After Early Hardships, This Halifax Family is About to Open their Dream Bakery
HALIFAX — In the cold, cold, winter of 2013, a couple immigrated from Abu Dhabi to Halifax to start a new life with a young family. But those early years were hard. Razan Alkhaiat had a newborn child. Her husband, Ahmad Alkhatib, would need two years to get his visa situation resolved. On top of that, they had to go through the usual struggles of adjusting to a new city, culture, and climate.
“To be honest with you, it wasn’t really a great beginning for us,” recalled Razan who, along with her husband, originally lived in Syria. “It was it was hard. Especially at the beginning, we were just new. Ahmed was still an immigrant. He didn’t have any status. We had a baby at the time. And it was winter.”
“When Ahmad came, he didn’t even have winter shoes. I remember he had to go get diapers and stuff for Mira and he came back soaking wet because he just didn’t know that he had to wear boots. He had to wait for the bus for half an hour in cold winter and he didn’t even bring what I asked him to,” Razan added with a chuckle.
But now, those early hardships seem well worth it.
The family is getting ready to renovate and open Levantic Bakery. Razan and Ahmad (who works as a graphic designer for a company in Dubai) are waiting for the approval of building permits first. They hope to be open by late summer or early fall. The new bakery will be located at 226 Broad Street in Bedford.
Halifax has grown on the family thanks to the kind people and the coziness of the city. Years prior, Razan tried living in Montreal but it wasn’t the city for her.
“The coziness of Halifax and the mentality of people who live here actually made us feel more comfortable and happier to live here,” she said. “It’s not like somewhere else in bigger cities like what I had in Montreal, for instance. It was harder to cope because the mentality there is all different.”
It took a long time to find the right location. Razan wanted the bakery to be in a quiet residential area, rather than a busy main street. The search for a storefront was also made difficult by the pandemic and the high cost of leasing commercial space.
“We always wanted a business of our own. And we wanted to have something like a coffee shop in a residential area. That’s always been the dream for us. It all started back in 2019 or 2020. And then we started shopping around and then Covid hit.”
“It’s been really hard [to find commercial space]. Some of the landlords just don’t want to rent to a new tenant. And that’s understandable. But it was a struggle for us. In other places, the rents were much higher. Some of the places they didn’t want to deal with bakery or food.”
Razan and Ahmad aren’t going into the bakery business without any experience. Since last year, you might have spotted Razan at some Halifax-area farmers market selling her bread and cakes. She had been operating under a home-based business called Marj; a name created using the first letters of all four members of family (Mira, Ahmad, Razan, Jude).
Marj has since become Razan’s nickname, since many customers assumed the business was named after her. The great reception Marj received at the farmers’ markets encouraged Razan to expand into a full bakery.
“It was crazy busy, and I almost sold out every time I went in, like a couple hours later. It was just great seeing everything getting sold out. People were trying to get in early enough to get my products just gave me the confidence and boost to continue with this.”
Levantic will sell a variety of bread, including sourdough and milk bread. But Razan’s signature product is one worth getting excited for, a pistachio baklava cake.
“It’s been a really great hit. Everybody just raves about it. I hope it gets more attention at the shop too. Because I really like it, personally.”
Derek Montague is a Huddle reporter in Halifax. Send him your feedback and story ideas: [email protected].