After more than three years in the making, Emerson’s first official culinary student organization is fresh out of the oven. 

 The Emerson Baking Club, formerly known as “Stairway to Leaven,” became affiliated with the college at the end of last spring.

“It feels great,” club co-founder and senior media arts production major Tomas Macasaet said on becoming an official campus group. “I immediately was just like, ‘my dream has come true, my baby has been born.’” 

The organization originated after an anonymous student Instagram thread circulated throughout Macasaet’s freshman year, asking if anyone wanted to start a baking club. After Macasaet and many others responded expressing interest, he and his co-founder created a group chat for the club and began organizing and leading bakes.

Soon, students convened in the communal kitchen on the third floor of the Colonial Building to whip up sweet treats. Mascasaet, known as “Chef,” and his co-founder funded supplies and ingredients using money from their off-campus jobs.

While Macasaet had to bite the cost of keeping the group running on a weekly basis, he said that it was to ensure being a part of the club didn’t cost members. 

“My parents would get so mad at me for spending about $50 or $60 a week and they were like, ‘what are you even doing?’” Macasaet said. “But it was a super fun process, even though I had to pay for a lot of stuff. [We] made a lot of good memories decorating with other students and getting them to enjoy the art of baking.”

Throughout the years, the club has baked everything from the simplest dishes like meringues to more complicated foods like dumplings. Additionally, the club does a lot of catering work, both paid and free to help provide treats for other groups that meet around campus like Emerson Esports, Atlas Magazine, and Sigma Pi Theta.

Macasaet said that when the club first tried to become affiliated in his freshman year, it faced problems sustaining its membership numbers because eboard members kept leaving. By his sophomore year, Macasaet was the only original member of the club left, he said. 

“I realized that it was a very ambitious dream to have a culinary-focused organization on a liberal arts campus in Boston,” Macasaet said. But he wasn’t going to give up.

Finally, after spending the next few years rebuilding the club’s membership numbers and remaining active to comply with SEAL’s affiliation standards, that dream became closer than ever to realizing.

Macasaet was more determined than ever to get the club affiliated, especially with his senior year approaching, where he would transition to living off campus. He said he was disconnected from the group during his junior year while trying to get the organization recognized by SEAL.

“Although it was heartbreaking to not be able to participate as much during my junior year, it’s so much more gratifying now that I have the club in capable hands,” Macasaet said. Macasaet now works as one of a few baking leaders for the club, helping to facilitate bakes.

Kellyn Taylor, a junior visual media arts major, got involved with the club her freshman year, where she started out as a baking leader before being promoted to vice president and, eventually, president of the club once it became affiliated.

Taylor said that in the years before the club became affiliated, outreach and marketing to Emerson students was difficult. Last year, the club was given a secluded space to advertise their group alongside other interest groups away from the main showroom during the Org Fair in September, the biggest event for organization outreach every year.

“We were just put into a classroom in Little Building and barely anyone showed up,” Taylor said. “It was just not advertised very well … and we would never get a lot of people signing up at those kinds of events.”

But with its new affiliation status, and being able to locate in the main fair, the club has seen its membership numbers rise.

“At the org fair alone [this year], we got like over 100 people [to sign up],” Macasaet said.

However, the club’s growing popularity comes at a bitter price. The group anticipates having to fit at least 40 people in one kitchen, assigning each of them a responsibility. 

But “a cookie recipe is not going to have 50 steps,” Macasaet said. Over time, even in years past with smaller numbers, members have left after not feeling satisfied with their lack of ability to participate.

Macasaet hopes having access to school funding might allow them to purchase more equipment and split the use of multiple kitchens for meetings.

Taylor said the club is also trying to implement an RSVP system to organize the bakes with larger groups of people.

Being the only culinary club on campus has other difficulties too, as money continues to be an issue for the organization.

“Since we’re the only culinary org on campus, we don’t, and neither does SEAL, know how to really do purchase requests with groceries because there’s no option for fresh produce,” Macasaet said.

SEAL approved a budget of $1,525 for the club for the 2024-2025 school year which will provide money for new mixing bowls, trays, and other baking equipment, in addition to paying for groceries for the bakes. 

Under SEAL’s policies, organization leaders must provide SEAL with a grocery list and allow them to order food through online grocery pickup and delivery services.

“It’s made it very difficult for us to get what we need on time and not have to constantly email back with SEAL [for approval],” Taylor said.

The club has not yet met for the fall semester, but has plenty of plans for the year, including baking one specialty pie every month for the first semester and doing a specialty bake with vegan and gluten-free options every month, to ensure members with dietary or cultural food restrictions can continue to participate.

They will have their first meeting this Friday at 3 p.m. where new and returning members can sink their teeth into baking double chocolate chip cookies.