PA&D - a new , better look

[mckayinutah]

Hello all,

I happened to stop by my local Barnes and Noble Booksellers yesterday, and to my surprise, saw the newest issue of PA&D.

I almost didn't see it for 2 reasons:

1. They now have a new look. I was so used to seeing the script " Pastry Art and Design" on the cover that I actually had to do a double take to see that it was in fact the magazine. I usually get thrown off by the "P" since there is a magazine called " Pasta " that I sometimes mistake for it. The title is now in plain Block letters, which I think looks good.

2. I had just come from having my eyes examined, so I was somewhat seeing

" blurry ' ( I was actually walking around with 1 eye open and 1 eye shut ) and could actually only see things up close if I took my glasses up onto my forehead

( so to say the least, I almost didn't see it.)

Back to the important stuff. I like the new look as well as the new format of sorts that is inside. They now have columns on wine, bread, schools, cookbooks,and prepared desserts, as well as the usual 3 or 4 PC spotlights ( I have always loved those )

A very nice article on Jill Rose ( she is on the front cover for those looking for it ), who has opened her own pastry shop ( I believe her last gig was PC at LaCaravelle, which is or already has, closed ), and some other things that I won't mention that are always well liked by me.

I thought I would just let anyone who is interested know what I have found.

Take care,

Jason

[Wendy DeBord]

I received my issue a week or two ago and noticed the changes also. I'm undecided whether it's an improvement or not. I did notice there wasn't a batter up column writen by M.S.., not sure why he didn't write it or previously introduce the new changes....but oh well.

I wasn't crazy about the bread article just because it was so hugely basic.

It was bizarre that one of the articles was written by the owner of a huge wholesale pastry business........because the day I got my issue someone on thread here had mentioned this guys company (in a neg. way). It was weird and timely because I'd never heard of them before, yet alone twice in one day. The person here who mentioned it did affect how I read that article. I'm not sure how a huge wholesale company owner fits into giving pc's ideas or help.......should we turn to his stuff when we don't have enough time, and put ourselfs out of a job? Na, I don't want any frozen stuff being sold to my clients-they might think I made it and I don't want a bad rap. Instead I'd rather learn how to handle an over booked shedule or get advice on how to get an assistant out of your employeer.

I did like the new look, and appreciate that they are stirring things up and whether they hit a home run each time or not, they're trying.

[Skwerl]

Wendy, this issue did have a "Batter Up" column talking about the changes. Like you, I found the column on prepared desserts a bit surprising. I realize that costs are naturally important to restaurants, but are prepared desserts something that we want to further promote in an industry trade magazine? I understand taking shortcuts using premade gianduja and fruit purees, but if a pastry chef is buying premade desserts, who needs the pastry chef? I could see a chef start to purchase a premade dessert here and there, and eventually management would decide to cut out the pastry chef and pass the savings on to themselves.

What about the consumer's perception of a restaurant after he recognizes that Le Foux Nain, Cafe Avant Lard, and Hooters all have the exact same tart (I don't mean the waitress)? I can't speak for everyone, but I would much rather have a hand-crafted dessert instead of some thawed factory-molded thing and I would gladly pay more for a "real" dessert.

Dessert is something very special, and I hate to hear of chefs cutting costs by using prepared desserts. IMO, any pastry chef purchasing prepared desserts is damning the next generation of chefs. I fear seeing a trend in moving toward manufactured desserts. I don't want my dessert from a Super Mega Wal-Mart of the pastry world. I hope Pastry Art & Design will drop their column on prepared desserts and replace it with one discussing how to raise people's appreciation for fine pastry.

[Steve Klc]

Won't happen--this has been going on for some time now and you'll see increasing advertorial and editorial coverage of that because the advertising dollars are there--you telling me Albert Uster shouldn't promote IcEscape in PA&D? The reality is this is a big growth area--enabling more chefs to do without pastry chefs, more hotels to fire their higher-paid more experienced pastry chefs and replace them, even more inexperienced people will take jobs sooner than they would otherwise, staff jobs will be cut. There have been some very well-known pastry chefs--competitors in the US National Pastry Championships--who have had jobs where mostly what they did day to day was use these products and send them out the door to banquets and breakfast buffets. This already is a reality all these professional pastry school graduates have to face. That just makes what we say on eG all that more relevant so you can react to it head-on--you accept it and ignore it at your future peril otherwise.

