A Budding Cookie Pop-Up Wants to Prove That Butter Isn’t Necessarily Better

Selah Bakery owner Rochelle Tyler makes batches of cookies in her home kitchen in Hollywood five days a week. The bakery’s modest set-up only allows for a dozen to be baked at a time, but the demand is about to increase significantly.

Selah’s plant-based offerings are already available seven days a week at the Arts District location of the Pie Hole, and will be sold out of its Pasadena outpost, as well, starting next month. Now that Selah’s wholesale and personal orders keep going up, LA’s got a new vegan baker ready to compete with the likes of popular options like Cake Girl, Erin McKenna’s Bakery, and Just What I Kneaded in Frogtown.

Tyler’s grandmother taught her how to bake when she was five and she’s now carrying on the family tradition of sharing baked goods. But instead of gifting her creations to family or neighbors, Selah’s goal is to bring greater Los Angeles texturally pleasing cookies baked without animal products. To get that buttery feel, Tyler uses apple sauce, vegan butter, or coconut oil. The bakery currently has four cookie varieties at play, with one called Hollaback Girl that channels banana pudding, a chocolate chip version, a strawberry and cream flavor, and a gluten-free Snickerdoodle-inspired option called the Spice Girl.

Selah Bakery started operations in 2019, with a regular stand at the Hollywood Farmers Market and, more recently, her pop-up at the Pie Hole. She also landed a regular spot last year at the Black Market Flea in Florence, which supports Black-owned businesses and runs on the last weekend of the month. Tyler had a short chef tenure at the Original Cannabis Cafe before it opened, then moved to Sweet Laurel Bakery in the Palisades before striking out on her own.

California’s cottage food operation license makes Selah’s operations possible, but her mentorship through the Pie Hole’s Pie Lab accelerator program — at no cost to Tyler — is making Selah Bakery scalable. She’ll likely move into an industrial space, but also looks forward to having her cookies on sale at Gelson’s over the holiday season, and envisions a Volkswagen Bus as a food truck in her near future.

Selah Bakery cookies are available at the Pie Hole in the Arts District, located at 714 Traction Avenue, seven days a week.

Selah Bakery