KUCHING: A 28-year-old Sarawakian who left home a decade ago, to pursue her dream as a pastry chef, has recently been listed as one of Asia’s top female pastry chefs by the Michelin Guide.
Michelle Goh from Kuching, a chef at Mia, a European contemporary restaurant in Thailand, was among 17 in the region to be honoured by the renowned culinary guide book in conjunction with the recent International Women’s Day.
Her signature dish ‘Cereal Bowl’ was inspired by her sister’s favourite dessert, which was shaved ice topped with Milo, condensed milk and corn.
“All those ingredients are typically things that we have for breakfast, so I decided to make an equivalent of a cereal bowl,” she told the Michelin Guide.
The dish, she said, contained homemade cereal mix consisting of caramelised popcorn, chocolate crumble, dehydrated milk and feuilletine, a scoop of corn ice cream, and finished table side with cornflakes infused milk.
Goh left Sarawak when she was 18 to study at Le Cordon Bleu in Sydney, Australia, before moving to Singapore and then Bangkok as a pastry chef when she was 23.
Her fiancé, Chef Pongcharn ‘Top’ Russell, are the main forces behind Mia, which won the Michelin Plate award for the first time in the 2021 edition of Michelin Guide Thailand.
For many chefs around the world, being awarded Michelin stars is one of the greatest professional achievements.
