Cookie Connection: Lucille’s Baked Goods delivers homemade delicacies to North Scottsdale

Lucille Abbene started Lucille’s Baked Goods from her Scottsdale home in 2022, and the business continues to thrive. Growing up in East Hampton, Long Island, Lucille Abbene spent years surrounded by the smell of fresh-baked doughnuts, pastries and fruit pies at her parents’ luncheonette.

A love for the culinary world extended into adulthood, when she began baking desserts of all kinds for her husband in her 30s.

She spent decades honing her craft, simultaneously balancing her career as a surgeon and moving several states before landing in Scottsdale, but she never thought she would turn that love for baking into a business. It was a kindness for her family and friends, and she loved spending hours weighing flour, perfectly combining the right amount of each ingredient and tinkering with different recipes.

It was those friends, however, alongside her husband Ron, that suggested she open her own business. From there, Lucille’s Baked Goods was born, an online order-based bakery that Abbene operates from her home with occasional pop-ups in the Scottsdale area. After three years of operation, Abbene has expanded her business, selling across the nation as well as in local Scottsdale businesses temporarily, such as nail parlors, car dealerships and dispensaries.

“I have that basic cookie dough, and then I put different things in it, or change things up on it. I just try things and experiment with them, and my husband’s my taster,” Abbene said. “He will tell me if it tastes terrible, or it’s not good.”

Her recipes are from both her mother and from tweaking her own as she has grown up. Made from scratch with the highest-quality ingredients, her menu includes cranberry white chocolate macadamia cookies, double peanut butter paisley brownies and cinnamon twist bundt cakes with vanilla glaze. Among Abbene’s bestselling items is her chunky “chocoholic” chip cookies, made with Irish butter and semisweet, bittersweet, milk, dark and white Guittard chocolates. She also offers seasonal baked goods, such as Italian rainbow cookies for Christmas, and custom items. This summer, the bakery will feature s’mores cookies.

After a brief stint selling on Nextdoor, Abbene now accepts orders through her website, lucillesbakedgoods.com. There is a turnaround time of 48 hours for orders to give Abbene time to gather all ingredients and bake: None of the cookies are premade. Local delivery is available in Scottsdale, and the team ships out orders on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. During the summer months, products with chocolate can’t be shipped due to the heat, but are still available for local delivery.

Customers can purchase several dozen cookies or brownies in one online visit, each dozen approximately priced at $36. Bundt cakes are $42 each. Lucille’s Baked Goods also has a rewards program, which offers special cookies for purchase, a points system and discount coupons.

Each purchase comes in chic black-and-white packaging labeled “Made from Scratch in Lucille’s Kitchen.”

Abbene’s favorite part of owning Lucille’s Baked Goods is meeting people. She loves reading reviews, preparing orders for repeat customers and having potential purchasers call her back. While it does not issue refunds, Lucille’s Baked Goods will remake any product, or replace it with something else if customers are unsatisfied with their order. As a perfectionist, Abbene will not send any cookies that do not look uniform or aesthetically appealing. Instead, she will donate these products (which taste as good as any of her other baked goods) to the nearby police station, fire department or Men’s Mission in Phoenix.

“I do not want to throw them away. I go to the golf course here, and give them to the caddies, too,” Abbene said.