[Skwerl]

What a sickening thought. I hope the result of this will at least go in the direction of pastry chefs opening pastry kitchens to service a small number of local restaurants, perhaps specializing in different desserts for each. This might have a lot of positives involved like having independence and a complete pastry kitchen. I hope chefs start to go this route if they can't find a home in a good restaurant that will respect them. I could chew on that more easily than the idea of having Wal-Mart Pastry making desserts for 98% of the country's restaurants.

[Steve Klc]

Well, I wouldn't swing this too far to the other side--but what this says more than anything else is we often don't get to define the kinds of jobs we have, the salary and pay structure, and the jobs we want to do aren't going to be there as often as we'd like them to be, etc--that instead of making $9 an hour right out of pastry school in a restaurant, you might be working in a foodservice situation somewhere cranking out wholesale desserts on a line not too different than an auto assembly line--and just like in those plants you can be slotted and specialized or you can hopefully multitask and learn different stations (different parts like windshields or doors) and move forward. I don't think it's necessarily better or worse in a restaurant or a centralized wholesale Walmart type operation: both operations hire less-formally trained people and inexperienced people with good attitudes and no skills--employment benefits will likely be better at a WalMart-type operation than in an individual restaurant. I'm still waiting for the professional pastry school backlash to hit (and I hope it never does) when too many of these graduates seduced by the magazines realize they could have gotten these very same jobs without going to school and into debt--and that their prospects aren't necessarily any brighter because they went to school. And if we get handfuls of entry-level program-seeking students to stop and reflect--and then make a more informed decision--we'd have gained. Because that's one thing they won't be hearing about from the magazine or from the schools themselves.

I don't blame chefs, like the guy who wrote this column in PA&D, for pursuing an opportunity to get something reliable, consistent and fairly decent if not exactly personal. Michael Schneider and Mark Kammerer (a very smart and creative guy by the way) are actually doing every pastry chef in the country a favor by running this column. Foodservice guys are like that--and this chef knows, frankly, there's not that much difference in quality between some of these preprepared/frozen things and what an under-trained, over-worked pastry chef would provide--and if he outsourced for relatively the same quality he'd save in other areas and could cut salary, staffing, benefits, absenteeism, overhead, etc. Fact is, this is a big segment of the audience--the chefs control the pursestrings--the manufacturer money is there for advertising and promotion--as it has been with a company like Chocolates a la Carte who has spent big time to co-opt some of the better pastry chefs in this country and also insulate themselves with advertising dollars into magazines like PA&D and Food Arts and competitions like the Vegas CaryMax event. All we can do is pick up our skill level, move forward, keep calling attention to it, raising awareness with the public and look to support more personal, more individual work--in cooking and in pastry.

[tan319]

I've been trying to get back to this thread to post my thoughts on the new design, format, etc. for awhile now so here goes;.

Look: Wasn't prepared for it being so stark, a bit harder to see on the newsstand.

An improvement?

Maybe if that title script was driving one nuts, never bothered me much.

Content: Seems like it's linked heavily to advertisers or businesses with a vested interest.

Reading about the prepped desserts and how it bothered some of the posters, I was kind of nonplussed. That stuff is for hotels and the like to me, and even if some of the chefs use these items for banquets and such that are names do indeed use them, I was kind of ambivalent about it.

Once I got the new issue though, something about that column being written by the corporate chef for 'Sweet Street' desserts really got to me.

All this talk about sanitation, ingredients, made me feel like he regards those of us who do make our stuff everyday, from scratch for the most part, as a bunch of shirtless sweaty morons out of a Peter Greenaway flick, infecting the public because we aren't in a factory punching out this shit.

Even the column written by the dean (?) of my alma mater, culinary-wise, struck me as sort of inappropiate for some reason.

It wasn't the content of it, it was the factoid stuck at the bottom of it, just seemed like a paid ad to me.

So even more now, as I just read on the Food and Wine magazine thread featuring "Pastry Provocateurs", I'm bugged about PA&D getting scooped by an entertainment mag.

What gives???

I know they had Izzunni in the 10 best recently, Laiskonis too, and they both represent the newer styles of pastry work, but the rest of these guys have been pretty much ignored for a good year and a half now.

Not that it matters much in the bigger picture, but I've stuck up for PA&D when crap was being thrown en masse by various people here, who were complaining about how they thought that content was being influenced by connections to PA&D, either thru the World Pastry Forum or the 'Cup', amongst other things.

I'm not so sure they weren't right.

Did Conticini get a cover not only because of his great work, but also because of his connection to Valrhona, the World Cup and The World Pastry Forum?

