San Francisco chef raises $17,000 to help Ukraine with her celebrated Russian honey cake - SF Gate

Michelle Polzine couldn’t shake the feeling of uneasiness in the days that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine late last month. The former chef-owner of San Francisco’s now shuttered 20th Century Cafe wouldn't bear that sense of angst and restlessness for long when she decided to take action. Polzine organized, made some calls and put her skills to the test by launching a Russian honey cake fundraiser to aid Ukrainian families fleeing their country.

“I took the Russian honey cake and I'm using it to raise money to fight Putin. There's a little irony there. Now, we call it Ukrainian honey cake,” Polzine told SFGATE.

Polzine’s fundraiser began early this month when she reached out to her former customers by Instagram and email to share that she would bring back her famous 10-layer honey cake in a special bid. The fundraiser started with a minimum donation of $250, before switching to a raffle with $30 tickets. All proceeds were given to chef José Andrés’ organization World Central Kitchen. Polzine says that the response was exciting, yet overwhelming, as some customers placed bids at higher prices than she could have imagined.

“I woke up in the middle of the night and I looked at the emails and was like, ‘... Oh my God, they ordered so many. This is already more than I could do … we have to close the door!’ I had no control over how many orders I would get,” she said. “Every time I got an email I was like, ‘It's fine. It's fine. This is awesome. Great. Yay,’ and people were donating crazy amounts for a honey cake. One person donated $1,000.”

Chef Michelle Polzine raised $17,000 towards Ukraine with a Russian honey cake fundraiser in early March 2022. [This image was excerpted from Baking at the 20th Century Café by Michelle Polzine (Artisan Books). Copyright © 2020.]
Michelle Polzine, 20th Century Cafe

But the volume of orders shouldn’t have been a surprise. Polzine’s customers were stunned last spring when they learned that 20th Century Cafe would permanently close after a short eight-year run. No longer would they savor the cafe’s sourdough bagels, strudels or its celebrated multilayered honey cake once considered an “incredible work of art and ‘craftswomanship’” by celebrity chef Samin Nosrat.

The closure marked the end of a particularly challenging period for Polzine after undergoing a difficult surgery, dealing with the fallout of the pandemic and weathering the overall trials of operating a business in SF.

“San Francisco is not hospitable to small business owners,” Polzine told Eater in 2021. “I love this city as a citizen. I still want to live here. But I no longer have any interest in owning a business here.”

Fast forward to March 1, 2022, Polzine was without a restaurant or an active sales permit, but it wouldn’t prevent her from baking. Polzine couldn’t fathom fulfilling 40 honey cakes total with a handheld mixer at home, but the saving grace was her industry friends at State Bird Provisions and Zuni Café who received the talented chef with open arms into their fully equipped kitchen.

“Michelle reached out to us, particularly because of the ovens we have in our pastry kitchen,” said Nate Norris, chef at Zuni Café. “We have the kind of old-fashioned deck ovens that she really likes to bake her cakes in, very similar to the ones she had at her 20th Century Cafe. [So] we worked out the details. Michelle has been a business neighbor for many years here and is somebody we have an immense amount of respect for.”

On the days that Zuni Café was closed for business, Polzine worked diligently for 12 hours to bake hundreds of cake layers with the assistance of a Zuni Café staffer. Together, they counted the bake trays, separated each layer, assembled, and carefully packaged the glorious honey cakes into individual boxes. The following day, she headed to State Bird Provisions to bake the remaining pastries. Polzine added that both businesses were fully supportive, even offering to order wholesale ingredients to help save her a trip to nearby Rainbow Grocery.

The elaborate cake is an arduous task, Polzine admits, that begins with burning honey until it bubbles and is later incorporated into melted butter and other ingredients. The batter requires about 30 to 40 minutes of “straight mixing” until the flour is well combined. Eventually, thin layers of cake batter are smoothed onto parchment-lined pans for a quick bake followed by a cool down and assembly.

“I can't believe that I did this every day for eight years,” Polzine says with laughter over the phone. “Forty is enough, believe me. It takes a long time to make the cake. It's over 300 layers if that puts it into context.”

Last Wednesday, Polzine returned to Zuni Café to complete the raffle and hand the cakes to the winners. And Polzine was proud to share that with the help of her loyal customers, her honey cakes helped raise $17,000.

When asked whether she was planning more fundraisers, Polzine initially wasn’t certain, hoping instead to take a momentary break from baking. However, days after the event ended, she emailed SFGATE to share that given the fundraiser's “huge success,” she would work toward a monthly raffle with the next one slated for mid-April.

“I'm just feeling the love,” Polzine said. “People are so rad. My restaurant community, former customers and people on Instagram bought raffle tickets. I just felt horrible, and this made me feel better. Even if [it feels] like there’s nothing we can do in the world, there's something that we can do in our communities.”

If you’d like to support World Central Kitchen with donations toward feeding Ukrainian refugees, visit its site.

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