Pastry Chef, Roland Mesnier

[curls]

Opened the Washington Post and learned that Chef Roland Mesnier has died. I never met him but have enjoyed baking from and reading two of his cookbooks. RIP.

 

https://www.whitehousehistory.org/roland-mesnier-in-memoriam-1944-2022

https://www.chefrolandmesnier.com/about/history-timeline/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2022/08/27/roland-mesnier-pastry-chef-white-house-dead/

[Alex]

What an amazing chef! It's a lovely obit in the Post. This is my favorite quote of his: 

 

Quote

"Most people run afoul of baking because they are too uptight when they bake,” he told the Baltimore Sun in 2007. “I used to have a glass of wine before I baked. It worked for me. And if all else fails, just finish the bottle of wine."

 

And this is my second favorite: 

 

Quote

Only once, he recalled to The Washington Post, did he bend firm rules of White House employment. It was in 1987, and the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev visited President Reagan in Washington. Although it is standard that all food gifts sent to the White House be destroyed for security reasons, he could not bring himself to part with two enormous tins of Russian caviar that had come from Gorbachev.

 

“I looked at the other chef and said, ‘I don’t know about you, buddy, but I’m willing to die for what’s inside,’” he remembered. “‘So I’m taking one home, and you can have the other one.’”

 

[Shelby]

I would have liked this guy.

[heidih]

Yes writer captured his zest and passion for life in that obit. I had to laugh at Nancy "admiring" the pastries - like she ever allowed herself to eat one.