Did Adria get an article (meager as it was) wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy back in 99 or 2K because he was going to be judging in the WPC?

Here are some of my thoughts from the other thread...

"But, I have to say, all this morning I've been getting more and more annoyed that a magazine like Food & Wine, which to me, while being a good mag, has such a broad focus for the home cook, entertainer and party thrower, has an article like this on these new wave guys, and Pastry Art & Design, which is designed for pastry chefs of all sorts, has ignored this whole facet of dessert making! For pretty much more then a year and a half.

Now, speaking of production deadlines, I'll take this all back if say, the next issue of PA&D has something on these chefs, as a movement or solo but, Jesus, does anyone else think it's sort of an oversight that's bordering on ignorant?

Take a look at this link for Sam Masons dessert menu at wd50, click on the camera symbol besides some of the items, and tell me that his plating doesn't satisfy some kind of existing (?) requirement that PA&D says has to be met to be in there.

http://www.wd-50.com/menu2.html

No, there's no pastillage, pulled sugar monoliths, butterfly tuiles, whatever, but there is class and a simplistic beauty in these, and I'm sure the other chefs works, not to mention their innovation and thoughts in taking dessert cuisine further on down the road."

Sorry to wax so 'paranoid', but, Scheneider, if you are reading this, you guys should be hanging your heads in shame.

I know you wrote many moons ago about how many of your readers complained about, for example, articles about savory and sweet things being mixed together, they want the focus to be on the S.O.S...

Maybe, every once in awhile, someone has to take the lead.

Oh, I forgot, PA&D even got scooped by a Rap/Fashion magazine.

Edited June 8, 2004 by tan319 (log)

[alacarte]

Content: Seems like it's linked heavily to advertisers or businesses with a vested interest

I feel obligated to warn the pastry chefs on this board that PA&D features advertisers prominently in even what appears to be objective, independent articles not marked as advertorials. I wrote a free-lance article for them, and one of the stipulations was that a particular advertiser had to be mentioned in the text of the article. This isn't something I would do now, but since I was only starting out in food writing at the time, I sucked it up and did it.

And to add insult to injury, I was never even paid for the article. Would never work for them again, or for their sister mag Chocolatier either. And I've heard that this is hardly an isolated incident. Writers, beware.

[tan319]

That's pretty bad.

I'm going to edit here, to say I can understand having to maybe do things (not you alacarte, them) to help pay the bills.

There have been times that I wondered if their readership was high enough to keep them in business.

Naive, I suppose, but I cared, whatever.

But nowadays, even something like Pastryscoop.com, which IS an advert for the FCI, delivers more of what I want sometimes, most of the time, actually.

Interviews with cutting edge pastry chefs, as well as bakers, more traditonal pastry chefs, chocolatiers, etc.

I can write them an email suggesting something and get a response.

I come from a record business background.

The music business has always been kind of slimy, pay to play, stuff like that, but even a music rag is quicker to acknowledge a trend then PA&D.

Look at Faders article on Sam Mason. It's like PA&D is dragging their feet in the sand or something. Or they're too busy with all of this WPF stuff.

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.

Not having a decent web presence yet is surely an indicator that they're stuck with and in the old world, where you react to things in a timeline of months rather then hours, kind of like the Pony Express.

PS:alacarte, I'm sure Michael will PM you at some point demanding to know who you are, etc.

I'll read it at the newstand from now on, instead of buying it and taking it home with me, unless there's an article that I want to have in my archive.

Edited June 8, 2004 by tan319 (log)

[chocomag]

You got me guys. I just received a message to go on the site and see what you are all saying about us. To begin with, I have never alibied PAD's shortcomings in terms of delivery and content. In fact, I have repeatedly asked all of you to send us your ideas or suggestions.

Alacarte, tan319 makes it sound as if I am going to demand to know who you are so I can make some horrible trouble for you. C'mon folks - is there anyone out there who can honestly say I have ever done a vindictive thing to any pastry chef (or anyone else for that matter)?

If you weren't paid, why didn't you contact me and tell me what was going on. I don't know the reason or the circumstances but we don't stiff writers. Sometimes we take a long time to pay and for that we are guilty but never stiff.

Have any of you out there ever used a chocolate or product other than the one you really wanted to use because of a management dictate? Maybe it was $ dictated.

I can tell you that unless you are living under a rock, EVERY magazine that takes advertising bends over for their advertisers. To us, that means including them in round-ups (which I suspect alacarte's article probably was). We do not, nor have ever been a magazine of ratings and what is acceptable and what is not. Our philosophy is simple. Don't say something good about something that is bad. Other than that, it's a dollar business, as is every establishment all of you work for.

