The challenge in getting educated as a vegan pastry chef is in replacing all the parts of traditional culinary school. Someone is going to have to teach me all about sugar sculptures and then give me a paper that says I’m a success.
The current project: I’ve been looking online for cake decorating classes that end in a certificate. They won’t be vegan, but I can grunt my way through a little bit of what repulses me (I did work in ice cream stores, of course.) The problem seems to be that the world of cake decoration is a backwards-facing racket.
All the design on these websites looks circa 1995. This bothers me because these are people I would pay to teach me to produce superior-looking food. Fondant, commercial marzipan, modeling chocolate… these things do not taste good, they look good. The people who teach them should care about aesthetics. They also charge more than I am comfortable with for classes I already know most of. I haven’t been professionally taught, so I’ll have to start at the beginning.
Wilton has a strangle-hold, but unless I head to some tiny town in Illinois, I’d be striving towards their expensive certificate in a Micheal’s. Now that would make me feel like a pro.
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vegan baker 
I hate fondant.
Comment by Bake & Destroy March 1, 2008 @ 4:35 pmoops… I meant to do this: http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2142/2289403624_8577fb07a5.jpg
Comment by Bake & Destroy March 1, 2008 @ 4:36 pmYeah fondant tastes nasty.
Comment by Jessica March 2, 2008 @ 12:49 pm