This summer, join us for the debut of Campfire Chefs—one more way The Resort at Paws Up has turned camping into glamping. While each of our camp’s Dining Pavilions is normally staffed with an exceptionally talented chef who prepares your daily breakfast and dinner, this series allows you to dine on the cuisine of chefs who are at the pinnacle of culinary success. These include award-winning names such as Chef Amanda Rockman:
Helping us celebrate National S’mores Day (August 10) is renowned pastry Chef Amanda Rockman.
Rockman’s interest in the culinary field began at an early age. Growing up in Katy, Texas, she was inspired by the dinner parties her mom would throw for friends. Rockman remembers seeing her mom dust the outline of the Kremlin on a chocolate sachertorte and thinking it was the coolest thing she’d ever seen. Her mom’s passion for food sparked the same interest in her.
Rockman went on to attend the Culinary Institute of America in New York, where she received her A.O.S. in Baking and Pastry Arts, and later completed an internship under Emily Luchetti at Farallon in San Francisco. Her career then took her to Chicago, where she worked at the acclaimed TRU, Spring, the three-Michelin-starred L2O and the Peninsula Hotel. Rockman also opened the Bristol, Balena and Thompson Hotel’s Nico Osteria as executive pastry chef.
Having previously worked in Austin as executive pastry chef at Fino and Asti, Rockman returned to Texas in 2015 as executive pastry chef at the South Congress Hotel. There, she oversees the pastry and bakery programs for in-room dining, banquets and the hotel’s four food and beverage outlets: Café No Sé, Central Standard, Mañana Coffee & Juice and the Stephen F. Frostin’ ice cream truck.
Rockman was named as a James Beard Foundation Award semifinalist in 2015, received the Jean Banchet Pastry Chef of the Year Award in 2011 and 2012 and was selected as Chicago Tribune’s Pastry Chef of the Year in 2012. She has appeared on Top Chef Just Desserts, Hungry Hound, The Better Show and Windy City Live. She currently writes her own pastry blog, Pastrylandia.