Stella Parks
Stella Parks | |
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Born | Kentucky |
Stella Parks is an American pastry chef and food writer based in Kentucky. She has worked in various Lexington-area restaurants, notably Table 310, and was a longtime contributor to Serious Eats. Parks received a James Beard Foundation Award in 2018 for her bestselling cookbook BraveTart: Iconic American Desserts.
Early life and education[]
Stella Parks was born in Kentucky, where she grew up in Versailles.[1][2] She began working in restaurants at the age of 14.[3]
Immediately after graduating high school, Parks left to study at the Culinary Institute of America.[4][3] She graduated in 2002 from the school's baking and pastry program.[1][5]
Restaurant career[]
Parks worked in a variety of restaurants in the Lexington, Kentucky, area, including Wallace Station and the Holly Hill Inn.[6] She also spent time in Tokyo, moving there to study Japanese as part of a self-described "quarter-life crisis."[5]
In 2010, she was hired to work at the new Lexington restaurant Table 310 as its pastry chef.[5][2] In 2012, she was named one of America's Best New Pastry Chefs by Food & Wine magazine in recognition of her work at Table 310.[7]
Writing[]
As part of a project with a photographer friend, Parks started her food blog BraveTart in 2010.[2][8] A year later, she began writing a "BraveTart" column at the food website Serious Eats. She became a longtime contributor to the publication, where she served as a senior editor and was dubbed the website's "pastry wizard," though she has continued to be based in Lexington.[8][9][10] After contributing to Serious Eats from 2011 to 2019, with three years as its pastry editor, Parks became editor emeritus at the site.[11]
Parks's work combines baking, history, and science.[12][13] She is known for developing precise, complex recipes that often elevate American childhood favorite desserts through copycat recipes.[14][3][9]
In 2017, Parks published her debut cookbook, BraveTart: Iconic American Desserts.[15] She spent six years working on the book, which involved archival research as well as recipe testing.[12] The cookbook celebrates iconic American desserts and explores the history of the commercial food industry's influence on home baking.[8][16] The BraveTart cookbook became a New York Times bestseller and was well received by critics.[4] It was described as "the most groundbreaking book on baking in years" by Saveur and "one of the greatest dessert books of our time" by Bon Appétit.[1][17] In 2018, Parks's BraveTart: Iconic American Desserts won a James Beard Foundation Award for Best Baking and Dessert Book.[18]
References[]
- ^ a b c Craddock, Kat (2019-03-22). "BraveTart is the Best Baking Book We've Seen in Years". Saveur. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ a b c Hilliard, Emily (2013-03-18). "Give Me Some Sugar: Getting to Know Stella Parks". Southern Living. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ a b c Hoffman, Maggie (2012-01-12). "Get to Know Us: Stella Parks, BraveTart". Serious Eats. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ a b "Stella Parks: Pastry Wizard". Serious Eats. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ a b c "Stella Parks". Kentucky Women Writers Conference. 2012. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ Rosen, Kristina (2020-10-21). "Chefpreneur Ouita Michel announces her first-ever cookbook". Ace Weekly. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
- ^ Brion, Raphael (2012-02-15). "Food & Wine's Best New Pastry Chefs 2012 Announced". Eater. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
- ^ a b c Crowley, Chris (2017-08-14). "A Baking Book That Celebrates the Science of Junk Food". Grub Street. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
- ^ a b Lower, Claire (2019-03-14). "I'm Pastry Chef Stella Parks, and This Is How I Eat". Skillet. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ "Masthead". Serious Eats. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ "Stella Parks: Editor Emeritus for Serious Eats". Serious Eats. Retrieved 2021-05-25.
- ^ a b Patton, Janet (2017-07-25). "American desserts celebrated in new cookbook by Lexington baker". Lexington Herald-Leader. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ Moussa, Adam (2020-05-28). "I'm Baking the Hell Out of This Quarantine Thanks to 'BraveTart'". Eater. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
- ^ Craddock, Kat (2017-09-07). "Bravetart's Stella Parks on How Corporate Marketing Invented American Dessert". Saveur. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ Parks, Stella (2017). BraveTart : iconic American desserts. Santos, Penny de los, López-Alt, J. Kenji. (First ed.). New York. ISBN 978-0-393-23986-7. OCLC 959875767.
- ^ Black, Jane (2017-07-25). "'BraveTart' is packed with clever upgrades of baking classics". Washington Post. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ Beggs, Alex (2019-05-01). "May's Cookbook Club Pick Is BraveTart, One of the Greatest Dessert Books of Our Time". Bon Appétit. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ JBF Editors (2018-04-27). "The 2018 James Beard Media Award Winners". James Beard Foundation. Retrieved 2020-11-14.
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- Living people
- American women chefs
- Culinary Institute of America alumni
- Pastry chefs
- Chefs from Kentucky
- James Beard Foundation Award winners
- People from Versailles, Kentucky
- 21st-century American women