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Head Judge, Pastry Biagio Settepani immigrated to the United States from Italy as a child, and began working in the local pastry shop at the age of 13, thus beginning his life long passion for pastry and baking. He opened his first pastry shop at the age of 21, and in took over Bruno's Bakery in New York City. Biagio continues to grow his business, expanding Bruno Bakery and opening Pasticceria in July 2000. He attended classes in pastry arts through Cacao Barry US, The School of International Confectionery Arts, The French Pastry School, Patisfrance/Paris Gourmet, L'Ecole Lenotre, and Décor Italia. He credits his participation in pastry competitions for enabling him to stay in contact with trends. As an instructor for the New School Culinary Arts, he hopes to give his knowledge and experience to the future pastry chefs. Biagio has competed internationally, and among his accomplishments are the 2001 Medal of the French Government at the Salon Philanthropique NYC, Best Sugar Showpiece at the 2001 and 2003 National Pastry Team Competition, the Silver Medal at the Patisfrance Pastry Competition in 1999, the Bronze Medal "Grand Prix du Chocolate, France in 1999 and the Gold Medal at the Salon Culinaire Philanthropique in 1998. |
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PASTRY PANEL judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel |
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| Florian Bellanger | Robert Ellinger | Louise Hoffman |
| Ewald Notter | Anil Rohira | Christophe Toury |
| Fank Vollkmommer | ||
Florian Bellanger judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Florian is the Chef / Owner of "Pastry Solutions LLC" a complete pastry consulting company as well as Chef / Owner of Mad-Mac LLC, “The Authentic French Macarons and Madeleines |
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Robert Ellinger, C.M.B., C.E.P.C. judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Owner and Pastry Chef of Baked To Perfection, established in 1986, a retail/wholesale bakery operation in Port Washington, New York. Robert held positions as Head Pastry Chef for The Metropolitan Opera, The United Nations, The Water Club and The Garden City Hotel in New York. Born in Jericho, New York, Robert graduated from Sullivan County Community College’s Hotel/Restaurant Management Program with an Associate of Science Honors degree. Robert was then selected to attend Highbury Technical College in Portsmouth, England where he received the prestigious Chefs III Diploma. Robert rounded out his education when he returned and graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree from The Florida International University in Miami, Florida. In 1997 he successfully completed his Certified Master Bakers Exam and Certified Executive Pastry Chef Exam. Awards:
Culinary Philosophy: A commitment to use and produce the best according to the standards of excellence established by European pastry tradition. |
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Louise Hoffman judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Louise Hoffman is an Associate Professor in the Hospitality Management Department at NYC College of Technology. She earned her Master's degree from Empire State College completing a Masters in Liberal Studies with emphasis on food and culture. She graduated Culinary Institute of America in 1983 with her Associates degree and prior to the CIA earned her Bachelors Degree in Fine Arts from the College of Ceramic Arts at Alfred University. She has studied with Ewald Notter at the International School of Confectionery Arts and many other highly regarded pastry chefs. Her professional career began over twenty five years ago working in French restaurants as a line cook and chef. After twelve years in restaurant kitchens, she moved into teaching, writing, catering, pastry and confectionery arts. For the past 12 years, she has competed in the Salon of Culinary Arts at the International Hotel/Motel and Restaurant Show and was a finalist for three years in the PatisFrance U.S. Pastry Competition, winning the Bronze Medal for Third Place in 2002. She has been a Confectionery Judge for the past five years in the PatisFrance U.S. Pastry Competition, a guest pastry chef at the National Pastry Team Championship in Beaver Creek Colo., in June 2001, at the 1999 New York State Restaurant and Food Show; the >98 Atlantic Baker=s Expo in Atlantic City and at the >98 Women Chefs and Restaurateurs Convention in NYC. One of her areas of expertise is confectionery arts which she teaches at the New York City College of Technology in Brooklyn NY. In 2004 and 2005, her Confectionery Student Team won the First Prize, The Marc Sarrazin Award in the Salon of Culinary Arts at the International Hotel/Motel Show in NYC. She is a Member of American Institute of Wine and Food, The Baker’s Dozen and a member and Officer of The Societe Culinaire Philanthropique. |
