Shop Halo Halo Has Closed and Is Ready for What’s Next, in Portland

Shop Halo Halo, a Filipino bakery, closed down their storefront in the Woodstock neighborhood this past August. Currently doing pop-ups and fundraisers (including their own), they are in search of a new location. I spoke with Shop Halo Halo’s owner, Geleen Abenoja, to learn more.

Why Did Shop Halo Halo Close?

“It was quite a few reasons,” said Geleen. The reasons are not uncommon, and are likely familiar to any tenant operating with a commercial lease: issues involving money, expectations surrounding property management, wear and tear on the physical building, timing that complicates the ins and outs of running a business. “I won’t get into the super nitty gritty details because we’re actually still in negotiations over our lease,” said Geleen.

They were in a newer building, which is nice, and the space they rented ended up turning out to be larger than they needed, despite their earlier concerns of it being on the smaller side. They, meaning Geleen and Daphne, the woman who ran the plant shop, Daphne’s Botanicals, alongside Shop Halo Halo (together they were Botanical Bakeshop).

“Originally, we were supposed to share half of that space,” she explained. “But we ended up taking the whole bottom floor of the apartment building. And so our budgets on things ended up doubling.”

She added, “In the end, we weren’t really able to make it work.”

Woodstock

Aside from the space and building, she found that Woodstock was not a neighborhood that people from the Filipino community would easily travel to. “We were quite far from some of the larger Filipino community hubs in town, which are based around the Beaverton and Gresham areas,” she explained. “I was finding a lot of my regular customers had a hard time getting out to us.”

The Surprising Challenges of Food and Plants Together

Eventually, Geleen learned that the mix of food and plants was not optimal in their case. “We had an open kitchen, which also posed some challenges in working with a plant shop where there’s exposure to things like bugs and chemicals,” she explained. “The idea of a plant shop/bakery initially sounded really cute, but logistically it was actually hard to carry out.”

She added, “In the long run, it’s best for us to move into our own independent spaces where we have a little more control.”

Of Leases and Friendship

Geleen told me that Daphne will remain in her space there in Woodstock. They are able to separate from each other and not incur any penalties financially—when they moved in, they shared the space but were on separate leases. Daphne’s lease was a little bit shorter than Geleen’s, so she will remain until it’s time to renew the lease, when she can decide to stay or go.

They had a good working relationship while there together, and still remain colleagues and friends. “We were both kind of disappointed—we were proud that we gave it a shot. It turned out to be much harder than we thought it was going to be, but we’re still on good terms.”

Where Will Shop Halo Halo Land?

Geleen mentioned earlier of Beaverton and Gresham as home to local Filipino communities, so I thought perhaps she would be looking those directions as possible option.

“The Filipino population in the Portland area has grown quite a bit in the last five to ten years,” said Geleen.” It is kind of polarized to the east and west sides and little pockets in town as well.” She is currently considering a location on the west side of Portland that is eager to welcome food business into its space.

Regardless, though, she’d like to be in a new location before Christmas. “I was hoping to get in before Thanksgiving, but it’s taken a little bit longer than we anticipated,” she said. “It’s really hectic entering the holiday season.”

When she does get a space, she hopes it will be a little bit smaller than what she had in Woodstock, “I’d like it to be a little bit smaller—a warm, intimate space,” she said. She hopes to be able to host workshops, small events, community events, and classes in what she expects will be a cute space.

About Geleen, Founder of Shop Halo Halo

I was curious about Geleen’s background with baking. She told me about her early days growing up with a big family, her move to Portland, using her baked goods to fundraise, and time during COVID.

Learning Desserts From Family

“I grew up in a very large Filipino family in the Seattle area,” Geleen explained. It was a part of town with a fairly large Filipino population, with great access to Filipino restaurants, shops, and bakeries.”

She continued, “We had a really big extended family that would hold many family parties. Not just around holidays, but birthdays, too. Every weekend we had some reason to get together. But in my family, I had a ton of cousins but I was the only girl. And so I would be roped into helping in the kitchen to prepare desserts. 

“I would learn some of the traditional Filipino desserts from my grandma, from my mom. I picked up a love for cooking and baking, being with my grandparents and my aunts in the kitchen, preparing for family parties.” Geleen considers herself to be a self-taught baker.

Moving to Portland, and Making Her Own

In 2012 she moved to Portland and found that it was very difficult to access a lot of the things that she grew up eating (thankfully St Barbra’s Pinoy Bakery opened in 2015, which is now Chik & Chuck Pinoy Bakery, as of January 2025). So she either had to re-learn how to make them herself, or find them at an Asian grocery store.

But despite her access to Asian markets, it was still difficult to find some of the more obscure Filipino desserts or traditional things. “So I started just making them on my own,” she explained. “I would share them with friends, bring them to community events. And around that time as well, I was very much involved in the Filipino organizing community here.”

GABRIELA

She was an activist member of GABRIELA Portland and worked to find ways to fundraise for their different organizing efforts. One of those efforts was to send GABRIELA members to the Philippines to learn about the different conditions that communities (e.g., fisherfolk) in the country face—climate change being one of them.

“Right now we’re doing a typhoon fundraiser,” said Geleen.

Geleen contributed Filipino baked goods to any of the bake sale fundraisers; they also did some fundraising dinners.

