Fran Bates is busy. She and her husband Mike are entrepreneurs on New Athol Road in Orange with three businesses to date. The most recent is Over the Top Bakery.

The pair didn’t start out to run a bakery, Bates told me. They leased the property because it became available; the bakery that had occupied it closed. Their indoor flea market, Bates Down Under, operated in the lower level.

For a while the flea market sold furniture upstairs, but checkout proved awkward. They weren’t quite sure what to do with the main level. Eventually, she recalled, they said to themselves, “Let’s go back to the bakery. They seemed to have cars in the lot all the time.”

Fran Bates said that before opening Over the Top she had been “a casual baker.” She had started to bake cakes and cookies for customers at the Bates Crafters Gallery next door. Now she is baking seriously and has hired an additional baker, as well as a cake decorator who comes in twice a week.

The bakery opened in December, just in time for Orange’s Midnight Madness shopping extravaganza on the ninth of that month. Bates said she and her husband were grateful to the town’s government, which held a special session so that the couple could obtain a Victualler’s License before the event.

To date the bakery is doing well. In fact, Bates told me, she is having trouble keeping items in stock — particularly the to-go meals she offers. “I underestimated how well those would do,” she sighed. “Now, we’re in a position where I think we may be able to keep up!”

The bakery business has offered Bates a few surprises, particularly in terms of costs. “Payroll is huge,” she noted, “and supplies are huge. When we really looked at the rent, the supplies, the electricity…. The extent of them was crazy. But we don’t skimp, and I think our prices are reasonable.”

The bakery has developed loyal customers who appreciate the convenience and quality of Bates’s offerings. Her employees are also loyal and seem happy.

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“We cross-train. If we’re short over at the Crafter’s Gallery, we can send someone who works at the bakery,” she explained. “[The employees] all say they love it. It’s fun.”

I asked her to identify her most popular offerings. Choosing proved difficult. Bates started with bear claws and Danish but quickly moved on to her large gourmet cookies and other treats.

“Cupcakes all day long,” she mused. “Everyone loves our whoopee pies. The chocolate’s the best seller, but we try to come up with new flavors every week: pina colada, cherry almond, strawberry shortcake ... We try to keep it new and fun for the regulars.”

Aware of the demand for gluten-free baked goods, Bates has dedicated a shelf in the bakery to those treats and tries to have at least one offering (sometimes up to four) available each day. These may include muffins, brownies, cupcakes, and cake slices.

Her most recent new and fun trend was a cooking contest she instituted a couple of weeks ago when the bakery hosted a cookie cook-off.

The idea came, she told me, from her friend Stephanie Cook at Trail Head Outfitters. Bates had told Cook that she was thinking of expanding the space in the bakery and adding a cooking school, and her friend thought a cooking contest might help spread the word.

Six bakers paid an entry fee to compete in the contest. The bakery sold tickets for the different cookies; 100 tickets were purchased in all. The cookie that received the most votes — a brown-butter chocolate chunk offering from Brittney Bernard — was pronounced the winner.

The event was so successful that Bates has decided to repeat it. She hopes to have a macaroni-and-cheese cook-off in June and perhaps a cold salad contest in July.

She will probably try to avoid holiday weekends for these events in future, however. The cookie contest took place the day before Mother’s Day. Nurses’ Week and Teacher Appreciation Week also fell that week, leaving Bates happy but a little frazzled.

I was surprised to hear that she wasn’t constantly frazzled, sharing three shops with her husband and baking up a storm. I asked her how she kept everything straight. “Who says I keep it all straight?” she laughed.

Over the Top is open Thursday through Monday from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m.

These may be made with regular flour if gluten is not an issue. Fran Bates didn’t mention this, but I would grease the cupcake pans or use cupcake liners. You may also pour the batter into standard cake pans, but you’ll have to fudge the cooking time.

Ingredients:

1 cup water

2 cups gluten-free flour substitute

2 cups sugar

2 large eggs

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1 cup whole milk

3/4 cup cocoa powder

2 teaspoons baking powder

1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons vanilla

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Mix the ingredients together until well combined. Pour the batter into 12 cupcake tins. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cupcakes comes out clean, about 30 to 35 minutes.

Eat plain or frost with your favorite icing. Makes 12 cupcakes.

Tinky Weisblat is an award-winning cookbook author and singer known as the Diva of Deliciousness. Visit her website, TinkyCooks.com.