Chase Tse Ka-wai is the pastry sous chef at the Sheraton Hong Kong Hotel and Towers. She started off as a student baking for her classmates and old people."In high school, I took economics and learned how to cook and bake cakes. One time, my classmates and I volunteered to make cookies for the elderly and we chipped in to buy an oven; I kept it at home as I was in charge of baking. The seniors liked them.
"I felt like I had achieved something. If my cakes or cookies didn't work out, then I didn't take them to school and gave them to my dad to eat instead. He didn't mind.""I didn't have the grades to get into university, so I applied for the pastry course at the Vocational Training Council. My dad was very open-minded and let me pursue this path.
"During my time there, I got promoted twice, the second time to open a shop in Yoho Mall, in Yuen Long [in the New Territories]. While I learned about the challenges of opening a shop, the business side is not really for me; I prefer focusing on making desserts. "I prefer chocolate. Fondant is like plastic, where you can cover up mistakes, but handling chocolate requires skill. It's hard at first, learning to temper it and make it smooth, whereas there is not much technique involved with fondant.
"When I was in high school, I wanted to work at the famous hotels like The Peninsula, Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental. And then I had the opportunity to work at the Mandarin Oriental and forgot this was my dream. It was my dad or older sister who reminded me.