A South Jersey pastry chef comes back for another rise
Cheesecakes, croissants, and an assortment of Turkish specialties are the wheelhouse of Moorestown’s By Zena bakery.
When Zena Demirceviren sold her shares of her pastry shop in Riverton, N.J., 12 years ago after the birth of her daughter, she found that she couldn’t stay away from baking.
“It doesn’t get out of you,” said Demirceviren, a native of Turkey who has been in the United States for 25 years. Even during her new career in finance — as a loan officer for a mortgage company and auto dealerships — she was known among her friends and former customers for her cheesecakes, pistachio rolls, and baklava. (The shop, Zena’s Patisserie, closed in 2020 during the pandemic.)
In fall 2021, her baking hobby got out of hand. On a whim, she mentioned on a Moorestown Facebook group that she would take Thanksgiving orders. Hundreds of people reached out, she said. She got a cottage food permit for her home kitchen and filled the orders. When more orders poured in, she leased a commercial kitchen.
She realized that she had missed the satisfaction of serving a retail clientele. She signed a lease last year for a portion of the grand Moorestown Trust Co. building at 41 E. Main St. in Moorestown, near her home.
After numerous construction delays, By Zena opened last week. One side of the building, formerly an art store called AR Workshop, features a café and retail shop selling sandwiches, salads, breads, desserts, and kitchen goods. The other side, once a Starbucks and later a juice bar, is being developed into a seating area.
Besides cakes, pastries, coffees, and teas, By Zena offers a savory menu overseen by her business partner, chef Ahmet Muyesser. They’re building out that menu, but for now, the breakfasts are croissant sandwiches as well as Turkish platters with feta, kasseri cheese, olives, vegetables, and a boiled egg, served with the bagel-like bread simit and flaky ring-shaped acma.
The lunch menu, available till closing or sellout, is all sandwiches: organic chicken salad tossed with house-made mayo, labneh, apples, and herbs on croissant or walnut-raisin bread; house-brined turkey and sharp cheese with arugula, sun-dried tomato aioli, and tahini labneh on sourdough or baguette; and harissa-roasted vegetables with greens and sagami cheese on sourdough or baguette. The kitchen closes at 3 p.m.
This is, in fact, Demirceviren’s third bakery. After studying pastry at Le Cordon Bleu in Istanbul, she operated a commercial bakery there before she and her husband immigrated to the United States. By Zena opened in 2002.
Demirceviren said she wants to extend By Zena’s hours (now 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.) into the evenings.
She said the goal is to create a community gathering place. “If you’re eating something, it should be worth every calorie,” she said. “It should be memorable.”