business as friends began requesting she bake cakes for various events. Martindale went on to start a pop-up bakery called Milk & Honey, which primarily served cakes. She later rebranded her business to Q Bakehouse.
The skills required for engineering and baking aren’t all that different, Martindale said.
“Baking is very much an exact science, and that's how you produce the baked goods. It's all the chemistry and all ingredients interacting with one another, and so I do really love the precision of it,” Martindale said. “And I think that's probably why I like baking so much. It's like my science background kind of translates well into it.”
Rediscovering childhood treats
The pivot from cakes to fusion pastries was triggered, in part, by Matindale’s experience during the pandemic.
“A lot of time spent at home during lockdown, missing the food that my parents made, kind of rediscovering my roots and realizing how I didn't really know how to make a lot of the food that my parents made growing up,” she said.
Martindale spent a lot of time perusing YouTube tutorials about cooking Chinese and Tiawanese dishes. She quickly realized there was “room to play” with the East Asian flavors and textures she grew up loving.
“And all of my experimenting when it comes to recipes is like, ‘How much sugar can I take out of this recipe without sacrificing the texture of it?’” Martindale said. “And that's definitely more my palate. And also, I think the Asian palate in general is just having desserts and pastries that are just less rich and sweet.”
Many of her creations also embody “Q,” which is pronounced “cue.” The Taiwanese term describes the chewy, bouncy tension in foods like tapioca pearls, noodles, and rice cakes.
“It’s a texture that's really strived for in Asia,” Martindale said. “And to say something is ‘Q’ is really a compliment. ”
Incorporating East Asian flavors
Recently, Martindale spent some time experimenting with taro after her mother bought an excess of the ingredient. But not every idea has ended in success. There have been “so many different flops.”
Among them was her attempt at a White Rabbit-flavored cookie. White Rabbit is a Chinese milk candy popular across East Asia.
“It was super hard and chewy, and they did melt in the oven, but as they cooled, they just turned back into that hard candy, essentially,” she said. “And you couldn't even really eat the cookie without it just like, completely sticking in your teeth.”
Occasional “flops” are inevitable, but baking with new flavors doesn’t have to be intimidating or complicated, Martindale said. Ingredients like matcha powder, black sesame oil, and gochujang are widely available now.
“It's really just getting those items and then being able to just add even a tablespoon and per your recipe, you know, or two if you want to add a little bit more flavor,” she said. “But anything you can kind of just incorporate and see how it turns out, and adjust to your taste.”
For Martindale, there’s a very specific indicator of whether her experiment has been a success.
“I always find it the highest compliment when somebody comes in and tells me their Asian parent came with them and they liked everything,” she said. “And I think that is such a high compliment for me and really validating, I think that, I've hit the palate that I'm hoping to get.”
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