Saturday, September 24, 2011
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
HOUSEMADE JAMS, RELISH & COOKIES!! Available now from $6.50
Grab a jar of jam and smother a hot scone or buttered piece of toast with your favourite flavour. Highly recommend the apricot.
We also now have cookie bags available which have been baked in-house by Rhianna - our infamous pastry chef. You can also make an order for any of our cookies, macaroons or cakes - perfect for gifts or when entertaining guests!
Monday, January 24, 2011
Sweet tooth: life of a pastry chef
Rhianna Healey (pictured) first decided she wanted to be a pastry chef when she was in Year 10 at Emmanuel College
She pursued her dream through a school based apprenticeship at Cobb Loaf Bakery in Camperdown.
“They offered me a full time position as a baker after I finished the apprenticeship,” said the 21 year old.
Making her dream a reality required a lot of passion though considering the young apprentice’s start time was often 3am.
“I was travelling from Garvoc to Camperdown every day,” she said.
“I would get up at 1.45am and mum would drive the half hour journey to drop me off and pick me up.
“My mum drove me back and forth for one and half years, before I got my licence.”
When asked how a teenage girl manages to drag herself out of bed at that time of the morning, when most of her friends were probably only just getting home, she was adamant her passion kept her going.
“I never use to get out of bed early. I would sleep till 11am. But my passion drove me,” she said.
Not only did her family’s support ensure Rhianna’s success within the tough industry, it was also their influence that originally led her down the food path.
“My mum, my aunties and both my nannas love food,” she laughed.
“It is really in our family. I have always loved food, especially sweet food.”
Her mum is her recipe guru, providing the young chef with plenty of inspiration.
“My mum has passed down a lot of her recipes, cakes and slices, and I search through family cookbooks as well,” she said.
While Rhianna is hard pressed to name her favourite thing to cook, she admits cheesecakes are her latest obsession.
“I love cooking cheesecakes at the moment,” she said.
“There are so many variations of the humble cheesecake. I was on the internet for two hours last night hunting down recipes.”
She also confessed having a soft spot for cooking the old style sweets like lemon slice and cookies – perhaps best affectionately known as Country Women’s Association style cooking.
“I make my muffins and scone fresh every day for the cafe,” she said.
In her current role as head pastry chef at the Pavilion Café and Bar her wake up time is a much more civilised 4.15am to arrive at work by 5am.
Being the only one in the kitchen at that time means Rhianna can turn up the music and get stuck in to the flour.
“We are going through three or four cakes every day. I almost can’t keep up with the cake sales,” she said.
An added bonus is Rhianna’s macaroon making talent.
She was taught how to make the heavenly French confections by the head chef from Carlton
The Melbourne
“Coming from a Camperdown Bakery, we didn’t use many French words,” she laughed.
“So I had to really step up and learn the more commercial cooking terminology.”
While Rhianna loves running her own kitchen, she has ambitions to learn more about her profession in France and Germany
“I want to head to Paris
“And the breads from Germany
Her parting words for all sweet tooth wannabe pastry chefs are “you have to be passionate about the food and tolerant, because there are a lot of different personalities in hospitality, so if you love it, you have to put up with it”.
“Food is what you make it – sweet.”
(Article available in C2C Magazine)
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
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