Camille Mansell’s sweet journey with Desert Frost Cake

In the quiet hills of Hop Canyon near Magdalena, Camille Mansell is creating art with confection, with handcrafted cakes that carry her experience and talent. Mansell has turned a lifelong passion into a growing business that’s beginning to reach far beyond her hometown.

“I started baking in middle school,” Mansell recalls. “But the design and everything came when my favorite shows were all the cake decorating shows on TV. I always just loved to bake.”

Compliments from her mother helped spark Mansell’s career choice, “She always said I had the best moist cake”, was the first affirmation of a talent that would take Mansell across cities and styles, from traditional pies to vegan, gluten-free cakes.

Before returning to her hometown of Magdalena, Mansell spent nearly eight years in Albuquerque, working a variety of baking jobs that shaped her skills and confidence. At the Sit ‘n’ Fix Diner, she learned the foundations of traditional baking. “I would add in my own decorating touches, like little carrots on their carrot cake” she says, even when the dessert menu was more rustic.

Later, at Annapurna’s Vegan Vegetarian Café, she challenged herself to learn vegan baking. “It gave me confidence to make vegan cakes, so now I make both regular and vegan cakes,” she explains. “Vegan cakes are dairy-free, and I’ve learned to work with different flours and egg alternatives.”

Her journey continued in Los Angeles, where she spent five years in West Hollywood working at Duff’s Cake Mix, a public cake decorating studio founded by celebrity baker Duff Goldman. “I used to watch him in the cake competitions, and I loved him,” Mansell says. “It was a great experience. It kind of made me want to do something like that or bring that here.”

In 2023, Mansell’s father passed away, prompting her return to Magdalena. “He left me some land in Hop Canyon,” she shares. Her return home to an area with a lack of bakeries opened up Mansell to the possibility of starting her own business, “If I’m going to bust my butt for all these other businesses, I might as well try for myself.”

That decision was the birth of Desert Frost Cake Factory, a homegrown business that’s quickly gaining traction through word of mouth and community support.

“Most of my cakes have become word of mouth,” she says. “Francis Dorothy Zamora posted some stuff I did for the basketball banquet, and the Mage Board spread everything even further.”

Mansell’s cakes are as varied as the celebrations they serve, from fancy with fondant to classic buttercream. She has options for any occasion, “Birthday cakes, wedding, graduation, anniversary, thinking of you,” she lists. “Right now, I’m doing two today and two tomorrow. It seems like that’s been the pattern lately, about two cakes a week.”

She’s also introduced “mini cake grams”, small, personalized cakes meant to brighten someone’s day. “Someone just says, ‘Hey, I’m thinking of you,’ and they’ll order a tiny little cake to send out,” she says.

While Mansell is currently rebuilding her portfolio, her ambitions are clear. “I rented a place to bake a huge wedding cake in Albuquerque,” she says. “That opened my eyes to branching outside of Magdalena. If I could start branching out to Albuquerque, I think that would give me a bigger boost and more of an opportunity to make something bigger of this.”

Her niche? Specialty cakes, each one a custom creation that reflects her artistic flair and deep care for her clients.

“Decorating and taste go hand in hand,” she says. “My mother always said it has to taste as good as it looks.”

With her homestead growing and her reputation spreading, Camille Mansell is proving that even in a small town, big dreams can rise, layer by layer, just like her cakes.