Fred and Sarah van Kleef are the proud owners of Patisserie Royale, Motueka. December 2012 marked the 10th year of successful business ownership in Motueka. Fred, normally elbows deep in flour, took some time recently to write a bit of history about how he came to a baker. Here's what he had to say;
"I started working in the Netherlands in a very good and small bakery helping out after school at the age of 15, back in 1985.The work room was below streetlevel so staring out of the window looking across the cobbled street you be seeing people's legs and mainly bicycle wheels! I didn't get paid I just wanted to be part of the team and making things . . . anything really as long as I could be there. My first paid job (in regards to bakery work) was in a Supermarket, first cleaning, then slowly starting to help the bakers in the early hours of the morning. Having started in the Supermarket, learning a little bit about baking and cleaning, in 1987 I then saw a ad in the paper regarding working holiday in Switzerland on a farm. I worked and and lived in the alps for about 6 or 8 weeks when I got a phone call to start my apprenticeship in my hometown in a bakery. back I went to Holland,working and going to school one day a week to do theory. We had one teacher with whom I clicked very quickly. Unfortunately, he moved away to the south of Holland. Strangely enough, a Dutch man used to come into the bakery some years back and we started talking one day . . .turned out he was my old teacher!! 20 years later, never been in contact, and here he was in my shop in Motueka . . .it's a small world!
