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Sherwin still cooking
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By Arlene Fine
Senior Staff Reporter
It’s been at least 27 years since Clevelanders had their last taste of Ben Sherwin’s coconut squares, halvah tortes, rainbow cakes, date macaroons, holiday honey cakes, and cream cheese pastries. Yet, last spring when Ben’s youngest son Sandy, 50, himself a world-renowned pastry chef, moved back to Cleveland, he was overwhelmed by “urgent requests” to recreate those old favorites.
“It’s amazing. So many people my age and older vividly recall the exceptional baked goods the Sherwin brothers – Ben, Lou, Sol and Joe – made famous in Cleveland,” he says. Fortunately, he has an intact file containing every one of the Sherwin family recipes.
At some point, Sherwin would like to reintroduce his family’s baked favorites to the Cleveland community. But for now he is very pleased with his position as director of the School of Pastry Arts at Loretta Paganini’s International Culinary Arts and Sciences Institute (ICASI) in Chesterland. The school offers certificates in culinary and pastry arts.
This job is frosting on the cake for Sherwin, who, along with creating award-winning pastries and working side-by-side with such famous chefs as Jacques Pepin and Julia Child, studied and taught pastry classes at the original Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. He also worked as lead pastry chef and instructor at the famed French Culinary Institute in New York. Recently, he served as corporate consultant for The Grand Union Company, a large supermarket chain.
“Working at ICASI is a perfect fit,” says Sherwin. Both he and Paganini studied their craft at prestigious culinary institutes and come from generations of professional cooks and bakers. “We also share the same passion, work-ethic and self-discipline when it comes to food preparation and instruction.”
Sherwin considers the long hours he spent as a teenager assisting his father and uncles in the bakery, the catering business, and at their party center as an ideal apprenticeship for a culinary arts career. “Watching my family members work nonstop, seven days a week, made a big impression on me and my siblings,” he explains. “We were ingrained with a love and dedication for the food business at an early age and have stayed with it our adult lives.”
Sherwin’s oldest brother Alan is dean of the culinary arts school at Michigan State University; his brother Edward is president of the Baltimore-based Sherwin Food Safety Company; and his sister Carolyn Sherwin Gabelman, who is also the keeper of Sherwin family recipes, is a noted Cleveland area baker and teacher.
Sherwin’s return to Cleveland was prompted by his desire to be near his large family, particularly his 89-year-old mother, Marion. And “with Michael Symon’s Iron Chef popularity, Cleveland has a big culinary thing going right now,” he adds. “I’m hoping to be my hometown’s renowned pastry star.”
He expects to be in the limelight shortly, when his three baking and pastry cookbooks are published along with his two coffee-table books on the same subject.
Reconnecting with the Jewish community is high on Sherwin’s list. “I saw a picture of the original Sherwin’s bakery on 105th St. at the Maltz Museum and felt so proud,” he says.
In an effort to give back to the community, Sherwin looks forward to donating his time, teaching cooking classes as fundraisers for sisterhoods and other nonprofit Jewish groups.
“It’s really nice to be back in Cleveland, where so many people wish me well,” he says. “And I hope that someday Sherwin’s baked Alaska and chocolate-drenched coconut squares served at so many bar and bat mitzvahs and weddings will be back on dessert plates.”
afine@cjn.org
Talk to us
It’s been over 50 years since this reporter’s husband had his bar mitzvah at Sherwin’s Party Center on 105th and Carnegie Ave., yet the memories of that day, along with the photographs, still remain vivid.
If you have a favorite Sherwin’s memory either about special baked goods or a simchah catered by the Sherwin brothers, please contact Arlene Fine at afine@cjn.org or 216-454-8300, ext. 230. Photos are welcomed.
“It’s amazing. So many people my age and older vividly recall the exceptional baked goods the Sherwin brothers – Ben, Lou, Sol and Joe – made famous in Cleveland,” he says. Fortunately, he has an intact file containing every one of the Sherwin family recipes.
At some point, Sherwin would like to reintroduce his family’s baked favorites to the Cleveland community. But for now he is very pleased with his position as director of the School of Pastry Arts at Loretta Paganini’s International Culinary Arts and Sciences Institute (ICASI) in Chesterland. The school offers certificates in culinary and pastry arts.
This job is frosting on the cake for Sherwin, who, along with creating award-winning pastries and working side-by-side with such famous chefs as Jacques Pepin and Julia Child, studied and taught pastry classes at the original Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. He also worked as lead pastry chef and instructor at the famed French Culinary Institute in New York. Recently, he served as corporate consultant for The Grand Union Company, a large supermarket chain.
“Working at ICASI is a perfect fit,” says Sherwin. Both he and Paganini studied their craft at prestigious culinary institutes and come from generations of professional cooks and bakers. “We also share the same passion, work-ethic and self-discipline when it comes to food preparation and instruction.”
Sherwin considers the long hours he spent as a teenager assisting his father and uncles in the bakery, the catering business, and at their party center as an ideal apprenticeship for a culinary arts career. “Watching my family members work nonstop, seven days a week, made a big impression on me and my siblings,” he explains. “We were ingrained with a love and dedication for the food business at an early age and have stayed with it our adult lives.”
Sherwin’s oldest brother Alan is dean of the culinary arts school at Michigan State University; his brother Edward is president of the Baltimore-based Sherwin Food Safety Company; and his sister Carolyn Sherwin Gabelman, who is also the keeper of Sherwin family recipes, is a noted Cleveland area baker and teacher.
Sherwin’s return to Cleveland was prompted by his desire to be near his large family, particularly his 89-year-old mother, Marion. And “with Michael Symon’s Iron Chef popularity, Cleveland has a big culinary thing going right now,” he adds. “I’m hoping to be my hometown’s renowned pastry star.”
He expects to be in the limelight shortly, when his three baking and pastry cookbooks are published along with his two coffee-table books on the same subject.
Reconnecting with the Jewish community is high on Sherwin’s list. “I saw a picture of the original Sherwin’s bakery on 105th St. at the Maltz Museum and felt so proud,” he says.
In an effort to give back to the community, Sherwin looks forward to donating his time, teaching cooking classes as fundraisers for sisterhoods and other nonprofit Jewish groups.
“It’s really nice to be back in Cleveland, where so many people wish me well,” he says. “And I hope that someday Sherwin’s baked Alaska and chocolate-drenched coconut squares served at so many bar and bat mitzvahs and weddings will be back on dessert plates.”
afine@cjn.org
Talk to us
It’s been over 50 years since this reporter’s husband had his bar mitzvah at Sherwin’s Party Center on 105th and Carnegie Ave., yet the memories of that day, along with the photographs, still remain vivid.
If you have a favorite Sherwin’s memory either about special baked goods or a simchah catered by the Sherwin brothers, please contact Arlene Fine at afine@cjn.org or 216-454-8300, ext. 230. Photos are welcomed.
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