Springfield Gardens baking business changes course to feed frontline workers
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Althea Georgiana Casimir-Magloire (right) and her daughter Ymara Magloire with bite-sized rum cakes they sell through their company Althea’s Tropical Delights. Photo courtesy of NYCEDC
By David Brand
Just two years after making the leap from accountant to professional baker, Althea Georgiana Casimir-Magloire faced an existential threat to her Caribbean cake company.
Althea’s Tropical Delights relied on festivals, markets and conferences to sell their tropical fruit-infused desserts and to drive new customers to their website. But by mid-March every one of those in-person events was cancelled.
“We came to a complete halt,” Casimir-Magloire said. “I had to figure out how to pivot to stay afloat.”
The Springfield Gardens resident decided to step up for the community, cooking full meals for hospital staff and other essential workers during COVID’s peak. She got a boost from Frontline Food Queens, an initiative that links local restaurants with corporate and individual sponsors to provide healthy meals to medical workers.
Casimir-Magloire’s sponsors include the cast and crew of the TV show “Blackish,” which enabled Althea’s Tropical Delights to cook dishes like curry chicken with brown rice and black eyed peas, as well as vegan options, for staff at the St. John’s Episcopal Hospital in Far Rockaway.
“That was our savior,” Casimir-Magloire said. She and her daughter sent a video to the “Blackish” cast and crew thanking them for the support.
The shift to community service was nothing new for Casimir-Magloire, however.
She decided to found her business after working to raise money for her native Dominica, a small island nation devastated by Hurricane Maria in 2017.
Casimir-Magloire wanted to bake rum cakes, but New York City health rules prevented her from selling the homemade items without a license. She sold t-shirts instead.
The roadblock inspired her to get certified and channel her love for baking into a full-time job.
“I opened all kinds of businesses, but I never thought of doing my cakes as a business,” she said. “This is the business I’m most passionate about.”
Casimir-Magloire enrolled in a small business training program run by the New York City Economic Development Corporation and Queens Public Library that helped her hit the ground running.
She has continued expanding her new role, connecting with other programs that provide healthy meals to frontline workers and food pantries.
The next step, she said, is moving from a commercial kitchen on Long Island to a site closer to home in Springfield Gardens.
“We’re looking to get our own kitchen space as production slowly increases because we want to continuously produce food for the community,” she said.
