Baking and Pastry Arts: A Career and Lifestyle

The world at large loves cakes and pastries decorated stylishly with rich flavours appealing to multitude of tastes of food lovers. If you have creativity, a taste for beauty and a sweet tooth, then Baking and Pastry Arts are where you should be.

The Baking and Pastry Arts involves creation of different types of bread viz., hearth and specialty breads. The discipline would be incomplete if it did not include desserts, pastries, patisserie and confections. You get to learn basic pastry and cake production, cake styling and menu planning. Additional aspects include basic cooking, nutrition and food safety. If you choose to do a program in this discipline, some institutions also offer you paid externships that double up for practical experience.

For most of us, baking and pastry arts is more than an interesting hobby. There are attractive career prospects in this industry like entry level positions of Pastry Cook and Baker and later on, moving to Pastry Chef, Dessert Chef, Bakery Trainer, Bread Maker or Production Pastry Maker. You can work in bakery shops, kitchens, grocery stores, restaurants, hotels. Food service managers in this specialty can earn from $40,000 to $70,000 annually as per statistics recorded in 2004.

There are several institutions offering reputed programs for degrees in Baking and Pastry Arts across the world like The International Culinary Schools at The Art Institutes located over several locations. Another school in the same league is the Le Cordon Bleu Schools North America. Add to the menu, the Le Cordon Bleu International is another top class school with over 110 years of teaching experience. The University of Phoenix’s punchline reads “Thinking Ahead” and true to its name, it offers online learning. The French Culinary Institute completes the list of top schools honing the next generation of culinary leaders.