Young new crop of bakers and pastry chefs gaining attention with their sweet creations
THEIR wonderful creations may look too good to eat but the new young bakers and pastry chefs lighting up our Instagram feeds know that taste is just as important as looks when it comes to sweet treats.
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TAKE a walk through Christy Tania’s ice cream shop Glace and you will quickly realise it is anything but an old-fashioned ice creamery. The Indonesian-born, French-trained pastry chef is keen to pay homage to the old favourite flavours, like cookies and cream and mint slice, but her delivery is modern, creative and fun.
She is typical of a new brood of bakers, pastry chefs and cake decorators bringing a funky new creative flair to sweets and baking and amassing millions of social media followers in the process. The creations of Andy Bowdy turns heads with his loaded, OTT cakes with their signature torched meringue toppers. Even the humble doughnut has been reinvented with creations from Camperdown’s Grumpy Donuts featuring their famous buttered toast doughnut, maple bacon bar and s’mores offering. And we marvelled at the young genius of MasterChef alumni Reynold Poernomo, who opened Koi Dessert bar with his brothers Ronald and Arnold in Chippendale after the then-20-year-old was eliminated from the show in 2015.
James Laing, director of the Cake, Bake and Sweets Show, says the popularity of the new crop of bakers, pastry chefs and cake decorators is largely influenced by social media, and in particular Instagram.
“There’s a huge and continuing rise in prominence of pastry chefs and bakers,” says Laing, whose show rolls into Sydney on November 23. “Some of these guys we’ve been dealing with have a social media following in excess of 2.2 million between them, bigger than many prominent chefs.”
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Laing says the fact desserts are so visually appealing puts them above savoury food in terms of social media currency and gives the creators a rock star profile. Anna Polyviou, nicknamed the punk princess of pastry, is the resident pastry chef at Sydney’s Shangri-La Hotel. But when she travels for festivals and her own shows, she does so with her own entourage complete with DJ and videographer. She’s easy to spot for her hot pink mohawk, high top sneakers and signature G-Shock watches. But at the heart of what she does is delectable old school desserts with modern, no-boundary flavour combinations.
Despite the huge social media numbers, these creatives are mostly all traditionally-trained pastry chefs, some learning their skills in the best French restaurants. “With these guys, there’s no fear of style over substance,” Laing says. “You may think their creations look too good to eat, but when you dig in you realise taste and flavour is as important as the Instagram photo. It’s not good enough for it just to look good and they know it.”
But not all have arrived at success through traditional means, says Nicole Reaney, founder of social influencer agency #AsSeenOn.
“We are seeing highly trained and skilled chefs through to people dropping their first careers and falling into the art,” she says pointing to the self-taught cake popsicle sensation Raymond Tan of Melbourne who has an Instagram following of more than 200,000.
“The depth and breadth of creations and the push to create the ‘next best thing’ is breathing new life into an age-old industry.”
Another that came to baking as a second career is the hugely successful Katherine Sabbath. Four years ago she was a high school teacher but got sick of fitting her baking into her spare time, so quit to pursue her passion as a full-time career. More than 450,000 Instagram followers and a cookbook later, Sabbath reigns as one of Australia’s top bakers.
Similarly, six years ago Stacy Brewer gave up her career as a stylist and art director to train as a pastry chef honing her skills at Sydney’s Grounds of Alexandria and Andy Bowdy Pastry. She is highly sought after for her signature bold floral-embellished special occasion cakes attracting celebrity clients including Kate Waterhouse, Sigourney Cantelo and Kyly Clarke.
Matt Moran, who recently finished filming the fourth season of Foxtel’s Great Australian Bake Off, says it’s heartening to see so much young talent come through the show.
“What you tend to find with the young ones in particular is that they really push the boundaries with presentation,” Moran says of the show’s contestants. “It’s really cool to see, they’re so passionate and you can tell they practise for hours.
“But they also understand about balance of flavour, which is something (Maggie Beer and I) really push with the contestants. It can’t just be something that looks good but is so sweet you can’t eat it.”
Laing says the younger demographic’s obsession with all things sweet is clear in the age range of visitors to his the Cake, Bake and Sweets show, which is expected to attract around 450,000 at both the Sydney and Melbourne venues.
“Around 40 per cent of visitors are aged 25 to 39 with an additional 31 per cent aged 40 to 54,” Laing says.
“For most of us, our earliest memories are of cooking with our mum or grandmother and waiting to lick the cake batter spoon. Cakes and sweets are so enticing and visual and so kid-friendly.”
Despite this skew in demographics, Laing says there is still a thirst for foundation skills and so the show offers a range of workshops and demonstrations. One stage will host the Sugar Lab, dedicated to crazy, modern demonstrations. While the other stage offers a more back to basics approach to baking.
“Many of the visitors will come over multiple days to make sure they get full exposure to the workshops and demonstrations,” Laing says.
“So we offer a three-day pass for those young people who are super engaged and enthusiastic to become immersed in the world of baking.”