A cup of sugar was added to the recipe for Iowa City with the grand opening of Butter Custom Bakery on July 27 and 28. The bakery is located on 805 S. First Ave. in the same plaza as Heyn’s Ice Cream and across the street from the East Side Hy-Vee.

Owner Kaitlyn Wright grew up on the East Side and graduated from City High. Wright, who has baked since childhood and has continued baking with her own daughter, said opening her bakery felt like the natural next step in her baking journey.

“I’m familiar with the area; I have a lot of good memories here,” she said. “I think Iowa City is a great community, and I’m really excited to be back here and be part of that community. I’ve always wanted to run a business, and it just seemed like the next step to reach more people.”

Butter Custom offers a variety of baked goods for all those with a sweet tooth. The bakery takes orders for custom cakes as well as offering its signature delicacies. Doughnuts, muffins, cupcakes, cookies, and treats such as brownies and cereal bars will fill the display case, Wright said.

“We use high-quality ingredients, and everything is made fresh and small batch,” she said. “Nothing is frozen, and I don’t use refrigerated dough from a supplier or anything like that. I make everything from scratch myself.”

Wright is the sole person running the business and making the baked goods, though she has help from friends and family. Longtime friend Rachelle Zehr, who helped run the register during the opening, said the bakery willl have an large impact on the community.

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“My favorite thing about the opening has been the amount of passion people have for locally owned businesses, women-owned businesses, and that we are on the East Side,” Zehr said. “We really don’t have a home bakery on the East Side, so it’s been wonderful to see the number of people coming in really excited for Kaitlyn.”

In addition to the products for sale, the bakery also has a space for birthday parties and baking classes. Wright hopes to have a few classes available each month for both children and adults, each with a particular focus.

“I’m really excited about the classes portion of the bakery,” Wright said. “We will have classes for adults and for kids, just to come in and practice some techniques for decorating cakes, cookies, and other stuff. We’ll have different themes for those classes, and it will be a space for birthday parties and events, too.”

The opening brought a large crowd of families and community members, and the display case was quickly swept clean. Wright was baking throughout both days of weekend celebration to keep up with all the customers sampling the sweets.

“Fitting to the bakery’s name, the cake is really buttery,” University of Iowa senior Maya Guadagni said after sampling a vanilla cupcake. “It’s delicious.”

Children and adults grinned as they licked the sweetness from their lips while enjoying cupcakes or sugar cookies. One customer even gave Wright a poem written about the bakery that characterizes the joy that baked goods can bring.