YOUNG ENTREPRENEUR From her college years spent as a hostess at Tavern on the Green or her stints in New York working for prominent caterers, Elsylee Colon has been involved in culinary arts for a long time. Her experience as an event planner and working in the hospitality industry helped her fine-tune her knowledge of food presentation and styling techniques.
Colon began experimenting with flavors and textures as a child. Her grandmother, also a chef, encouraged her to play around and create new dishes and recipes for family gatherings. With those newly discovered dishes, Colon would later make gifts for her family and friends that were always created by hand and especially for them, a quality on which Colon's business, Elsylee Galetes Artesanals, centers.
"I think that this personalized element is usually taken for granted today by most catering and food companies," she says. "Giving someone a handmade gift that was made specifically for them at the time of the order makes them feel ultra-special and unique."
ORGANIC IN METHOD AND INGREDIENTS After spending seven years in New York City, Colon moved to Miami to be closer to her Spanish roots and to start her own company. Elsylee Galetes Artesanals creates 75 percent organic, handmade-to-order cookies in small batches with the highest quality all-natural ingredients, which use a diverse and exotic blend of flavors.
"To achieve success in the creation of amazing and harmonious food, you have to arrive at a point where the flavors, textures, and presentation are balanced in such a way that they become a coherent and beautiful work of art," Colon says.
That notion of food as art is what sets her gourmet treats apart from the rest. Colon takes her culinary interpretation of renowned artistic movements and depicts them through the design of her cookies.
Every collection is named after an architectural movement, while each cookie within that collection is named after a city that embodies that culture. For example, the "Baroco CollecciĂł" channels the major characteristics of Baroque architecture with its emphasis on bold and rich structures, energy, tension, and a strong contrast of light and shadow. To top it off, the cookies come in a stylish box with colorful accents to reflect the movements' emotions and designs.
COOKIE ACCLAIM Colon's desserts have impressed guests at weddings, university gatherings, wine tastings, gallery openings, corporate and private lunches and dinners, and more since the company's inception in April. Guests have raved about the organic, all-natural, handmade quality of her cookies, calling them "classically innovative" and "the new cookie trend." Colon has also garnered praise for the fact that her cookies are made in a boutique bakery, where each one is handled individually, instead of in a mass-production factory.
