In the 1970s, it wasn't so cool to be a pastry chef.
But when his 16-year-old son made his first successful pound cake, the clerk of a British firm decided to spend half of his life savings to send him to a baking school in the Philippines.
That son is Mr Fabian Doh, who has since risen up the ranks to become the principal of Prima Limited's Baking Industry Training Centre (BITC), which celebrates its fifteenth anniversary tomorrow.
Today, the 48-year-old is in charge of Singapore's only fully- accredited baking school in Keppel Road.
BITC works closely with the Workforce Development Agency in training bakers and pastry chefs for restaurants, hotels, confectionaries and educational institutes - even readying talents to work in the upcoming integrated resorts.
While Mr Doh started his baking career in some of the region's famed hotels like Rasa Sentosa, it was through much perseverance and many a 14-hour workday that he mastered the skills needed as a pastry chef.
Being a left-hander did not help.
Mr Doh told my paper in an interview yesterday: "I was disadvantaged in the kitchen because most tools are designed for right-handers."
Back in 1986, Mr Doh was working as a demi chef - the assistant to the pastry chef's assistant - in a hotel when a Swiss chef sneered at him for being completely helpless if his boss were not around.
"It took me a good six years, but I finally mastered the art of inscribing words on a cake," Mr Doh said.
Other than in the Philippines - one of the best places in the region to learn baking 20 years ago - Mr Doh's training has brought him to parts of Europe such as Schwyz and Zurich, Switzerland, where he not only honed his craft, but advanced his learning in baking theories.
"Making pastries and baking is a precise science. There is no such thing as agaration," he said, referring to estimating measurements.
Mr Doh made his switch from a career in the hotel industry to teaching at the BITC in 1995, when his wife felt that he had to make adjustments in his working hours so they could spend more time together.
Although he currently enjoys more worklife balance, Mr Doh still rises at 5.30am on a schoolday and is normally the first to arrive at work even before 8am - to check that BITC's hallways and classrooms are spotlessly clean.
BITC has come a long way - it was formed in 1993 as a partnership between Prima Limited and Spring Singapore to upgrade the local baking industry.
Mr Doh recalled that gourmet pastries and cakes had not always been in the baking scene.
"In the 80s, a fancy cake meant buttercream with wafer roses, and bread meant an-pan.
"Today's customer wants mildly flavoured rye bread, or something that has canola seeds or dried figs in it."
BITC throws its doors open to the public for a charity bake-off tomorrow.
