Owner of SophisticakeIT makes delicious pieces of art

by Amanda DePerro

October 25, 2018

12:00 AM

Harris teaches classes where attendees are provided a chocolate shoe to decorate while they drink wine

Francene Harris' Mom's Banana Pudding

Ingredients

1 large box (5.25 oz.) instant vanilla pudding, or 3 cups homemade

1/2 box vanilla wafers

2 medium bananas

1 container whipped topping

Directions

Mix pudding per directions on box and let set up. While your pudding is setting up, crush up the vanilla wafers and cut bananas into bite-sized chunks. Once the pudding is set up, start layering your ingredients starting with the pudding, then whipped topping, bananas and vanilla wafers. Continue to layer until all ingredients have been used. Chill for at least one hour, then serve.

"“My mom cooked from scratch but, unlike my grandmother, her baking was not from scratch. But this (banana pudding) recipe was her all-time most requested,” says Harris. “Although she passed away three years before my son was born, to this date it is his favorite requested dessert.”

Francene Harris, owner of SophisticakeIT bakery, has always loved shoes and has always loved baking. It wasn’t until adulthood that she would combine the two in a professional format.

With a grandmother who taught her to love the kitchen and a working mother who needed her oldest daughter to cook for the rest of the children, Harris spent much of her childhood in the kitchen. However, for a while, it seemed this would just be a hobby.

While working in the corporate banking industry, Harris often brought in cakes for potlucks and coworkers began to request specific dishes. If it wasn’t for a cake decorating class teacher though, Harris may have never realized that she could bake for a living.

“After the first night, I was helping my teacher clean up, and she was like, ‘Why are you here? Why did you come to class? You already have what it takes – I’m not going to be able to teach you anything,’” says Harris. “Hearing those encouraging words just lit a fire under me and I took off from there.”

With the moral support of her husband, John, Harris began to bake. She had crafted inanimate objects out of food and fondant before, but she was frustrated by the delicacy of fondant and sugar paste. She particularly loves shoes, and has over 100 pairs in her closet; so when she found a chocolate mold in the shape of a shoe, everything changed.

“I decorated the (expletive) out of it,” says Harris. “I kept looking at more and more shoes and ordering more molds, and I started having my own molds manufactured. … It’s just been one thing after another; it’s just my love.”

Harris’ chocolate shoes are so realistic, they’re often mistaken for real – albeit elaborately decorated – shoes. From steampunk heels and lacey stilettos to matching his-and-hers Louboutin-style shoes, Harris loves creating edible objects. And, for the first time, one of Harris’ shoes was recognized not just as something delicious, but art. She submitted her steampunk shoe to an Ohio Art League exhibition, and became one of 61 artists to be chosen out of more than 350 applicants to be on display at the Fort Hayes Shot Tower Gallery.

“I can look at different shoes and I can see the art in the shoe. Now that my chocolate shoe is being recognized as a piece of art, it’s coming full circle,” says Harris. “When they wrote me back and said my submission was accepted, I was so happy I was crying. It was on my bucket list.”

In addition to SophisticakeIT, Harris is carrying on her grandmother’s legacy by teaching classes online in an effort to promote cooking at home using fresh ingredients. She also offers chocolate shoe decorating classes, where attendees are provided a chocolate shoe to decorate while they drink wine.

No matter where SophisticakeIT takes her, Harris plans to stay in Westerville. She has a son and a daughter, and her son still lives in Westerville. She was attracted by the schools, though her first drive through uptown was what really sold her on the city.

“The first time I drove into uptown, I cried,” says Harris. “I thought, ‘Oh my god, this is the most beautiful town I have ever been in my life.’ I still feel that way when I drive through uptown.”