Once happy cake baker here. My delicious carrot cake made at North West Culinary Academy of Vancouver, June 2014.
So I did it, I finally registered for pastry school and made a life long dream come true. After a big career change and transition out out of a 10 year Communications and Marketing career, I enrolled in pastry school and completed my program in August 2014. It was a big decision but not a hard one to be honest. You can read the post I wrote about going to pastry school to learn more about this experience.
My name is Jeanette LeBlanc and I am the author of Beyond The Dough. Welcome and thank you for reading my blog. This blog was conceived in 2010 when I realized my intense passions and curiosity for people, what they do and why, writing stories, and most importantly – the food industry (particularly in Vancouver, BC). I wanted to go beyond the dough, and find the story behind the people in the industry. So, I started meeting people and hearing their stories to write about what they do in Vancouver’s food community. I loved it. My first summer of blogging was the BEST summer. Over the years that followed my posts leavened more into sharing some of my own culinary creations and sweet inspirations in the kitchen or general food experiences.
Fast forward to 2014, and I am now one of those people I used to interview. Over the summer of 2014 , I trained at the Northwest Culinary Academy of Vancouver in their professional Pastry and Bread Making program. One day, I aspire to share my own baked goods with my community.
I am a BC girl, born and raised, and love the west coast. I also love to bake, which you’ve likely gathered by now! But I also enjoy running, hiking and other good things in life, but generally I think about baking when I’m doing those other things.
Baking has been a passion of mine for as long as I can remember.
Now, I invite you to follow my journey through the baking world and beyond the dough. I promise to share as many delicious photos as I can, and even some coveted recipes from time to time.
I believe following your passion is super important. On that note, I leave you with a quote from the great Julia Child:
The measure of achievement is not winning awards. It’s doing something that you appreciate, something you believe is worthwhile. I think of my strawberry souffle. I did that at least twenty-eight times before I finally conquered it. ~ Julia Child
August 2010: My debut as a cake maker, for my friend’s backyard wedding. I baked her cake and 200 cupcakes single handedly from home. It was an operation – that I would do again in a heartbeat!
My first week of pastry school at the Northwest Culinary Academy of Vancouver, 2014. Brand new white uniforms!
Beyond The Dough 
Love the site! I am only a foodie of the eating variety!
Wow, finally checked out this site. I enjoy food and cooking, but don’t have enough time to fully explore it. This is a great site that has forced me to reconsider my lazy, quickly-inhale-while-trying-not-to-consider-the consequences attitude towards food. More please Lady J!
Thank you! I enjoy every minute of the site, and glad I can inspire anyone to want to cook better 🙂 You are a great cook too!!!
What a great site you have!
I love love love that you made 200 amazing cupcakes for your friend!
My company is Rodelle we make high quality baking products. I am contacting local Vancouver bloggers to inquire if they would like to try our products. To be frank, we want to get in touch with “tastemakers” in the baking world and get them to try our products for themselves and if they LOVE it as much as we do, we hope it inspires them to write about us! We really want to expand in the incredible Vancouver area, with it’s amazing food culture, and make an impact with consumers in the next 3 weeks of this holiday time.
We would love to send you a gift basket with our products! Is that something you would be interested in? If so shoot me an email or give me a call, 970-402-1454 (my cell)
My Best,
Deb Lecy
Yes 200 cupcakes was quite the challenge, but it was a sweet one in more ways than one and I loved the idea of baking for my friend. Your product line does look great and of fine quality. I am interested!
Great site Jeanette! I was checking out anything related to the cupcake throwdown and found your article. i am the host of the throwdown and am already pumped for the 2012 edition! i just got a website and am looking for a larger venue to kick it up a notch and raise even more moola. here’s a tease: i’ve got a kitchenaid stand mixer up for raffle!!!! anyways, check it out http://cupcakethrowdown.com it’s brand new so i will be adding date and location as it becomes available. perhaps you’ll bake for it this year? throw it down girl!
steph
Great blog Jeanette! It took me a while to finally check it out, but becoming a blogger myself has inspired me to check out other people’s blogs. It’s a whole new world I’m just discovering! I can see it might take me a year or so to catch up on your blog … but what I’ve seen so far is pretty amazing. Keep it up!
Kaia
I’m a Vancouverite as well (though I live in Ontario for university!) and it’s nice to see another BC girl on the blogosphere 🙂
Indeed, well thank you for reading! If you want more local BC food content too, you should check out Food Bloggers of Canada, there are many more of us 🙂