“I always thought I would never get one [a tattoo] … but I knew I would never regret that one.”
—Alina Eisenhauer
Alina Eisenhauer’s childhood love of cooking and baking led her to become a successful dessert bar owner and entrepreneur, a competitor on Chopped and Cupcake Wars, and the winner of Sweet Genius, but she didn’t always take the most direct route to success.
Alina took her first restaurant job cooking in her neighbor’s breakfast place when she was thirteen. When she was sixteen, New York’s SoHo restaurant Whole Wheat and Wild Berries opened a location in the nearby Berkshires. Alina decided she wanted to get her foot in the door, so she showed up at the restaurant with a tray of no-bake cheesecake and a chocolate cake and left with a job that would last her through high school. When Alina started college, she left her love of all things culinary behind and began to pursue a career in television and film. However, she soon found herself getting very interested in fitness. She moved from Fitchburg State to Northeastern University in Boston to study physiology, and started to compete in fitness competitions. In 1996, she placed in the finals at the Ms. Fitness USA pageant, Miss Fitness America, and the Miss Galaxy pageant. Alina’s love of physical activity soon led to a ten-year stint in the health and fitness industry, primarily as a personal trainer. But all of that changed when Alina became pregnant with her son in 2003.
While taking a break from her fitness career during her pregnancy, Alina began to dread the idea of commuting back to Boston every day and started to think about other options. Then, when her husband came home one day complaining he couldn’t find any good bread in their town, inspiration took hold and Alina began to think about opening a bakery. She says, “I never worked in a bakery before in my life, but then that’s my MO. Figure it out.” While pregnant, she read and did the research, and in 2003, by the time her son was six months old, she opened her first bakery, Sturbridge Baking Company, in Sturbridge, Massachusetts.
Alina operated the bakery for five years, earning a “Best Bread” award courtesy of Worcester Mag and then expanding to sell cookies, tarts, pies, and cakes. Craving more of a restaurant feel, Alina sold the bakery in 2008 to raise the capital for Sweet, her current dessert and cocktail bar located in Worcester, MA. Since opening Sweet, Alina has garnered many accolades, including a “Worcester’s Most Creative Chef” award by Pulse magazine in 2009; Worcester Mag’s “Best Dessert” award in 2009, 2010, and 2011; Worcester Living’s “Best Dessert” award in 2009, 2010, and 2011; and City Living’s “Best Dessert” award in 2008, 2009, and 2011.
Alina got her first tattoo in 2006 after attending the women’s chef and restaurateur national conference in Rhode Island as a guest chef. Alina mentioned that she’d always wanted a tattoo to a chef she was working the event with, and the next thing she knew, they were headed to a tattoo shop where she had “Born to Cook” inked across her arm.
But Alina didn’t stop there. After appearing on the first season of Food Network’s Chopped, she had the opportunity to cook at the James Beard House in New York City. After a perfect service, the event was so amazing that she and two other chefs got tattoos to commemorate the event, the logo of the James Beard organization with the date of the dinner. Alina got hers on her left arm. Her next tattoo? Either a sugar molecule, or a pinup girl chef modeled after herself with the phrase “A woman’s place is in the kitchen.” You’ll have to wait and see what she chooses.
Bread pudding is a regular feature on the menu at Sweet, and beer pairings are often recommended with the dishes, but with the beer jelly this is a way to include it right in the dish.
