Meet the Producer: Hot Cakes

If you see someone wandering around the Ballard Farmers’ Market (Sundays, year-round, 10 a.m.–3 p.m.) with a little red timer in her hands, she’s probably hooked—on Autumn Martin’s molten chocolate jar-baked cake. Named the Ari Cole (after her brother) the cake ($7) is one of three delectable food items—and by far the hottest seller—Martin offers through her new company, Hot Cakes, at the market. 

Martin, 27, is no stranger to sweets. A former pastry chef at Canlis, she’s now the much-lauded head chocolatier at Fremont-based chocolate maker, Theo—a perfect spot for this one-time student of Montreal’s Callebaut School of Chocolate. The idea for Hot Cakes’ best seller was born last summer. Martin was asked to prepare dessert for an auction dinner at Arlington’s Ninety Farms, and came up with the idea of baking and serving molten chocolate cake in a 4-ounce Mason jar. “People loved it,” Martin says. By Thanksgiving she was at the Ballard Farmers’ Market selling the all-organic Ari Cole, as well as Josephines ($3)—almond butter rum financières named after Martin’s sister—and the Dean Martin ($7), a warm sautéed salad of bacon, dates, French bread cubes and blue cheese ($7). As for her decadent molten chocolate cakes, market-goers can purchase the batter raw in its jar to cook at home, or Martin will bake it for you at the market in her vintage oven, and hand you a timer, allowing you to enjoy a 17-minute market stroll until your heavenly hot cake is ready to devour. Can’t make it to the Sunday market? Swing into Theo (3400 Phinney Ave. N; 206.632.5100; theochocolate.com) to pick up the cakes seven days a week.