Turning Passion into Pastry: My Journey into Baking

I am a very creative person. I took art and music classes in high school, and I majored in music in college. Then after college I took a sensible office job and settled down to “real life.” I started baking during this time, but just the odd loaf of bread or birthday cake.

Fast forward 10 years: I feel stuck. A “normal” life with a stable job is all well and good, but every day when I log into work I feel like my soul dies a little. I need something more than this. I need to make things. I need a goal to work toward instead of circling the pool of existential dread every day.

Existential dread will certainly make you re-evaluate your priorities, and one day not so long ago I found myself telling a friend I wanted to open my own bakery. And in the instant I said it I realized how much I really did want that. So I sat down to figure out how I could make that happen. Bills are, unfortunately, a very real thing, and I prefer to keep my lights on and my cats fed, so quitting my job doesn’t make sense quite yet. But what if I continued to work my unfulfilling job while I studied baking? That seemed a reasonable path forward.

I researched pastry schools and found two options that stood out: an online course (I found that very surprising – an online pastry school??), and a pastry course at my local community college. Both had pros and cons, but after much deliberation I determined that neither were right for me, and both for the same reason: time. The online course requires 15-25 hours a week and the community college course would require me to be in class during my working hours. Necessity (or in this case, existential dread) is the mother of invention, so I decided to create my own pastry course using the class lists from the other two schools as a guide. My course is missing a few things, but I can take a few actual classes later on for the boring (but important) stuff, like creating menus and learning to run a business.

Here is my plan of attack (I provide it for you here in case you, too, have decided you want to be a baker, but do not have the resources or time to go to pastry school). I intend to bake my way through as much of this as I can in the next 2 1/2 years and reassess on my 35th birthday. Who knows what may have changed by then?

I am writing this blog primarily as a learning tool and personal record of my work. I hope it is also entertaining and perhaps even helps you, my audience, learn more about baking.

Until the next time: may your yeast always rise and your flour never run out.

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Dramatic Lyric

I am a musician and a life-long maker of things. I love to read and write, and my favourite book is Jane Eyre.

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