Tan319, take the last 2 years of PAD and look at the Signature section. Usually 4 or 5 recipes and bio's per issue. How many of them are "competition" pastry chefs? We are happy to feature new chefs to the magazine if they let us know who they are.

Scooped by Food Arts!!!!!!! Is this sacrilege or something. They have a good magazine and come out many more times a year than we do so their lead times are shorter. It happens. Do I like it? No. But I can live with it.

Steve, you seem to have a very realistic viewpoint of the business and if you stop believing that Haymarket and Carymax are motivated by evil, we will usually be on the same page.

I do not like the fact that frozen or wholesale desserts are cutting into jobs. I don't like it at all. In fact, those of you who believe I am only in this business for the money, should clearly understand that any loss of pastry chefs or jobs hurts my circulation. And, to set the record straight - I am not in this for the money, any more than each and every one of you out there.

But, frozen and wholesale desserts exist and we need to cover that. I was talking to Philip Braun, the president of Albert Uster, and he is carrying ICEESCAPES, a product that fits into this category. He wants it to be successful and of high quality but he really hopes it is used as a means of supplementing hotel requirements. Do I believe him? Absolutely - I know him and he is a straight shooter.

We're all in business and most of us try real hard to do what's right. Try giving the benefit of the doubt unless the evidence is to the contrary. But keep on demanding answers from me and others like me. It keeps us alert.

Till the next time.

[tan319]

For one thing, it's Food & Wine magazine, not Food Arts.

But speaking of Food Arts, will you be featuring any coverage of the con fab that went on in Napa a few months ago too? Like they will be in one of the next two issues?

I wasn't implying that you were going to make any kind of trouble for anyone.

Rather, that you would do exactly as you have done, ask them to speak up, etc.

The Icescape product line doesn't bother me in the least, in fact, if one was a pastry chef and didn't have a sheeter and a lot of time and staff, why not use the product?

It's all butter, that says a lot for the quality, I suppose, and as in one of the threads here a fair amount of people, one in particular, was talking about his dealings with a pretty bad case of carpal tunnel syndrome/repetitive stress injurys caused by hand rolling his own croissaints,

The case would be made for purchasing this kind of product if you were in that kind of situation.

I posted my suggestions when you first came in here sometime last year, asking for them.

I'm not going to write you every month, wondering where the articles on, say Balaguer, Mason, or any of these newer guys and gals are.

I expect the magazine that speaks for pastry chefs to be on the lookout for these things, just like they are about new products from Sweet Street and Albert Uster, even if those business's are paying for it, which is fine.

And I realize that a publicist or a freelance writer knocking on your door, to place an article gives those of us who are interested in certain chefs more of a chance to read about them, and makes your life easier,but, if there is a history of non payment or very late payment, those chances are going to get slimmer.

Those signature pieces and bios are fine, but that's not what I'm talking about.

You've ignored a movement in dessert cuisine, that's been written about a fair amount in all kinds of media, from the New York Post to Fader magazine, and it points to, or seems to point to, either a bias against it, or an ignorance of it.

Is your magazine supposed to be on the forefront of reporting on what pastry chefs are doing and where pastry is going?

In every facet?

Or are you going to keep throwing it back at us?

There's a lot of us out here, a lot are non communicators, just like lurkers on an internet site who either feel like no one is interested in what they have to contribute or that it will fall on deaf ears.

Are you deaf?

You are a New York based business, right in the heart of where a lot of this action is taking place.

Pichet Ong, Jenigher Metha, Sam Mason, Will Goldfarb, a host of others, are right in your own backyard.

There's no excuse to not take notice.

[Wendy DeBord]

Our philosophy is simple. Don't say something good about something that is bad. Other than that, it's a dollar business, as is every establishment all of you work for.

It's fine if it's all about money, that is how the world works. But eventually the advertisers money won't be there if the readership isn't buying this mag. because another publisher has stepped in and provided better reading material.

Yes, of course we too work for the all mighty dollar. The standard we have to meet is not only to please our imediate boss, but to please the little guys who pay our bosses salary. Your standards are set by you with great care for your advertisers and little care for who funds your advertisers in the first place. If you ignore your readers you won't have advertisers.

Heck, I don't know why any of us even care anymore. You haven't taken our suggestions and run with them, ever. You constantly ignore us. YET.......it sure is funny how that secret agent always calls you to tell you someone here is talking about you. That's a hoot!

