Getting Bizy

Hannah Long started baking with her mom, Kim McAbee, when she was a child. She treasures her memories of baking cinnamon rolls together every Christmas Eve.

As an adult, Long has become a talented baker, McAbee said.

“The baking comes so easy to her,” she explained, noting that she tends to follow recipes to-the-book while her daughter can successfully throw a recipe together. “She’s not afraid to try (new things). Hers is always much better than mine.”

When Long got married in 2012, she began selling chocolate-covered strawberries for Valentine’s Day. As her strawberries gained popularity, she started selling them and other baked goods at the Portland Farmers Market. Now she sells out of stock at the market nearly every Saturday, and she recently announced plans to open a central location.

Almost eight years after her strawberry success, Long is opening her own bakery and coffee shop, Bizy Dips, in the John Jay Center for Learning lobby at 101 S. Meridian St., Portland. After a ribbon-cutting ceremony and soft opening Friday, the new business will open to the public Tuesday.

Long said she’s excited to open her shop in the facility in part because of its centralized location.

“We’re really just right at the heart of Portland,” she said.

Long plans to sell popular items like cinnamon rolls and chocolate-covered strawberries. She will also sell muffins, cookies and other baked goods. She decided to add coffee to her shop menu because she loves coffee and, as she said, “what goes better with baked goods than coffee?”

Her drink menu will include a full lineup of expresso drinks, lattes, cappuccinos, cold brew and regular coffee. She plans to theme different drinks after bakery items, like a chocolate-covered strawberry mocha or a blueberry crumble latte. She will also sell iced and hot tea as well as flavored sodas and hot chocolate for non-coffee drinkers.

For now, Long will continue baking her goods in her kitchen at the Prayer Cottage, a house located at the corner of Pleasant and Middle streets in Portland. Her father built the cottage for their family to use as a meeting place, and it’s also used for Bible studies and traveling missionaries. She hopes to add an oven and baking area at John Jay so visitors can smell the fresh treats when they walk inside.

Long plans to rope her husband, Patrick, into some barista training. Patrick explained that while his home-based recruitment marketing job lost some business during the COVID-19 shutdown, his wife’s bakery was booming.

He’s taken the supportive role in helping Hannah achieve her dream business.

“I’m not a baker — I’m the official taste-tester,” he said.

Patrick is also helping his wife with marketing, but he noted she has the final say in all decisions.

Rusty Inman, executive director of John Jay Center for Learning, said the organization’s board proposed in November that it might be nice to have a coffee shop or meeting place.

After connecting with a few different business owners, they chose Bizy Dips.

Inman thinks both Bizy Dips and John Jay will have a mutually beneficial relationship.

“I’m excited to bring people in the door,” he said.

McAbee noted that she’s proud of her daughter for starting a bakery.

“It’s like an art to her; she’s just really good at it,” McAbee said. “I’m the mom — I’m supposed to be teaching (her) recipes, but she’s always giving me recipes.”