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Anil Rohira judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Anil Rohira is the Corporate Pastry Chef at Albert Uster Imports. Chef Rohira's success on the national stage began in 1997, when he won gold at the ACF Centerpiece Competition. Three Gold Medals followed in 1999, all earned at the ACF Food Show, which also awarded him "Best of Show." At the 2000 National Pastry Team Championship, he won the Bronze Medal, and followed with "Best Sugar Showpiece" at the next year’s event. In 2002, he qualified for a spot on the USA Team to compete at the 2003 Coupe du Monde in France. As team captain, Chef Rohira won the title of "Best Sugar Showpiece." Most recently, he was recognized as "Distinguished Visiting Chef of the Year" by Johnson & Wales University. In 2006, Anil was named one of “The Top 10 Pastry Chefs in America” by Pastry Art & Design magazine. |
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Ewald Notter judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Ewald Notter is Co-owner of the Notter School of Pastry Arts in Orlando, FL. He was the first inductee into the Pastry Art and Design Hall of Fame by Pastry Art and Design and Chocolatier magazines. In 1999, Notter won the Gold Medal at the first National Pastry Team Championship with Thaddeus Dubois. In 2000, Ewald repeated this victory with Jacquy Pfeiffer and Sebastien Canonne. He was also honored as Pastry Chef of the Year and qualified to compete as part of the United States National Team in France, which one the Gold Medal. Since he stopped competing, Ewald has been consulting and judging numerous competitions. In 2003, Ewald was honored from the American Academy of Hospitality Sciences with the 5 Star Diamond award as “One of the Finest Confectionery Chefs of the World.” |
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Christophe Toury judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Named one of the ten best chefs in America in 2000 and 2001 by Pastry Art and Design and Chocolatier, Christophe began his career in pastry at the age of fifteen, 20 years ago in his hometown of Charters, France. After a two-year apprenticeship, he moved to Paris to work at Patachou Pastry Shop where he worked under the direction of Andre Renard. He later joined the Ritz Paris and spend two years there as a pastry cook. In 1992, Christophe moved to New York to work with Renard at Les Celebrities in the Essex House and was later promoted to pastry chef at Café Botanica. From 1996 through 2002, Christophe served as Executive Pastry Chef at the Four Seasons hotels in Hawaii and New York. Christophe joined The Mandarin Oriental NY as part of the opening team of the hotel, where he delighted guests with his wealth of experience and creativity. In 1993, he was named Moet Pastry Chef of the Year after his first place win in the Moet & Chandon and Pastisfrance competition in New York. That year, he was also commissioned by Hershey’s Chocolate to create a showpiece for the 100th anniversary. Christophe is currently an executive pastry chef for a wholesale bakery in Long Island City. His desserts can be described as contemporary French-American. “Christophe has an amazing touch when it comes to pastry,” says owner Martin Bernier of the Food Attitude bakery. “He knows how to create visual excitement on pastries and skillfully recreate the American dessert with a few French twists.” |
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Fank Vollkmommer judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Frank Vollkommer is the Executive Chef of the Saratoga National Golf Club. Prior to taking this position he held positions at The Culinary Institute of America and New England Culinary Institute where he taught classes in the baking and pastry degree programs. |
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Head Judge, Bread Ciril Hitz is an instructor at Johnson & Wales University in Providence, Rhode Island. Ciril received his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at the Rhode Island School of Design, where he majored in Industrial Design with a concentration in Ceramics. After completing his studies, he moved back to his native Switzerland where he completed his three-year apprenticeship as a Pastry Chef/Chocolatier. While in Europe, he attended various classes in Switzerland and France to further develop his skills as a pastry chef. He returned to America in 1994 where he worked in various positions in the pastry industry before eventually joining Johnson & Wales in 1997. Ciril has been recognized with numerous awards and accomplishments, both in the industry and as a faculty member at Johnson & Wales. He had the honor of being chosen to represent the USA as a 2002 Bread Bakers’ Guild Team member in the Artistic Category and competed at the Coupe du Monde de la Boulangerie, Paris, France, where the Team took the Silver medal. Other awards include; Three-time winner of the Grand Prize for Buffet Presentation at the NY Food Show; the Rising Star Award: the Publishing & Research Award; Les Amis d’Escoiffier Chair, all of which are special recognition awards through Johnson & Wales University. In his spare time Ciril enjoys working in his ceramic studio, where he continues his creative approach with the dough-like characteristics of clay. He sees no division between creating art and food and loves the challenge of working with the fermentation process within the life cycle of bread. His work has been featured on the NBC Today Show as well as The Food Network’s “The Best Bread in the World,” a feature documentary covering the entire Coupe du Monde de la Boulangerie Competition in Paris, France. |
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| Tom Gumpel | Gerry Newman | |
| Craig Ponsford | Christy Timon | Tom Vaccaro |
