“Some of my earliest memories are of begging my parents to let me cook,” says Marisol Morley, the Wilton-based chef and cookie artist behind Tiny Kitchen Treats. “Growing up, I always had the urge to create something — I just didn’t know what.”
That creative hunger has driven her ever since, whether she’s turning cookies into miniature canvases or singing as the frontwoman of the Fairfield County cover band Midnight Cardinal. It traces back to her childhood on New York City’s Upper East Side, where she pleaded for a chance to bake. Eventually, her mother gave in, teaching her to make flan and Colombian cookies.
Long before she’d even heard of the Food Network, Marisol staged pretend cooking shows in her bathroom, mixing beauty products into imaginary recipes and narrating every step. By her teens, she was the de facto chef of her friend group, hosting dinners and laying out full spreads.
After high school, she pivoted to another passion: music. Wyclef Jean signed her to a record label, and from 18 to 23 she worked as a recording artist. “I always had this urge to create,” she says. When that chapter ended, she took a job at an investment bank. “I had the kindest, best boss, but I’d go home and think, What did I make today?”
That question came into focus when she was asked to plan the bank’s Halloween party. “I decorated the hallways, the ceilings, baked everything for the treat table — it was like Pinterest exploded in a conference room,” she says. “And I did it pretty much by myself, on a shoestring budget.” The experience reminded her how much she’d missed baking and hosting. She told a friend they should start a side business doing kid birthday parties and treats from her small apartment kitchen. The name came easily: Tiny Kitchen Treats.
Soon after, Martha Stewart visited the bank as a guest speaker and offered advice that would shape the business: “Pick one thing, and become the best at that one thing.” Marisol chose cookies.
“I started getting amazing clients right away,” she says. “I quit my job, and the next week I was on a Verizon commercial doing cookies. It felt like the universe’s way of saying, you made the right decision.” The business quickly outgrew her apartment, moving into a commercial kitchen in Long Island City, which she shared with her close friend Ashley Holt, a fellow baker and food stylist. Instagram was taking off, and her playful, photogenic cookies flourished there.
In 2020, she and Holt launched a second venture — an academy offering baking and other creative classes. When the pandemic hit, Marisol and her family moved to Wilton. The commute to the city became unworkable, and she made the difficult choice to close the bakery, planning to take only select projects from home. But word traveled fast. “Next thing you know, I was doing it full scale again!” she says, laughing.
After her third child was born in late 2022, she scaled back once more. Now she focuses on family life and hand-picked collaborations. “One of my best friends is Jill Arden, who owns Arden’s Rowayton, and I’ve done guest chef dinners with her. Ashley still gets incredible projects — we built a twelve-foot gingerbread house for Great Wolf Lodge last Christmas. Courtney Davis, another close friend, and I have done work for Daniel Boulud at her hotel in Palm Beach,” she says. “You don’t stop being creative. You don’t stop being a baker. I just don’t have a bakery anymore.”
When she’s not making tiny treats or spending time with her “tiny people,” Marisol is back on stage with Midnight Cardinal. “I stepped away from music for almost 20 years,” she says. “Back then, it was all or nothing — I wanted to be a worldwide superstar. But you grow older, wiser, and realize external validation isn’t where internal validation should come from. We’re a cover band, but we’re still creating. We’re still expressing ourselves. If the spark is in you, it’s never really gone. All it takes is the conscious decision to start again.”
Her story proves there’s always room for what brings true joy — from painting cookies to making music, from building a family to raising chickens (yes, she has chickens) to building community (she founded the Wilton chapter of the Mama Collective). “You have to put yourself out there a bit,” she says, “but that’s how you reignite your passion.”
Follow Marisol @tinykitchentreats and Midnight Cardinal @midnightcardinalmusic
“I always had this urge to create.”