It really no longer matters to me, I've found other sources to fill my pastry reading needs. I'm sure your's won't always be the only American pastry rag on the stands. When the next one comes along we'll all greet them with welcoming arms just as we did yours.

[Wendy DeBord]

Steve, you seem to have a very realistic viewpoint of the business and if you stop believing that Haymarket and Carymax are motivated by evil, we will usually be on the same page.

I am guilty of admiring Steves thoughts and writings on pastry arts. But I've had disagreements with him too. But one thing I've come to learn (sometimes even reluctantly) is he's alot smarter than I. I've yet to see him write something that wasn't dead on right. Sure that stinks when you have the opposite view...........but every damn time he makes me stop and think and every damn time he's right.

Somewhere along the way you must have taken something Steve has written to heart the wrong way. That's your own mistake Micheal. If you calm down and read his exact words I'm certain you've misunderstood.

We all have our own points of view. It's up to each of us to take the time and be humble enough to really listen to what others have to say...........then we might learn something about each other.

[tan319]

BTW, the article in Food & Wine magazine, "Pastry Provocateurs", is very good.

A lot of info, no recipes, more a look inside where these people talk about new ingredients and inspiration.

Jacque Torres weighs in (Favorably) with his thoughts.

It should be on nesstands now, July issue.

[artisanbaker]

That's cool that you got Lionel to do a bread column

bon continuation

[mckayinutah]

Just picked up the latest issue of PA&D, with the 10 best pastry chefs. This is one of my favorite issues of the year, but it is interesting to know that out of the 10, 3 have left the positions that they had when the issue was done. This brings me to a question that is based on individual opinion.

Why is turnover so high for pastry chefs, especially those who have been recently " found " ?

Frederic Monti, voted 1 of the top 10 last year as well as this year, gone from the Ritz Carlton in Naples ( see my other thread on other Ritz Carlton PC news ). Is popularity or sudden fame to blame?

Mark Chapman, a new 10 best winner, no longer at La Mansion del Rio in San Antonio ( I will say though, he had been there for 6 years, which seems like an eternity in this field ) . Does winning or being named this achievement, give some a " big " head? I'm not saying it does, but out of the last 2 years and 16 top 10ers ( 4 this year were also awarded this honor last year ), 5 have changed positions since they were awarded this achievement ( which is actually less than a year, considering the last 10 Best issue came out in November 2003.)

Am I being over dramatic, or is this normal ? just to add to this discussion, Joseph Panepinto, Executive Pastry chef at the Garden City Hotel on Long Island ( A place Bripastryguy and I are familiar with ) just won Pastry chef of the Year at the International foodservice show. I just saw this morning an ad for the pastry chef position at the Garden City hotel. Is it a matter of " take the money and fame, then run"?

Jason

[cbarre02]

Come come now, i don't think that many moves are made on big headed haste. Many moves take months to plan, especially for executive positions. I am not saying that a spot on the list doesn't help get there foot in the door, but given the turnover rate in this business why is this such a shock. Sure executive chefs don't see the moves that pastry chefs do, but there food makes a restaurant what it is... 80%+ of the food that is served in a fine dining establishment is savory. There for what the executive chef choosed to do, would be in the best intrest of the pastry chef to take note, and play along. A pastry chef gets tired of it, get offered more money... you do the math.

[mckayinutah]

Come come now, i don't think that many moves are made on big headed haste

Cory, I didn't mean to imply that these changing of positions was based on " big headedness", I was more interested in the number of PC's moving on ( yes, turnover is High in this industry ) and the fact that sometimes a little recognition is to blame for it.

Jason

[Wendy DeBord]

Boy, theres tons of reasons why a person changes jobs.

I don't think pc's heads get any larger then an other chefs when they acheive recognition.

Lets face it it's pretty hard to be noticed as a pc when we are always in someone elses shadow. The opportunity to stand in the spot light on your own is real recognition. To work in several kitchens and gain the respect of others each time you move is heart warming. The ultimate personal satisfaction of the job.

It's also damn interesting to grow from others who influence you!

The math is there. More money+new challenges+personal growth+possibly more recognition=time to change jobs.

[alacarte]

PS:alacarte, I'm sure Michael will PM you at some point demanding to know who you are, etc.

I PM'd him a while back, making it clear who I am and what I worked on. I'm not posting this info here to make anonymous threats. It's more a public service announcements to the myriad writers who frequent these boards.