A Malaysian's Recipe For Success

By Neville D'Cruz ADELAIDE, May 24 (Bernama) -- Take a small boy from a traditional Malaysian Chinese family, add a multitude of tasty delights from his childhood kitchen and you have the ingredients for a top baker. When Lee Fee Sang was growing up in Ipoh (Perak, Malaysia), his mother Leong Chew Ping and aunts would often gather at their home in Ipoh for festive baking sessions that included an infinite range of cakes for family get-togethers and open houses involving the entire clan. Little wonder, then, that Lee developed a fervent interest in food that would take him around the world, learning from top chefs, bakers and patissiers and eventually passing on his knowledge and skills to a new generation of bakers. After Lee completed his Malaysian Certificate of Education back in the mid 70s, he left for Britain to study baking at the Blackpool College of Further Education in Lancashire, although Britain in the 70s was not the best place to nurture nor savour some of Europe's best culinary offerings. "After completing my studies at Blackpool I had the good fortune of meeting up with the baking legend from Switzerland, Helmut Proff who was the Head of School for Liverpool College," Lee said. Helmut put Lee on an apprenticeship in Zurich in the early 80s where the latter attended a number of short professional courses at the world renown Faschule Richemont (Richemont Bakery School) at Lucerne, Switzerland. "Needless to say my passion for baking went beyond the borders of Switzerland. I travelled extensively across Europe with some of my fellow trainees from UK to visit France, Italy, Germany and Belgium to look at various bakeries and specialty products of the region," Lee said. Returning home to Malaysia in the early 80s Lee caught the first wave of hotel and tourism boom in the region. He worked at the Hyatt Kuantan (Pahang, Malaysia) as a chef de partie (pastry Kitchen) before returning to KL working for Fitzpatrick supermarket group as their bakery manager and subsequently established a number of hotbread shops under the banner of Bakers Fare (subsidiary of Fitzpatrick group). With a number of friends in the baking business already working in Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney, Australia, Lee took the plunge in the late 80s and went to Adelaide looking for a more relaxing and family-friendly lifestyle. Lee spent the first six months in Australia working for the famous Lobethal Bakery up in the rustic and tranquil surroundings of Adelaide Hills. He is currently the Education Manager for South Australia's Technical and Further Education (TAFE) College, Bakery Studies and is actively involved in education and development of the baking industry at the national level. -- BERNAMA