baking and pastry

Baking and pastry refers to the culinary arts of preparing and creating baked goods and pastries. It is a specialized branch within the broader field of culinary arts that focuses specifically on the art and science of baking. Baking and pastry chefs are skilled professionals who excel in the preparation of a wide variety of sweet and savory baked goods. 

Not only is baking and pastry a great career—it’s a surprisingly versatile industry with opportunity in many niches.

Some bakers concentrate exclusively on bread, while others prefer to bake cakes, cookies, pies. Some stick to pastry and other desserts, like chocolate, macarons, or laminated doughs for croissants and puff pastry. There are also specialty shops, like donut shops and patisseries (French pastry shops) where a pastry cook can focus on one niche.

And of course, foodservice establishments like restaurants and hotels need pastry chefs to design and make plated desserts, and bakers for breads and baked sweets.

In the culinary world, there tends to be a split between pastry people and culinary people.

“Pastry people” enjoy fine detail. They follow a recipe to the letter, and they know that they have to strictly adhere to laws of baking science if their creation is going to turn out well. They often consider their approach to cooking to be more scientific.

“Culinary people” can often be more adaptive and fix things in the moment. They should taste as they go and season or adapt. That will not work in baking and pastry! Last minute changes can spell disaster, and many raw pastry ingredients aren’t suitable for tasting until after they’ve emerged from the oven. Culinary arts are sometimes considered more art than science, since there’s more leeway in how you complete a recipe.

The best bakers and pastry chefs know that precision and attention to detail is vital. You have to follow every step in a recipe—even if it’s a different method than what you were taught in baking school! Your employer may be asking you to use a specific technique to achieve a special result. There’s always a reason. And above all, you must be consistent if you’re going to make several dozen perfect croissants or macarons.

Baking and pastry is also a great career for people who want to specialize. In the culinary arts, you may be responsible for a wide variety of cooking styles and methods. In baking & pastry, specialization is more common. You may only make gluten-free artisan breads. You may fashion complex chocolate creations. Others choose to only make decadent wedding cakes. There are countless opportunities for specialties in baking and pastry. 

Some think that baking requires simply following a recipe. But a recipe is a formula. If you adjust or remove anything, you have to replace that ingredient’s role in the formula. And that means you have to understand the ingredient’s function.

Baking school can teach you these functions and roles and allow you to practice ingredient substitutions.

Eggs, flour, the types of protein in each flour, chemical leaveners—each of these does its own job, and you omit or change the amount at your peril. This kind of foundational education is usually not available in a bakery or restaurant, which is why many successful bakers have attended pastry school.

Plus, education can be eye-opening in terms of what you end up pursuing after baking school.