Each week, Shiho shops at the Santa Monica farmers’ market for seasonal fruits, vegetables, and herbs to make batches of ice cream and sorbets. Seasonal cooking was ingrained in her from an early age. She has fond memories of cooking side-by-side with her mother, often using fruits and vegetables they raised together from her parents’ garden, and hot summers sipping green tea she helped harvest from her grandmother’s farm.

She left Japan for the US to study English and Art at age 15 and completed her art studies at California College of the Arts. Her artwork focused on highlighting one’s continuous journey to find a ‘beautiful spark’ in daily life and how that inspires oneself. She found that food continued to be a consistent source of inspiration. “When I encounter a perfectly ripe peach–the creamy fragrance, its sweet, abundant juice, the ticklish fuzz, the exploding sunset when split open–it’s the stuff that triggers memories, emotions, desire. I can’t help but be inspired to share the joy of this experience.”

Ultimately her passion for food drove her to attend culinary school, and shortly after landed a job at Tartine Bakery where she first worked alongside and then became friends with Zoe Nathan. After honing her baking skills at Tartine she helped open Zoe and Josh’s Huckleberry Café & Bakery in Santa Monica as well as Mutsumi Takehara’s Sandbox bakery in San Francisco. Shiho realized she wanted to try her hand at a business of her own and planned on opening an ice cream shop in Hawaii, where her husband was born and raised. However, Zoe and Josh proposed she should come on board to head the dessert kitchen at Sweet Rose Creamery. It was a natural choice to make, and so in 2010, Shiho helped launch Sweet Rose Creamery, sharing fun, bold flavors everyday.