Local chefs seek the sweet life

By Ginger Yang
STAFF REPORTER
Sunday, Apr 23, 2006, Page 18

To be a top chef you've got to be prepared to compete with the best. That's exactly what Taiwanese chefs Jason Tsai (蔡捷中) and Lee Yi-hsi (李依錫) have done by winning the Open de France de Dessert 2006 in Paris last month. Their victory is a necessary part of qualifying for the highest honor for pastry chefs, the Coupe du Monde de la Patisserie, which will take place next January. The two chefs took away the National Team Award and medals for Best Chocolate Cake and Best Sugar Art Design.

Open de France de Dessert requires contestants to complete two different kinds of pastry within five hours, a relatively short time for pastry-making. Gabriel Paillasson, who founded the contest, said that judges look for a sense of style and creativity in the work.

Tsai, 31, a chef at Taipei's Far Eastern Plaza Hotel, won with his Oolong Chocolate dessert. Lee, 29, who is a chef with the Tayih Landis Hotel (大億麗緻酒店) in Taichung, picked up the prize for making his sugar butterfly fly on his chocolate cake. Chief judge, Pierre Herme, regarded as the godfather of French pastry, gave the work of both chefs the thumbs up.

During the competition, Tsai and Lee collaborated with each other perfectly. "We were abroad, making pastry in insufficient time, the best pastry chefs in Paris grading us, and we still had to smile in front of the cameras -- that was awesome," Lee said. It was all came down to team work, and Tsai and Lee said their victory would not have been possible otherwise.

Top, Jason Tsai, left, and Lee Yi-hsi work on their creations during the Open de France de Dessert 2006 in Paris last month; above, Jason Tsai, right, and Lee Yi-hsi, left, receive the award for the Open de France de Dessert 2006 in Paris last month; left, Lee Yi-hsi's winning sugar art entry. PHOTOS COURTESY OF LI YI-HSI

Back in Taiwan, Tsai hopes his winning cake, Oolong Choc, will delight local customers. Oolong tea is familiar to locals but it has rarely been used as an ingredient in cakes. Although the cake won him the prize in Paris, Tsai said he has paid a heavy price for victory. He threw away many "imperfect cakes" after tasting them. "I was getting fat preparing for the contest," said Tsai, patting his belly.

"I experimented on the flavor for three months," he said. "I just couldn't find the right balance among the ingredients. After nearly 30 attempts, I finally found the right mixture for the filling."

Finding balance is always his challenge. Tsai says he wants people eating his cake to experience several distinct phases in the taste. "At first, it is soft and sweet. Then you discover a slight sourness, but this becomes sweet again, with the addition of a crispy texture," he said.

Unlike Tsai's chocolate cake, Lee's sugar art is not for eating. Fine work with sugar needs great skill, and virtuoso pieces are used at important functions, such as state dinners. A single 20cm piece of sugar art can cost upward of NT$8,000, and Lee is regarded as one of the most skilled practi-tioners of this culinary art form.

Having won more than five gold medals for sugar art in France, Japan, Hong Kong and Taiwan, Lee has set his sights on winning the Coupe du Monde de la Patisserie next January, the highest honor for a pastry chef. "I hope I can at least squeeze into the top 10," he said.

Tsai and Lee have put in considerable time, money and effort in training themselves to this level of mastery. While many children take years to make their career choices, both Tsai and Lee knew at high school that they wanted to be chefs and invested heavily in obtaining the best training money could buy in Switzerland and France.

Lee said that training to be an artist working in sugar cost him over NT$3 million and has given him blisters on his fingers.

Working with sugar, he must handle hot sugar syrup. But he said that to create a work of art, he can overlook the pain.

One of Lee's prize-winning works is a statue of an eagle. "To make it, I bought photo collections of birds. The eagle had hundreds of plumes. I shaped each one separately," he said. "Ambition is important to a man. Life is short. I have to do something different to satisfy myself -- maybe to satisfy my vanity."