Rory comes to the world of food and hospitality honestly, hailing from a family of restaurateurs. Her great-grandfather owned the Adams Cafeteria on 5th Avenue in Manhattan and her grandfather owned Smiths Bar in the Theater District. She has many fond memories of traveling into the city from her home in Long Island, spending hours with her grandfather in the restaurant. When she wasn't hanging ou
t at Smiths Bar, she spent much of her time combing through restaurant and kitchen supply stores, poring over her mother's cookbook collection, and honing her baking skills from an early age. There was never a question that she would do something else. She went to Johnson and Wales University in Providence, RI, graduating in 1998 with a degree in Baking and Pastry Arts. From there, she interned at Charlie Palmer's prestigious restaurant Aureole in New York City. Following the internship, Rory became Karen Demmasco's Pastry Assistant at Della Femina in Manhattan's Midtown. There she began to develop her own personal style. After nearly two years working alongside Karen, Rory took a position as Pastry Chef for the Lenox Room, a well-established restaurant on the Upper East Side. In 2003, Rory moved to California, working first at the Ritz Carlton in Half Moon Bay under noted pastry chef William Werner, who now owns San Francisco's renowned patisserie, Craftsman and Wolves. In 2008, ready for a new challenge, Rory moved to the Napa Valley and began working in the front of the house as a server at Thomas Keller's French bistro, Bouchon. After eight rewarding years there, she transitioned into the winery business, working for Far Niente for four years as a Wine Educator. In both instances, she valued the connections she was able to make with guests and appreciated an opportunity to see firsthand how people connected to the food and wine they were served. It was this appreciation for connecting with people and helping create treasured memories that helped spur Rory to launch her own business when the COVID-19 pandemic hit and she found herself stuck at home. Always a people person with a love of hospitality, she had long dreamt of finding a way to bring her passion for baking into people's lives and kitchens. With Rory's Bakehouse, she has been able to realize this dream, finding new and creative ways to connect with people. She takes great pleasure in the focus on baking at home, explaining, "I love that people get to experience the smells and the feeling of baking without all the work. It helps form an emotional connection that is really important to me."
