Mara Oyelaran

Mara grew up in Lagos and London, splitting her childhood between her grandmother’s puff-puff and the bakery case at the end of her street. After training at Le Cordon Bleu, she spent ten years running pastry programs in restaurant kitchens before deciding she wanted to make one thing, and make it perfectly.

She opened Velvet Glaze in 2019 with a single fryer, a borrowed mixer, and a sketchbook full of flavor ideas. That sketchbook is now on its fourth volume, and every new flavor on the menu still starts as one of her doodles.

On the journal, Mara writes about flavor development, technique, and the occasional glorious failure. When she is not in the kitchen, she is usually at the farmers market haggling over stone fruit.