Ex-convict finds sweet relief in the kitchen, opens Durham bakery

Hester was in federal prison serving three-and-a-half years on drug trafficking charges when he was assigned to work in the kitchen.

Thanks to the mentoring of a fellow inmate, Hester traded cooking up drugs for cooking up cakes.

"One day he told me, 'You know, Keijuane, I'm teaching you this trade and if all fails, you'll have a trade to fall back on,'" Hester said of the moment his life began to turn around.

When he was released from prison, the next step in his life started with a carrot cake – a recipe he had gotten while behind bars.

Hester made the cake for his co-workers, and "just like that," he began moving forward.

"I took it to work the next day, and to my amazement, everybody just went crazy over the cake," Hester said.

With $30 and a hand mixer, Hester started cooking cakes in his mother's kitchen and selling slices door-to-door, mostly to businesses, barber shops, beauty salons and nail salons.

"Anything is possible. I just believe that," Hester says of his transformation.

When his business grew out of his mom's kitchen, Hester opened Favor Desserts in Durham.

"I knew that if I really focused in and did something positive, that I could be successful, just as successful as I was doing at something wrong," he said. "This isn't the life I chose, this is the life that chose me. This is what God had for my life. This is the path he chose for me."