SHAH ALAM, June 4 — “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose/By any other word would smell as sweet.”
The Bard had it right, perhaps, in his iconic play, Romeo and Juliet, but I wonder if a cake or kuih by any other name would taste as manis?
This feels like the appropriate question for the sweetly named Manis by WildFlour, a bakery-café in Section 6, Shah Alam.
For co-founder Shazana Shukor, the connection began long before she ever considered running a café.
“I grew up in a very food obsessed family,” she says. “We love cooking and eating out and plan holidays around where we would get to eat.”
As a child, Shazana worked her way through cookbooks and recipes clipped from magazines, encouraged by parents who treated her culinary curiosity seriously.
By the age of 12, they were buying her kitchen tools; at 15, she had her own cupboard dedicated to baking equipment.
“I loved trying out recipes and learning about different cooking techniques and my family was happy to be my test subjects,” she recalls.
Today Shazana has something more precious than test subjects. Regulars to Manis by WildFlour all have their favourite dishes, be it the savoury and punchy Laksa Nyonya or the nostalgia-meets-storybook charms of their Pulut Hitam Cheese Tart.
Shazana’s path towards hospitality was not immediate, however. In the beginning, administrative positions sharpened her organisational skills.
Human resources and training roles taught her how to build systems for hiring and retaining staff. Later, working as an assistant head chef immersed her in the mechanics of food and beverage operations.
“I didn’t always know that I would end up running my own café,” she says, “but when I look back, every role I’ve taken on was preparing me for this.”
Her husband and business partner, Nurudin Mohamad — better known as Din — arrived at the industry from a different direction.
Before joining the business full-time, he worked in engineering, though the idea of running an F&B establishment lingered in the background for years.
“What kept pulling me back was my passion for people,” he says. “Customer service, building relationships, making someone’s experience memorable.”
The decisive moment came during the Covid-19 pandemic, when redundancy forced a reassessment of priorities.
“For me, it felt like a signal, this was just God nudging me to finally act on it,” Din says.
Today, their responsibilities divide naturally. Shazana oversees the kitchen and the food itself, while Din manages marketing, collaborations and customer engagement.
“And none of it would feel the same without her,” he says. “The chemistry that we share.”
The WildFlour name first appeared in 2020 during the uncertainty of lockdowns. At the time, Shazana was selling sourdough bread and quiches from home, trying to generate enough income to weather the pandemic economy.
“WildFlour started as a play on words,” she explains, “as my main product was sourdough, wild yeasts and flour were the foundation.”
What began as necessity gradually evolved into something more substantial. A turning point arrived when her former employer and mentor, Basira Yeusuff, who had since relocated to Seoul, invited Shazana to continue producing her signature bundt cakes.
“I was honoured that she trusted me enough to have her cakes on my menu,” says Shazana.
The cakes helped expand WildFlour’s audience over the following years, though success eventually created a different set of logistical problems.
Their one-bedroom apartment became increasingly overwhelmed by at-home production, just as customers were returning to dining out post-pandemic and online sales began to soften.
When a rental space became available near their neighbourhood in Shah Alam, the couple decided to commit fully to a physical café.
The name Manis emerged during the planning stages. Observing that much of their clientele would likely come from the surrounding Malay community, particularly older residents, Shazana wanted a name that felt familiar and immediate.
“We settled on Manis and in order to differentiate ourselves and tie it back to the original business it became Manis by WildFlour,” she says.
That sense of familiarity extends to the menu, where comfort food is often nudged gently in more contemporary directions.
Shazana speaks less about trends than about flavours she genuinely enjoys cooking for family and friends.
“I’m always drawn to fun flavours,” she says. “A lot of the recipes are foods I would make for my family.”
The bundt cakes remain among the café’s defining offerings, each catering to a different palate.
The Limau Nipis Bundt leans bright and citrusy; the Earl Grey variation carries floral, fragrant notes; while the Kacang Tumbuk version balances sweetness with salt and nuttiness.
(So, harking back to our earlier question, cakes by any name might taste as sweet... though perhaps more manis if baked by Manis by WildFlour, yes?)
Another signature item, the Mont Blanc coffee, traces its origins to Melbourne’s café scene.
“I first came across the Mont Blanc when it was trending in the Melbourne coffee scene,” Shazana says, “and I just love the combination of citrus, cream and coffee.”
Introducing it locally at an early stage helped secure its place on their varied coffee menu before similar drinks became more widespread.
Running a café, however, rarely allows much room for romanticism. Staffing shortages, fluctuating customer traffic and operational pressures remain constant considerations. Shazana approaches these challenges pragmatically.
“A rule my lecturers drilled into us is ‘anything that can go wrong, will go wrong, what matters is how you overcome it’,” she says.
The response, she explains, is always adjustment rather than panic.
“If there’s not enough staff, I make the menu smaller. If there’s a slow month, we plan content or promos or take the opportunity to focus on training and deep cleaning.”
One principle remains fixed throughout: “The only thing we do not do is compromise on quality.”
Operating with a lean team and comparatively lower overheads in Shah Alam has also given them greater flexibility than cafés operating in more expensive districts.
Looking back, Shazana summarises her broader philosophy with characteristic brevity.
“My guiding principle is ‘It’s not that deep’,” she says.
It is less dismissive than it sounds. She describes a tendency to overanalyse trends or second-guess whether an idea will translate commercially, only to discover that some of their most popular dishes emerged from spontaneous experimentation.
Seasonal favourites have become part of their repertoire, such as the Thai-inspired Tomyum Chicken Quiche at the start of the year or the festive Golden Huat Bundt — a limau kasturi and pineapple butter cake, finished with pineapple cream cheese — developed for Chinese New Year.
“People just love food that’s real and familiar,” Shazana explains.
The same perspective now informs how she navigates setbacks, whether difficult suppliers or staffing complications.
“It’s easy to spiral but I’ve learned to pause, ask what can we do better next time and move forward. Holding on too tight doesn’t serve the business.”
As for the future, the couple are thinking less about aggressive expansion than about deepening their role within the neighbourhood itself.
Collaborations and community events have shown them that customers increasingly value spaces designed for gathering.
“The events and collaborations we’ve done showed us people are looking for spaces that bring them together,” says Shazana. “And we want to keep creating those moments.”
There are plans for breakfast service eventually, with hopes of opening earlier and becoming part of customers’ daily routines.
Yet beneath the operational ambitions lies a simpler aspiration for what Manis by WildFlour might ultimately become.
“What I really hope for Manis is for it to become a place you can retreat to,” she says, “somewhere warm, familiar and reliable. The kind of place where you walk in and feel at ease.”
Manis by WildFlour
5G-4, Jalan Cenderawasih 6/7,
Section 6, Shah Alam.
Open daily (except Sun closed) 10am-7pm
Phone: 017-240 9690
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