| Lionel Vatinet | ||
Tom Gumpel brings a lifelong passion for baking and 20 years of culinary experience to his position as director of bakery development for Panera Bread. He was drawn to Panera Bread by the opportunity to deliver handcrafted artisan breads and baked goods to customers across the country while helping to cultivate a national bread culture that celebrates the experiences of baking and sharing great bread. Tom’s responsibilities at Panera Bread include: evaluating and enhancing current bread offerings; overseeing the development of new bread varieties and bread-based menu items; and driving efforts to create a strong internal culture through recruitment and professional development programs for bakers. Renowned as one of the nation’s top baking experts, Tom is a certified master baker and previously served as associate dean for curriculum and instruction for baking and pastry arts at The Culinary Institute of America (CIA). Tom joined the CIA faculty in 1995, where he taught baking and pastry arts in the college's degree programs, as well as developed customized programs for culinary professionals at both the college's main campus in Hyde Park, N.Y. and at Greystone, the CIA's continuing education branch in St. Helena, Calif. A 1986 alumnus of the CIA, Tom also holds a bachelor’s degree from Empire State College. He took additional advanced pastry courses from the International Pastry Arts Center in Elmsford, N.Y. Tom’s previous experience includes positions as corporate pastry chef for I.T.B. Restaurant Corp. in Greenwich, Conn.; Gardner Merchant Food Services in Trumbull, Conn.; and Bayview Hotel Corp., St. Petersburg, Fla. He also worked as a pastry chef in Florida and as a bread baker in San Francisco and Oslo, Norway. In 1999, Tom received international acclaim when he served as captain of the U.S. Baking Team that captured the grand prize at the prestigious Coupe du Monde de la Boulangerie (World Cup of Baking). His success in the competition was featured in People, USA Today, The New York Times, and on ABC's World News Tonight. He also was a member of the 1992 Culinary Olympic team that won a bronze medal at the International Culinary Olympics in Frankfurt, Germany. His passion for baking extends beyond his professional career into his home in the Hudson Valley. His bakery, appropriately named “Hidden Brick Bread,” is located in a refurbished barn on his home’s property. It contains a brick oven he built by hand, various baking tools and stainless steel tables. Tom bakes each weekend with his wife and daughter and holds occasional bread baking classes for local residents. Tom was the lead author on the CIA’s “Baking and Pastry: Mastering the Art and Craft (2003),” an instructional book for professional bakers. The book was adapted for at-home bakers and renamed “Baking at Home with The Culinary Institute of America (2004).” Tom serves on the advisory board of the Bread Bakers Guild of America. |
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Jeffrrey Hamelman judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Jeffrey Hamelman has been a baker since 1976. He is the Director of the bakery at the King Arthur Flour Company in Norwich, Vermont, and is also the instructor of the professional baking classes at the King Arthur Flour Baking Education Center. He is the author of Bread: A Baker’s Book of Techniques and Recipes. |
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Gerry Newman started his baking career in 1981 apprenticing under a Swiss Master Baker in Seal Beach, California. After three and a half years of training, he then moved to the San Francisco Bay Area and for the next six years worked at a number of fine bread bakeries and pastry shops. Wanting to learn more, Gerry moved to Virginia and worked at The Homestead Resort before taking the job has Executive Pastry Chef at The Boars’ Head Inn in Charlottesville, Virginia. After five years, Gerry and his wife Millie Carson saw a need for a high quality bakery in Charlottesville. They opened Albemarle Baking Company in the winter of 1995. In the last 13 years, the bakery has earned a reputation for great products, fair prices, and personal service. Customers drive over an hour for breads, cakes and pastries. In 2006 Gerry, along with Pastry Chef Riki Tanabe, competed in the National Bread and Pastry Team Championship. They finished third, winning best bread degustation and best viennoiserie degustation. When he is not baking, Gerry enjoys time with his wife and three children and is an avid cyclist. |
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Craig graduated from the California Culinary Academy in 1991, and in 1992 opened Artisan Bakers of Sonoma, CA with the support of his family. Over the years he has grown Artisan from a mom-and-pop bakery to a wildly successful and well-respected retail and wholesale bakery. Craig currently serves as the chairman of the Board of Directors for The Bread Bakers Guild of America. He has devoted much of his time and energy to the goal of education in artisan baking, especially work with Bread Bakers Guild Team USA for the Coupe du Monde de la Boulangerie. After attending the first Coupes in 1992 and 1994, he worked to earn himself a spot on the 1996 team. That year Ponsford won the USA's first gold medal for his performance in the Baguette and Specialty Bread category. In 1999, he was enlisted as Team Coach, and helped to bring home the gold again for the US. Craig served as Team Manager to the 2002 Team, when the US won silver and co-Manager for the 2008 team. He has served on the jury for the Coupe du Monde in 2002 and 2005, as well as at the South American Louis LeSaffre Cup in 2007. |
