The Little Black Dog Bakery is Bloomington’s newest culinary addition, but with a unique focus: it specializes in treats for dogs. Run entirely from her home kitchen, 33-year-old Bloomington native Claire Vesyoly brought her childhood passion to the community.
Vesyoly’s childhood love of dogs and her lifelong passion for baking inspired her to open the bakery. Her mother, Michele Stebbins, said baking was built into Vesyoly’s childhood.
“I’m from an Italian-American family,” Stebbins said. “I’m from the East Coast, so lots of baking is going on there. You just do what you do, and then what you know rubs off on your kids.”
Vesyoly attended Ivy Tech Community College in Bloomington for culinary school. She created the blueprint for the bakery’s future menu during a class assignment.
Following her education, Vesyoly landed in the Bloomington restaurant circuit. She started at The Elm and ultimately became the head pastry chef at Feast Market & Cellar for about seven months. It was in the professional world that Vesyoly’s confidence in her future reached a new high.
“That was when it seemed real,” Vesyoly said. “It was really like, ‘Oh my god, I can do this. Like, I could actually do this.’”
That’s when she took the leap. Vesyoly left Feast in October with plans to start her own bakery — for people and pets — out of her kitchen. With no job, only scraps of a plan and a dream, Vesyoly pressed forward. She officially opened Little Black Dog in December of last year. Where others might be worried about their daughter leaving their job, Stebbins thought the move made perfect sense.
“It suits her perfectly,” Stebbins said. “Claire is always best on her own. Not that she doesn’t work well with others, but I think she is very creative, and so for her not to have to follow somebody else’s ideas and itinerary and schedule, it suits Claire.”
Vesyoly drew from French-Canadian techniques for the pastry base and her father’s Japanese background for design inspiration. She said her background in theater design helped with the overall incorporation of her creativity into the final designs. Vesyoly pointed out that her Salted S’mores Cake used the inspiration of Japanese shrines for its baked meringue toppings.
Her menu now features 24 cakes, 22 cheesecakes, five different tarts, 12 pies, 11 different cookies, five brownie types, five quiches and 22 breakfast pastries. There’s another section of the menu which includes nine different biscuits and six different cakes designed specifically for canine consumption.
The bakery would not be here without Vesyoly’s love for humankind’s furry friends. Dogs cannot have a lot of what humans eat, such as chocolate, so Vesyoly found workarounds that dogs would still enjoy.
In resourceful fashion, she went straight to the source: her very own little black dogs, Coffee and Fiona.
Vesyoly’s dogs Coffee (left) and Fiona (right) are pictured. They acted as treat testers for Vesyoly’s baked goods.
“Fiona will eat anything, but Coffee tends to be a little pickier,” Vesyoly said. “The tail starts to go, sniffs at it, he’ll take stuff and he’ll hide it. I usually figure if I find it later, it means he did not like it and if it is gone, then I assume he ate it, and I think he liked it.”
Vesyoly uses ingredients like peanut butter and honey for her dog treats to ensure that no pup walks away with an upset stomach. Local veterinarian Dr. Vishnu Munagala said those ingredients are fine choices for dogs.
“Most of the times peanut butter and honey are very safe if they do not have xylitol which is very harmful,” Munagala said. “In moderation peanut butter is a great treat, and rarely do dogs have an allergy to peanuts.”
Vesyoly’s 15 different dog treats don’t include xylitol, a sugar found in some fruits, she said. She uses organic peanut butter which is safe for all dogs to devour.
Her trial and error paid off, along with her creative efforts. Little Black Dog Bakery is gaining traction in Bloomington, and Vesyoly has a stream of four to five orders per week from the community.
She once made a dog-edible gender reveal cake where the dog would eat the outer layer to reveal the gender of the customer’s baby. Vesyoly said she finds joy in the more creative projects she gets to work on for customers.
“I love being able to see what, what kind of things people want, and what kind of flavors they want, but being able to design it in a way where you send it off and they open that box, it’s a wow,” Vesyoly said.
Vesyoly will look to expand the business — still operating in her house — this summer in the Bloomington Community Farmers’ Market at Showers Common. She’s confident her edge in being a bakery for dogs in Bloomington will help attract customers with pets in town.
“My whole family has been really supportive, and my mom has been a very big help, helping me learn how this all works and providing emotional inspiration since my childhood,” Vesyoly said. “I really have enjoyed my time with the bakery; it’s been wonderful, and a dream come true to be able to do this.”
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