Maria Magdalena Eek (1733 – 1800) was a Finnish

pastry chef A pastry chef or pâtissier (; feminine pâtissière, ) is a station chef in a professional kitchen, skilled in the making of pastries, desserts, breads and other baked goods. They are employed in large hotels, bistros, restaurants, bakeries, b ...

. Based in

Turku Turku ( ; ; , ) is a city in Finland and the regional capital of Southwest Finland. It is located on the southwestern coast of the country at the mouth of the Aura River (Finland), River Aura. The population of Turku is approximately , while t ...

, she had a successful career and was a notable artist within her trade, eventually being granted a

Royal warrant of appointment Royal warrants of appointment have been issued for centuries to tradespeople who supply goods or services to a royal court or certain royal personages. The royal warrant enables the supplier to advertise the fact that they supply to the issuer of t ...

Biography

In 1782, she was given permission from the city authorities to manufacture and sell all forms of bread which was not included in the monopoly of the baker's

guild A guild ( ) is an association of artisans and merchants who oversee the practice of their craft/trade in a particular territory. The earliest types of guild formed as organizations of tradespeople belonging to a professional association. They so ...

, which in fact meant dessert bread such as cakes. She was given the permission granted to all women outside of the guilds: this entitled her to make and sell only what she had made with her own hands and only enough for her to support herself, which meant that she could not employ people in her business. She was also never registered as a baker, which makes the dates of her business difficult to trace. Despite these conditions, Eek managed to circumvent the restrictions: she supported not only herself but her sister and foster daughter, bought a house, had several assistants employed (which she referred to as only domestics) and had her pastries sold by sellers all over town. Her successes caused constant lawsuits from the members of the baker's guild during the 1780s.

References

1733 births 1800 deaths Pastry chefs 18th-century Finnish businesswomen 18th-century Finnish businesspeople {{chef-bio-stub