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Christy founded Clear Flour Bread in Brookline, Massachusetts in1983 in response to persistent requests for regular production of the naturally leavened breads she made at her catering business. The bakery grew to include a range of specialty breads and Vienoisserie. 25 years later, Christy enjoys the daily challenges running the bakery, including acquainting her customers with the pleasure, hard work, and alchemical mix of science and finesse involved in transforming flour, water and yeast, into bread and pastry. Christy has been recognized nationally as a pioneer in the American renaissance of the production of the hand crafted, authentic, breads of Europe. She uses the platform of her bakery to elevate the level of baking skills in America and is proud to report that many former employees have gone on to open critically acclaimed bakeries around the country. These bakery “alumni” turn out new and exciting lines of bread and pastry, along with traditional products of the highest standards, furthering the growth of neighborhood bakeries where food is produced as locally as possible to where it is consumed, in an open manner that engages customers in understanding how their food is made. Christy has been the subject of articles on artisan baking in magazines at home and abroad. She has been honored with awards, for both her business model and her products, most recently by being recognized as the BEST OF BOSTON® by Boston Magazine for 2005, 2006, and 2007. Christy teaches baking at Boston University’s Program in the Culinary Arts. In 2008 she is teaching master classes for The Bread Bakers Guild of America’s North American Tour 2008: Women of the Guild series. |
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Tom Vaccaro judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Thomas Vaccaro is Associate Dean for Curriculum and Instruction for Baking and Pastry Arts at The Culinary Institute of America (CIA). Chef Vaccaro is responsible for developing the college’s baking and pastry arts curriculum, monitoring food quality and cost, evaluating faculty, and fostering student development. A 1985 alumnus of the CIA, Chef Vaccaro joined the college’s administration in 2005. He returned to his alma mater from Atlantic City, where he was executive pastry chef at the Trump Plaza Hotel & Casino. He was also executive pastry chef at the Waldorf=Astoria in New York City and Trump’s Taj Mahal and Tropworld Casino and Entertainment Resort in Atlantic City. Vaccaro is a Certified Executive Pastry Chef (C.E.P.C.). He was the American Culinary Federation’s National Pastry Chef of the Year in 2004. He coached the U.S. Culinary Team to gold medals in the 2000 and 2004 Culinary Olympics in Erfurt, Germany and earned a perfect score in the pastry competition as the team’s pastry chef at the 1992 Culinary Olympics. Throughout his illustrious career, Vaccaro has earned gold medals in competitions around the world, including Scotland (2001), Switzerland (1993 and 1999), Chicago (1992 and 1999), Orlando (1998), New York (1990, 1996 and 1997), and London (1992). A native of Belleville, NJ, Chef Vaccaro is a member and former vice president of the South Jersey Professional Chefs Association. He is the chef coordinator of fundraisers for the Ruth Newman Shapiro Cancer Society. |
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Lionel Vatinet judicial panel / pastry panel / bread panel Master Baker Lionel Vatinet opened La Farm Bakery in Cary, NC in 1999 (4248 Cary Parkway, Cary, NC 27513); there he produces 15 different styles of breads, and an additional 20 seasonal breads throughout the year using a European hearth oven. Vatinet emerged from France’s prestigious “Les Compagnons du Devoir” in 1990 with the distinguished and hard-earned title of Maitre Boulanger (Master Baker), and pledged to devote his life to teaching, sharing and preserving the ancient art and science of bread baking. Since, Vatinet has consulted for many of the most well known artisanal bread brands in the US, and abroad, and was the founding instructor at San Francisco Baking Institute. La Farm Bakery is a realization of Vatinet’s life long dream – a modern bakery that continues the centuries-old baking traditions and techniques, honoring the ordinary yet extraordinary boulangeries that once flourished in every little town in France. Vatinet and his breads have been featured at the James Beard House, in O Magazine, Food & Wine, Celebrated Living, Pastry Art & Design, in Maggie Glezer’s James Beard award winning book, “Artisan Baking: Baking By Hand, The Recipes, The People, The Science” (Workman Publishing, 2000), and his cookies were featured on the “Rachael Ray Show.” Vatinet continues to lend his expertise, consulting for bakeries around the US, teaching at SFBI and serving on the Advisory Board for the culinary program at Wake Technical Community College and participating with the Bread Bakers Guild of America. Experience the taste of hundreds of years of French cuisine at La Farm Bakery. www.lafarmbakery.com
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