Chef gets creative with plastic cookie templates

By Lucy Chabot Reed

Megayacht chef John Rubino got tired of cutting out patterns for his cookies with an Exacto knife and a piece of cardboard.

So he asked a plastics manufacturer to make one that he could use over and over.
Now, in addition to his full-time job as chef aboard M/Y Lady Kathryn III, he’s started a The Pastry Design Group to create his Tuile Time cookie templates.

“I’m not a pastry chef, but out of necessity, I wanted to make desserts that look nice,” Rubino said. “I used to draw out a shape on a cardboard box. Everybody cuts them out, one at a time.”

What started as a little hobby with a pineapple design has risen to 41 designs, including the shaky starburst for M/Y Helios. Other designs include monkeys and sea horses, swooshes and stars, waves and flowers, hearts and leaves. Custom designs are possible as well, he said.

“It’s not a new idea,” he said. “I just researched some plastics manufacturers and sent it to someone to cut it. Now, it’s a business.”

The templates are 11- by 15-inch sheets of thick plastic with the images cut out in repetition. They lie in a cookie sheet and once cookie dough is spread over them, they lift out, leaving perfectly shaped cookies to bake in just a couple minutes.
Seems simple enough. To an outsider, it would seem like the standard sort of equipment every chef has.
But it was unique and interesting enough to catch the eye of leading chefs around the country.

Now the French Culinary Institute in Manhattan wants to use them for chocolates and meringue, so Rubino is working with Teflon to create a template that can handle the heat of an oven.

Rubino still works full time on Lady Kathryn III, a 145-footer based in Palm Beach. He also spent 10 years with the Gallant Lady fleet after getting his start fresh out of culinary school in Boston. He worked on M/Y Savvy Lady in the early 1990s and on M/Y Dorothea.
Married with a 9-year-old daughter, he said he enjoys the mix of home, business and cooking on yachts.

Rubino credits his network of friends and industry contacts with helping him get his business off the ground. About a year ago, just about the time Rubino had created his first template, Albert Uster Jr. was following up with old clients such as Rubino.

During their conversation, Rubino suggested the company might want to put his template in their catalogue. But the Usters planned to move away from offering equipment and more toward offering ingredients, Rubino said.

So the younger Uster referred Rubino to Sebastian Canonne at the French Pastry School in Chicago.

Canonne ordered some, and with that referral, Rubino was able to get the attention of several other well-respected chefs and schools. He says his templates are in use at the French Culinary Institute and the Culinary Institute of America in California.

Johnson & Wales in Rhode Island liked them so much that they ordered them for all their campuses and made them available for purchase in the school stores, he said.

The templates retail for $18 and chefs can find them at Culinary Concepts in Pompano Beach, National Marine Suppliers and Grateful Palate in Ft. Lauderdale, and from www.pastrychef.com.

But don’t be surprised to see Rubino walking the docks whenever you see Lady Kathryn III. He’s been known to drop by and visit his fellow yacht chefs, templates in hand.

This article was published in Earning Your Stripes Career News for Captains & Crews July 2005 issue