While successfully marketing cheesecake, she started turning her dreams of becoming an entrepreneur into a concrete business plan that eventually centered on rugelach. Those rich, buttery pastries, great favorites in the Schussel household, were first supplied by Betty Schussel, husband Erwin's mother, who baked in the great Eastern European tradition. Suellen was able to coax the recipe out of her mother-in-law and was soon creating not only rugelach as good as the traditional version from the old-country, but also her own variations such as apricot and raspberry rugelach.

The moment to turn dreams into reality came unexpectedly when a Lindy's customer inquired about rugelach. Since it was not part of the current product line, Suellen asked her boss if she could fill the order and was told she could.

"That first 40-lb. order came out of my own family kitchen and was probably the hardest one I ever filled," Suellen recalls. "I had plunged into this and suddenly remembered that my mixer was broken. I had to haul out a low-powered old one that, in fits and starts, could barely combine the butter and cream cheese. I had to mix in the rest of the ingredients by hand. A lot of hours and a lot of elbow grease and a lot of hope went into that order. When the customer described it as 'the best rugelach they had ever tasted,' I knew that this was it. I was going into business."

"Steve's Mom" was officially incorporated on October 17, 1988 and had exactly that one customer for its product. However, Suellen also acquired a distributor who helped to build a steady increase in volume - enough to warrant a move into shared space in a small commercial kitchen in Brooklyn. But, as is customary, distributors pay on a 30-60 day cycle. With immediate and ongoing rent, the cost of ingredients and other expenses to be met, Suellen found herself faced with a disturbing cash-flow problem.

The solution was the Roosevelt Raceway Flea Market. That first year found Suellen and Erwin, whom she had enlisted as official "Crowd-drawer" two and three days a week at the outdoor "Steve's Mom" stand, bundled up in multi-layers of clothing in mid-winter, stripped to shorts in the summer, sampling and selling rugelach.

Erwin, a guidance administrator in the New York Public Schools, remembers those grueling days. "I was reticent at first. My early efforts at saying, 'Samples?' have become a family joke. But I soon became adept at crying out, 'Try some rugelach! We have apricot, raspberry, and traditional.'" Erwin has now turned into something of a showman.

Even the eponymous Steve made occasional weekend appearances. As he recollects, "People would start to tell us how great the product was from the moment they tasted it. Then they would ask if I was Steve and who was Steve's Mom? I can't tell you how many labels Mom and I have autographed!"

The Flea Market paid off, not only in dollars, but in test-marketing new products. Now, Steve's Mom Inc. has its own spacious, custom-designed manufacturing facility in Brooklyn, capable of producing more than 1000 lbs. of rugelach a day.

Suellen has also developed Chocolate Fudge and Raspberry Chocolate Fudge Rugelach, Apple, Dutch Apple, Poppy Seed, and Cherry rugelach, Triple Chocolate and Black Forest Rugelach and three varieties of rugelach sweetened with sorbitol for people who must restrict their intake of sugar. There are several additional lines: Vienna Pralines™, nutty almond cookies; Fudgeroons®, chewy chocolate brownies topped with rich coconut macaroon; 'Scotcheroons®, butterscotch brownies spread with a thin layer of raspberry jam and topped with rich coconut macaroon; Hungarian-Style Strudels in 6 dessert and three savory flavors; "Well I'll Be Dip'd" , gourmet cookies dipped in premium chocolate; hamentaschen in 6 flavors and Italian cheesecake. All the products are kosher and carry the Orthodox Union kosher certification.

The company has a nation-wide list of clients, made up of retail bakeries, restaurants, caterers, catalog companies and specialty stores. Suellen hopes that her emphasis on quality ingredients, sharp attention to customer feedback and her own ability to create new product lines will continue to pay off.