COVID

Before the COVID pandemic hit, she was working at a pan-Asian restaurant (known today as Jade Rabbit) as a dessert chef. Of course, the pandemic was trouble for so many in Portland’s food and drink industry, and it forced Geleen to shift gears. She decided to offer Filipino baked goods through her own Shop Halo Halo—pre-orders and contactless pickup, as was done during that time. She felt, among many things, that it would be a form of moral support in her community.

“It was a really great way to connect with people who were feeling isolated through the lockdown,” she said. “We got to connect over our traditional food and I was able to instill that feeling of nostalgia and home for folks who are very much isolated. It grew in popularity like much faster than I expected!”

Meeting Daphne

Earlier, I wrote about the end of her partnership with Daphne. Here is the origin story.

Dessert Meets Plants

In 2021, while vending at a market she met Daphne, where they were boothmates. A few months after that market she asked Geleen if she wanted to join her in a retail space—opening a real brick & mortar.

“She reached out to me to ask if I’d ever considered opening my own bakery. I’d always thought about it, but it seemed really scary to have brick and mortar—or just even the idea of going at it alone. The idea of having a physical space just felt very daunting. Daphne said she felt the same way.

So, they figured, “Maybe if we did it together, it wouldn’t be as scary.”

So, they banded together to make it work. They reached out to the people behind the building they would occupy in Woodstock, pitching them the idea of their taking on part of the ground floor commercial space. They ran a GoFundMe campaign to help them pay for buildout cost, did pop-ups along the way, and eventually moved in and opened up shop.

“We put a lot of love and effort into that space, and it was a very difficult decision to leave it,” said Geleen.

Shop Halo Halo Baked Goods of Note

I asked Geleen about some of her favorite baked goods on her menu. “Our ube crinkle cookie is our bestseller,” she explained. “It sells out—when we were open in the bakery, it sold out every day, and it was the same if we had a pop up event. It felt like no matter how many I brought with me, they always sold out! They’re very delicious.”

She continued, “I use my grandmother’s ube halaya recipe. It’s an ube coconut jam that goes into the cookie, so it makes it really soft and moist. If someone hasn’t had anything from us, that’s the one thing that I recommend every time.”

She also talked about another pastry she really loves, the Sans Rival. “It’s kind of a Filipino take on a French dacquoise,” she explained. “It’s a meringue with a vanilla buttercream and roasted cashews. It’s one of my favorite Filipino desserts.”

She added, “It was the first thing my mom learned to make when she migrated out of the Philippines. The meringue layers are really crisp and airy.”

She spoke about the variant of buttercream that she uses instead of the more traditional one. “I think it’s traditionally made with a French buttercream, but we do a Swiss meringue,” she explained. “So it’s a little bit lighter, not as sweet. And then the roasted cashews add that extra crunchy texture. It’s a really beautiful dessert, and I really love it—so decadent and delicious.”

She has a customer who, once every two months, special orders a dozen of them to like give to his friends. “I think he freezes them and he’ll eat them over time.” 

She also makes more difficult things to find, like traditional Filipino rice cakes, Sapin-sapin, Puto, Cuchinta. She expanded on Sapin-sapin.

“Sapin-sapin is a three-layered steamed rice cake, and each layer is a different color and flavor,” she explained. “The top is usually an Ube flavor. The middle is coconut and then the bottom is jackfruit. And we top ours with the housemade coconut caramel and shredded coconut on top. It’s a really delicious treat that’s difficult to find in town.”

Shop Halo Halo Pop-Ups and Upcoming Events

She’s been doing a bi-weekly pop-up out of Union Way, an outdoor retail breezeway located downtown (1022 W Burnside Street, Portland), every other Saturday. “Usually the menu changes a little bit each time, but we’ll have some of our popular items,” she said. “Like the ube crinkle cookie, some of the different breads like our ube cheese pandesal and corned beef pandesal.”

Pre-orders for their Thanksgiving options have ended, and pick-up is at Tambayan PDX (6014 SE Foster Road, Portland), tomorrow, Wednesday, November 26 from noon to 5pm. However, while the pick-ups are happening, they’ll have a few thing available for sale. Walk-ins welcome.

Silent Night and Paroles

They are also doing something called Silent Night, a Filipino acoustic show where a couple of local Filipino acoustic bands will be playing at Mekong Bistro (8200 NE Siskiyou Street, Portland). It’s on Thursday, December 13, doors open at 5pm (end time not specified) and Geleen will be selling her desserts there, as well. There will be a benefit for the Foundation for Philippine progress, raising funds for typhoon relief in the Philippines.

She is hosting a workshop to make Parol ornaments. A Parol is a star-shaped lantern and an iconic symbol of Christmas in the Philippines. It will take place at the Filipino Bayanihan Center (1537 SE Morrison Street, Portland) on Wednesdays, December 3 and 10, 4:30pm to 7pm, and Geleen will be providing baked goods for folks taking the workshop. There will be some things for sale there, as well.

The Shop Halo Halo Fundraiser

On top of all this, Geleen is running at GoFundMe to support moving-related costs required for getting into a new space. You can find and donate to that campaign, right here. She also encourages you to share it with your networks.

It was great speaking with Geleen and getting to know her work in the Filipino dessert space. I look forward to stopping in at her new location when she re-opens!

Shop Halo Halo [closed mid-August 2025]
Previously 4981 SE Woodstock Blvd #2, Portland; Current location temporary
Shop Halo Halo website | Instagram