Arts & Entertainment

Dobbs Ferry Bakery to be Featured on TLC Series 'Bakery Boss'

Buddy "Cake Boss" Valastro helps transform Lidia's Bakeshop & Café in an episode airing Monday, Jan. 13 at 10 p.m.

When Irvington resident Lidia Racanelli opened up her own bakery, Lidia’s Bakeshop & Café, a little more than a year ago in Dobbs Ferry, she found herself overwhelmed.

So she looked for some help – and found more than she ever could have imagined.

“My sister Nadia was helping me look and just Googled ‘bakery consultant’,” Racanelli said. “That’s how we came across the application for Bakery Boss.”

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Bakery Boss is a new television series on TLC which stars Buddy Valastro, well known as the “Cake Boss.” The show follows him as he travels across the country, bringing his renowned blend of business skills and baking expertise to help other bakers that are struggling to make their American dreams come true.

After Racanelli filled out an application to be on the show in Spring 2013, “things started moving extremely fast,” she said.

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“I filled out the initial survey, then there was a Skype interview, then they sent in a camera crew to interview us to see if we were a good fit for the show,” Racanelli said. “The whole process has been an experience. It’s weird – not an average year for most people, most businesses, to be on a TV show in their first year.”

Once it was decided Lidia’s Bakershop & Café would be featured on Bakery Boss, the real fun started in the summer. That’s when Valastro and his team transformed Racanelli’s new business into a baking wonderland.

“They sent us away and gave us a makeover,” Racanelli said. "It's the first season of the show, so we had no idea how it was going to go."

The makeover included mostly interior décor, including colored shelves and tiled walls –expenses of which were all courtesy of the show. Racanelli said she has since made additional changes, but the Bakery Boss’s refinements have, by and large, remained.

“They did a really good job,” she said. “We’ve added to it, to make it even more suitable to our daily needs, which are always changing.”

Lidia’s Bakeshop & Café’s Bakery Boss episode will air Monday, Jan. 13 on TLC at 10 p.m. Here is TLC’s description of the episode:

Buddy visits Lidia’s Bakeshop & Café, located in downtown in Dobbs Ferry. Lidia’s mother Maria gave her all the resources she needed to open her own bakery in Dobbs Ferry, NY, but it may have been too much too soon for this talented but unprepared baker. The bakery lacks any type of organization and all of the stress is giving Lidia panic attacks. Buddy tries to mend the family while also giving Lidia the business knowledge she needs to run a successful bakery.

Even Racanelli herself has not seen the final cut. She said she’ll be tuning in Monday night and watching with her family.

“I’m excited and nervous,” she said. “I know I’m a silly person. I can get loud. I don’t know how that is going to come off on TV. But I guess we'll find out pretty soon.”

Lidia’s Bakery & Café is located at 63 Main Street in Dobbs Ferry. For more information, visit them on Facebook


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