How Malaysian pastry chefs became the best in the world

On January 28 this year, a team of Malaysian pastry chefs made history when they were crowned champions at the Coupe du Monde de la Pâtisserie (or World Pastry Cup) 2019 in Lyon, France – the first time that Malaysia has ever bagged the top spot in the 30-year-old competition.

But for the people behind the win, Malaysia’s rise to the top has been part of a concerted, nearly decade-long effort to cultivate and enhance the skills of local pastry chefs. The win was just the icing on the cake.

How it started

At the Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia in Petaling Jaya, a class is in session. Pastry chef Tan Wei Loon’s brows are furrowed in concentration as he moulds a distinctive Elvis bouffant on a cake shaped like a monkey. Around him, eager students watch in rapt attention. Some have travelled as far as Egypt and Hong Kong to attend this class.

In the background stands Niklesh Sharma, the founder of the academy and a proud papa if ever there was one. “Tan might have won the World Pastry Cup but he’s still teaching others. That’s the culture that we’ve nurtured here,” says Niklesh, smiling.

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When Niklesh founded the Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia, he also introduced the Asian Pastry Forum, which was instrumental in elevating the quality of local pastry chefs. Photo: The Star/Sam Tham

Indeed, the Academy of Pastry Arts has been instrumental in the Malaysian team’s win. Two of the three competing members of the team – Tan and Loi Ming Ai are chef-trainers at the academy while third teammate Otto Tay previously worked at the academy before going abroad to become a pastry consultant. The fourth member of the team is team coach Patrick Siau, head chef at the School of Hospitality, Sunway University.

All attest to the role that the academy has played in elevating the quality of local pastry chefs in the past decade. This in part has to do with the institution’s annual Asian Pastry Forum.

When Niklesh first established the Academy of Pastry Arts eight years ago, he knew he had to do something to set it apart if he wanted to churn out world-class pastry chefs. So he decided to start the Asian Pastry Forum, a nearly month-long yearly affair that sees international (and often award-winning) pastry chefs coming to Malaysia to conduct workshops and classes.

This, in a large part, spurred the success of many local pastry chefs as year after year, they were able to learn from some of the best in the world and apply new knowledge and skills to their own creations.

The trajectory of success

To compete at the World Pastry Cup, contestants first have to compete in a national qualifier. The top three contestants move on to the Asian Pastry Cup, which is held in Singapore. The winners of this competition subsequently qualify for the World Pastry Cup.

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Just one of the beautiful creations Malaysian pastry chefs are capable of producing. Photo: Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia

According to Niklesh, the Singaporean team was often the one people looked up to in South-East Asia, but over the years, this has changed as Malaysian pastry chefs have picked up pace, a fact that became clearer when they nabbed fourth place in the 2015 edition of the World Pastry Cup.

“We have a fantastic platform for pastry chefs now, and it’s not a fluke that we won. We have been consistently doing it from 2015, so everybody knew that Malaysia was getting closer,” says Niklesh.

But the road to success is paved with obstacles and the team knows this only too well. Siau himself competed in a 2011 edition of the World Pastry Cup with little success while for Tan and Tay, the 2019 edition was their third time in the competition arena. Loi is the only member of the team who had never competed in the World Pastry Cup before.

“The first time Tay and Tan competed in 2013, Tan’s sugar sculpture fell apart at the last minute. So there were some bad memories but it was really very good motivation for him – he wanted to come back,” says Siau.

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Siau himself competed in a previous edition of the World Pastry Cup and says even in this edition, the Malaysian team was considered an underdog. Photo: Sunway University

Tan learnt from that mistake and bounced back, even taking on the role of team coach in the 2017 edition of the competition (the team coach also acts as a judge and is able to taste the desserts of all the other competing teams).

“The reason I wanted to be the coach was so I would have a chance to taste what other countries made. So this time, we were actually very well prepared, because we knew the judging criteria and what we needed to do in order to be champions,” says Tan.

To prepare for the competition, the team did at least 15 full-scale trials, each one lasting about 13 hours from prep to culmination, as each of the three contestants were tasked with a category – sugar, chocolate and ice. This year, they also had to make a totally vegan dessert.

By the time they got to the competition, the team was wired and ready to go although Siau says they were probably not perceived as the biggest threat in the competition.

“To be frank, when we were there, we seemed like the underdogs,” he says.

But as the competition progressed, it soon dawned on them that they were very likely to be in the top three at least. “Most judges praised the vegan cake (the famed Elvis monkey cake), so we knew we had a chance,” says Siau.

And when the winners were announced and team Malaysia won the whole competition, it was the culmination of years of learning, practising and putting one foot in front of the other and moving forward.

The state of things

Although there is plenty of reason to celebrate, in many ways, the fact that Malaysia now has the best pastry chefs in the world has created a bit of a conundrum.

In other pastry-prominent countries like France and Japan, there is a long-held culture of eating and appreciating pastry in all its shapes and forms, from croissants to petit fours, eclairs and madeleines. So the role and growth of pastry chefs has risen alongside a culture that has existed for ages (in France, this dates back to the 13th century).

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In France, there is a long-standing culture of eating pastry regularly, which is not the norm in Malaysia. Photo: Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia

But in Malaysia, this culture does not really exist as Malaysians simply aren’t used to eating these French-style pastries regularly.

What this essentially means is there is now a wide lacuna between the Malaysian consumer who may not yet appreciate these desserts and talented Malaysian pastry chefs raring to flex their creative muscles.

It is interesting simply because the quality of local pastry chefs has surged and soared, producing talent that is unmistakable, yet there is no sustained consumer interest in what they do. In economic terms, there is supply but simply no demand.

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Loi (left) and Tan are ecstatic about their win and now plan to spread more awareness about pastry to pastry students in Malaysia. Photo: The Star/Sam Tham

“Actually, Malaysia is kind of a special case, because for competitions, yes, we are considered one of the very strong teams, especially from South-East Asia. So when we go for competitions, people recognise us. But it’s a little bit different because the Malaysian market for pastry is not there yet,” agrees Tan.

Siau concurs and adds that there simply aren’t enough Malaysian consumers who have an appetite for the sort of complicated French pastry that local pastry chefs are capable of producing.

“In terms of appreciation of French-style pastry in Malaysia, it’s still very low. Like the chocolate cake that we make is very chocolatey and has very little sponge and most of the people here like thick sponge and less filling, so it’s the other way around. So it takes time for us to change people’s perception,” he says.

Then there is the price tag associated with these desserts, which are admittedly on the higher side for most consumers. “If you pay RM20, you can get a decent meal but you also need to pay around RM20 for good pastry, which not many people will do,” says Tan.

According to Niklesh, when visiting pastry chefs come to Malaysia, they often think the country has an abundance of good pastry shops, a natural assumption given that Malaysians are now the best pastry chefs in the world.

“They always ask us for recommendations for good pastry shops and there are very few options. In fact, two of the French pastry shops that we knew of closed. It’s not good news because they were doing some version of what we’re teaching. It could be many reasons – pricing, taste – but Malaysians as a whole are still taking time to develop a taste for French pastry. It’s coming up, but slowly,” says Niklesh.

Look out for part 2 of this story tomorrow on Star2.com.