Interview

Positive by Instinct to Face Challenges!

Chef Abhinav Singh, Pastry Chef, Hyatt Regency Dehradun

Chef Abhinav Singh, the Pastry Chef at Hyatt Regency Dehradun, personifies great attention to detail and creativity. With an in-depth knowledge of sanitation principles, food preparation and baking techniques and nutrition, the chef brings the most mesmerizing breads, pastries and cakes at the hotel. His ethos as a proud baker is that the different varieties of flour used in baking makes all the difference. He follows basic food chronology, focusing on contemporary style baking techniques in the kitchen. In 2012, Chef Singh set foot in the culinary world at Hyatt Bangalore as a Commis Chef in bakery and pastry department. He then joined Taj Lake Palace Udaipur, Crowne Plaza Jaipur, Novotel Pune and Double Tree Ahmedabad and later Conrad Bengaluru before joining Hyatt Regency Dehradun. During his free time, chef loves to drive around and explore undiscovered routes, listening music. As a pet lover, he enjoys spending time with his pet. In an exclusive interview with Sharmila Chand, he talks about his work philosophy and more…..

What are the current hot trends in Indian Bakery industry?

People are opting for healthy food that also includes vegan, sugar free and gluten free breads as well as pastries without hampering the taste and richness of product is in trend right now.

How did you become a Pastry Chef? You were interested or by default?

I belong to Lucknow and I am a big time foodie, I always wanted to be an Indian master chef but after doing hotel management course I have been placed in bakery and pastry and since then I am working on learning skills of pastry.

What is your working (Cooking) philosophy?

Keep it simple; follow basics of baking, guests will love your creations.

What are your Hot Selling bakery items?

I love Dark chocolate, so I keep churning products using it - Magnums, Opera torte and bonbons in pastry. In breads category, I love to create flavours in croissants while sour dough bread remains one of my top selling item.

What is the demand these days in Bakery?

Sugar free desserts, breads made with healthy ingredients and millet items are in demand.

What about the health quotient? How do you take care of that aspect?

I personally don’t believe in artificial flavours in pastry, I love making my own purees and compote to flavour my pastries and in bread we use multiple healthy flours including rye, and ragi flour.

Learnings to be a successful Bakery Chef?

Update your self- In bakery trends are changing throughout, so it is important to keep yourself updated with latest bakery trends and follow it in your regular practice.

Training- When group of chefs works together it is important to train them so that your quality of products doesn’t go down.

Sourcing product- It is very important you source right product from market which is actually required to make your dessert taste good, there are so many artificial products available in market.

What do you like about your job?

I love the fact that there is no limit to what you can create in bakery arena. From baking to presenting, I get the feel of an artist who gets engrossed in his work to make the canvas outstanding and better than the last attempt. Also I like to combat new challenges that we chefs face every day.

What is your strength as a bakery chef?

Respecting my team fellows, believing in myself and the thirst to keep on learning, are my strengths.

What are you passionate about besides baking?

I love going on long drives, explore unexplored terrains on solo trips.

How do you like to de-stress?

Nothing better than spending time with my family with good food and music.

What are your dreams?

I would like to see my name amongst the renowned pastry chefs of India.

What is your Mantra for success?

Keep on learning and never go slow on hard work and trying new stuff.

Your favourite ingredient?

Chocolate, Chocolate and Chocolate. Trust me you can do wonders with it in terms of creativity, sculpturing, making desserts and what not.

Your fav chef who has influenced you and inspired you the most?

Since childhood I have seen chefs like Sanjeev Kapoor, and I think he was the first one to inspire me to cook something for my parents when I was 10 years old.

What do you personally like to eat as your fav comfort food?

It has to be homemade North Indian style food.