“The Sweet Stuff” is Christiansted’s new Crucian pastry shop crafting coconut, guava and pineapple tarts, Vienna cake, benye, red grout, and many more mouth-watering treats. The family-owned business is in the bright yellow building on the corner in the Richmond Courtyard. It’s a hop, skip, and jump from the Richmond Post Office and a stone’s throw from Bassin Triangle.
Crucian natives Xanthia Jacobs and her daughter Xaia Todmann have been baking since Todmann came home from culinary school. Family and friends gave her a bunch of orders; “I said, ‘Let me help.”’ This was in 2013, Jacobs told the Source.
“I thought about getting my grandmother’s recipes from my aunt in Maryland. I tried the tarts and they came out perfectly. It made me reminisce about when I was a little girl in my grandmother’s kitchen,” Jacobs said. “The Red Grout (and passion fruit) is truly a Crucian delight with five ounces grout and three ounces cream,” Jacobs added.
From there, Jacobs began making tarts and filling multiple orders for her family, for friends, and through word-of-mouth. She approached the gas station owner near her home about selling the tarts. The pastries took off with orders for more gas stations, stores and restaurants. The Sweet Stuff quickly built a name in the pastry business. Jacobs received her business license June 7, 2018.
The Sweet Stuff moved into its new home in the Richmond Courtyard June 7 with a Grand Opening and Sixth Anniversary celebration.
The Sweet Stuff pastry shop recently won the People’s Choice category, sponsored by Liberty VI, at the Tart Wars event in Frederiksted July 13.
Todmann always knew she wanted to bake. She just didn’t know exactly what kind of baking until she was in culinary school, she said.
It was 2011 and Todmann was a student at Le Cordon Bleu, the French Culinary Institute, in Miami. She was exposed to bread classes, sugar classes, chocolate classes and more. Her focus was the basic techniques of baking pastry. Once back home, she began to bake the cultural pastries she grew up with: Vienna cake, Crucian Cream Cake, and the plain cake with chocolate icing that Crucians looked for between each layer, she said.
Todmann finds peace in her kitchen. It’s when she’s baking, peace comes. “I don’t allow anyone in the kitchen with me when I’m baking. It’s something for me just to be by myself and create.”
“When Xaia was very young, she would be in the kitchen with my grandmother. I think that’s when her love for baking started. She would help mix or stir and she fell in love. She always knew that’s what she wanted to do,” Jacobs recalled.
Todmann attended the culinary program at the St. Croix Educational Complex High School, where the focus was on cooking, not baking. It was there she was privy to everything one needed to begin a culinary journey. It was a good jump start, she said.
“When I got to college, I had the fundamentals I needed for my culinary journey that were important for my focus in baking,” she explained.
Prior to Todmann’s graduation from high school, Jacobs found this “awesome school, The Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY. They had a week-long program on their campus.” Todmann was enrolled while Jacobs explored New York City.
The two did a tour of Johnson and Wales in N. Miami one Labor Day weekend. They went to South Beach and to the Emeril Lagasse restaurant, all set up by the Johnson and Wales School.
Since graduating from college and settling back home, life for Todmann has been nothing short of busy. Sunday is her day off. She preps on Monday for Tuesday, and so on throughout the week. Orders are taken on the website, over the phone, through texts, and in person at the store.
One could say the mother-daughter bakers have inherited their craft from Jacobs’ maternal grandmother, Florita Howell Petersen, who was affectionately known as “Mudda.”
“Mudda” was a baker, a cook, and she also sewed. She did everything, Jacobs said. “She sold her food and cakes at the Agricultural Fair every year and on weekends at the Shan Hendricks Market in Christiansted.”
“My grandmother worked seven days a week. I remember people coming on Sundays at 4 a.m. at the side door of her home to buy Titi bread and Maubi. She started out helping her mother as a teenager and began baking as a young woman with her own family. She lived right here in Richmond,” Jacobs said.
Jacobs, her sister, and her brother had to help wash those big, deep pots. It wasn’t fun, she said. Her brother cooked and worked in restaurants for many years on the mainland.
Linda Encarnacion Radix had been a faithful Sweet Stuff customer for many years before the shop opened, she told the Source in their chat at the bakery. “I’m ordering two slices of chocolate cake, two Vienna slices, and two coconut tarts. I always buy the Sweet Stuff to take with me when I’m traveling. I love the Guava Berry tarts in season and the Grout is delicious. I always recommend it to everyone. The quality and taste is over the top,” Radix said, pointing to the showcase as she ordered.
Sharon Hodge agreed to an interview and shared her passion. She has been indulging in the Sweet Stuff for years and has her favorites: pistachio, plain, and Baileys cakes and the passion fruit grout. “The shop is great! It’s my first time here,” she said.
Bead on a Wire is the next-door neighbor to The Sweet Stuff. Vanessa Harvey Hinds and her husband are the owners of the Richmond Courtyard. Hinds provides all the materials necessary to make jewelry, she sells jewelry, and she teaches jewelry-making classes at Bead on a Wire. Hinds spoke about being in close proximity to The Sweet Stuff on a daily basis. It’s a struggle trying to avoid eating those goodies, she said.
“Oh, I love my guava tart and red grout is my favorite. My husband loves all the cakes and the pineapple tarts. Everything is absolutely delicious. The service is very friendly. It’s nice, clean and wonderful. It’s a great place to get your Crucian desserts. They’re made every day. I love it – I do – I love it,” Hinds said, eyes bright as she shared her big smile.
For those folks off island who are asking about mail orders, Jacobs and Todmann are researching the possibility of The Sweet Stuff flying priority overseas, they said.
The Sweet Stuff Hours of Operation
-Tuesdays through Saturdays, 11 a.m.- 6 p.m.
-Sundays and Mondays, Closed
-Benye – Saturdays Only
-Sweetbread and Guava Berry tarts at Christmastime
For more information:
www.thesweetstuffvi.com
www.facebook.com/thesweetstuffvi
@thesweetstuffvi
340-208-0978
