Copyright Baton Rouge Advocate
Alyx Abreu's first foray into competitive TV baking has landed her in the middle of a sugary, showy red and green wonderland. After two weeks of eliminations, Abreu and now nine other "Holiday Baking Championship" contestants from around the country still have hopes of reaching the finale and pocketing the $25,000 grand prize. Food Network transformed its competition kitchen into the aforementioned wonderland, a winter village, for the series' 10th season. Abreu and the other bakers saw their workspaces and soaked in their merry surroundings in the show's premiere on Nov. 3. "You go into that space knowing that there's gonna be a kitchen there, and it's gonna be sort of holiday-themed, but genuinely, walking into it and seeing a winter village was so astounding," Abreu, a New Jersey native and New Orleans transplant, said by phone on Nov. 6. "I really didn't even know what to expect, and it just blew away any expectations that I might have had." In a first for the holiday series, the bakers were divided into two teams — "Nice" and "Naughty." Warm and toasty desserts and chilly and frosty treats, respectively, followed by an edible holiday village that included a dessert from each of them were the Episode 1 challenges, while this week, the teams whipped up mocktails and cocktails, and then were tasked with creating meringue-based desserts that appear as either cheerful or cheeky. Abreu, 34, makes meringue-based and other desserts and breads on the daily as executive pastry chef at French Quarter fine dining landmark Arnaud's. During an afternoon lull, she took time for a quick Q&A with this newspaper. This conversation was edited for length and clarity. Tell us a little bit about your decision to move to Louisiana. I lived in Boston for a little over 10 years before moving to New Orleans. I had been working with a restaurant group for some time, and we mutually decided that we were looking for different things. So I applied to a hotel down here in New Orleans, kind of on a whim, and things moved extremely quickly. New Orleans has always been a place that I've wanted to live, so getting the opportunity to realize that dream through hard work was really a dream come true. I've been here three or four years (with husband Richard Larro). I was hired on at Hotel Saint Vincent as their executive pastry chef. After about a year-and-a-half, I was able to move on to Arnaud's. They had a really wonderful opportunity, so I had to jump at that. How did you get into baking, and why did you decide to concentrate on pastry? I know a lot of people have stories about baking with their grandparents or their parents, and my parents and grandparents were not those kinds of people. My love of baking came from high school. We were allowed to do baked projects for certain things, so for history, we were able to do cookies from whatever time period or what have you. I really loved making the baked goods, making cookies or cakes and decorating them. I thought, "Maybe this is something I want to do for a living." I had been tossing around things like being a tattoo artist and giving my mother a heart attack. I think she was very delighted to hear that I would be doing something a little bit more level. … My passion kept coming back to pastry. I love the science of it. I love the methodology of it. I love the fact that if you do it exactly the way the recipe says, you're gonna get the same results every time. It's a labor of love. Do you have a pastry specialty? I always say it's a little bit of everything. I'm so terrified of becoming a one-trick pony that I always want to try out making anything that I can. Every job that I've worked has given me an opportunity to hyperfocus on one thing specifically. So the hotel was bread, and at that point I was making all kinds of different breads. It was my favorite thing to make in the world. The job before that was ice cream. Here at Arnaud's, we're really experimenting with entrees, cakes and different flavors that we can really introduce. So my specialty is just getting people to try new and different things. What's a typical day for you at Arnaud's? A typical day usually starts at about 5 in the morning. I get to work anywhere between 6 a.m. and 6:30 a.m., and from there it's going through the line, seeing what sold last night, building out a production list for myself and my assistants and checking the quality on everything that is left over. And then a cup of coffee, obviously. Any of our baked projects have to happen first, obviously negotiating time and space with the other people in the kitchen to use the oven. Usually anything that's baked goes in first; mousses, sauces, things like that happen afterward. Baked Alaska, which we make fresh every single day, usually happens around the end of the day, as well as some of our other a little bit more complicated items. A lot of the day is negotiating time and space, whether that's the oven or the stove top, making sure that my staff feels supported, that if they need help with anything, I'm there to help. But I'm right there in the weeds with them. On any given day, we can be cranking out 30 baked Alaskas, a bunch of cakes and 150 crème brûlées. Are you a Christmas person in general? I'm a holidays person. Working in the culinary industry, the holidays tend to have a little bit of a different meaning for us. It's our busy season. There's a lot of hustle and bustle, but what's really nice is that there's also that sense of togetherness. So I really love that Christmas brings everybody together and gives that jolly feeling even when it's crazy busy. Even when we're working insane hours, it's still Christmas and everybody still needs to be nice to each other. Speaking of challenging, what would you say was your biggest challenge while in the Food Network competition? Not doubting myself. I've been doing this for a long time. I've been in kitchens in the culinary industry for almost 18 years, so trying not to second-guess myself because there are so many other people also there competing with the same experience and, oftentimes quite a bit more experience. It's just trying not to be intimidated by all of the skill sets around me. You were already used to working with a time limit, right? Very, very used to it. I'm very organized, and time management is one of those things that I very much pride myself on. Anytime that I do a tasting for anyone, if I'm looking at a new job and they tell me I have "X" amount, I make a list of minute-by-minute what should be getting done. So the time limit didn't even affect me for the most part.
