Meet the Chef: The Pastry Chefs at The Heights Bakery and Cafe

Life, with all its ups and downs and hard-earned accomplishments, is smooth and sweet. After all of the hubbub of daily life – when the last bill of the month is paid or when that elusive Friday afternoon comes to a close – there comes a time when most people can relax, unwind, and maybe enjoy some all-American apple pie.

The owners of The Heights Bakery and Cafe, tucked into an unassuming shopping center on the corner of Crompond Road and Route 118 in Yorktown Heights, had these sensibilities in mind when they opened their authentic mom-and-pop bakeshop nearly three years ago.

Jim and Nan Crocker, along with their lifelong friend Valerie Gaglione, were searching for an escape from the humdrum monotony that precluded their lives as bakers. Each had seen enough of the world to know that the secret to happy living might be found in something sweeter – say, a cupcake.

Jim, 49, and Nan, 50, have been married 29 years and have known each other since they were in their teens. Before flour and icing, Jim was a career corrections officer with the Westchester County Jail and Nan was in business for herself as a private investigator. Jim's massive hands and physique alongside Nan's all-business demeanor stand in stark contrast to preconceived notions of what a baker might look like.

But now, amongst the wooden countertops and hulking ovens of their charming pastry kitchen, the pair seems at comfortable ease with their new profession, away from the hellish experiences that criminal justice careers often bring with them. Jim dealt with some of Westchester's toughest criminals. 

"What I used to do, there was nothing there," Jim said. "Not only was it thankless, but the place would still run even if you weren't there."

"We needed a change of pace….," Nan said, finishing Jim's sentence, as if by habit. "I was getting very run down. We both started to get burned-out, and this is something we started to keep our sanity."

Indeed, a lot of what Jim and Nan do in the kitchen comes naturally. Nan, a Yorktown native, grew up in a family that revolved around grandma's cooking and baking. Jim, from Parkchester in the Bronx, always had his hands in a pile of dough. During his 25 years working in corrections, he catered events for some of the unions and organizations he was a part of, sometimes feeding groups of 150 or more.

"For ballgames or summer picnics, Christmas parties, I catered events like those for a long time…," Jim said. "Honestly for me, the cooking aspect was always there."

"He used to bake cakes coming home from grammar school!" Nan followed with a laugh.

While both Crockers never attended culinary school, their skills are the result of lots of family tradition, patience, and trial and error. Most of their recipes come straight from Nan and Valerie's grandmothers' cookbooks. The pastries, pies, and cakes on their glass shelves are reproductions of time-honored family favorites that once garnished Sunday dinner tables and Thanksgiving feasts.

"We grew up learning from our grandparents… and that's what we use here, our grandparents' recipes…," Nan said. "I mean, if you look at this recipe, you can see it's from the '50s. You can see the age of some of these papers. They're yellowed and old, but the recipes stand the test of time."

Valerie, who has been Nan's friend since childhood, grew up in the Bronx in a very traditional Italian household. She is now as much a part of the bakeshop here as the spatulas and egg beaters.

In the display cases at the front of the store, many of the Italian pastries come from her perfecting and tooling with her mother's recipes. Aside from working in the medical field, Valerie has been in pastry kitchens since she was 14 years old.

"A lot of the bakers nowadays cut corners," she said. "Like they'll buy a carrot cake mix out of the box. But we make our carrot cakes from scratch, with real carrots and raisins in it… That's the way I was taught…. The custard recipe, I used to help my mother make it, and I used to yell at her, 'Why do we have to make this stupid recipe?' And she was get mad at me and say, 'It's tradition, now go and cook it!' It's funny, because now I make my living off of that custard…. It's therapeutic now, for me."

Together, the trio of Jim, Nan, and Valerie run a well-greased operation that is busy every month of the year. With Nan and Valerie carrying much of the workload and Jim filling in on the off-hours, The Heights Bakery is able to accommodate weddings, holiday parties, or the everyday morning breakfast sandwich or muffin. The shop also carries a large assortment of gluten-, nut-, and dairy-free products that are conveniently listed on separate menus.

"It's very difficult not to cross-contaminate anything," Valerie said. "Our ovens, one's used for gluten-free, the other's used for nut-free. Everything's got to be sanitized. You have to be very careful in this business."

"We have different mixers for everything!" Jim added.

"During the holidays, we've slept over here in the back," Nan interjected. "We've got an office back there and we've stayed there overnight."

It's clear that their jobs take a lot of time and artistry. But what is interesting is that each chef does not view their respective workload as work, at all. Jim, Nan, and Valerie are more than happy to be doing something they love, for a clientele that continues to come back.

"The customers here in Yorktown are, in one word, loyal," Nan said. "Very loyal."

As long as cupcakes or cream puffs continue to be the perfect afternoon treat or after-dinner dessert, the pastry chefs at The Heights Bakery in Yorktown seem to have their work cookie-cut out for them.

Cream Puffs Recipe

¼ Lb Butter or Margarine

1 Cup Boiling Water

1 Cup of Flour

4 Eggs 

Melt butter in boiling water, add flour, stir until it becomes a ball then remove pot from heat.  After mixture cools slightly beat eggs into the mixture and mix together. 

Spoon or pipe cream puff onto baking sheet. 

Bake in 450 degree oven for 15 minutes then drop heat down to 250 degrees and keep in oven for 25 minutes. 

Custard Filling 

1 Quart of Milk

1 Cup of Sugar

10 Eggs

¾ Cup of Cornstarch

Squirt of Lemon flavor, squirt Vanilla flavor, squirt of Butter flavor 

Mix all ingredients on stove top with a low flame.  Stir constantly until thick.  Remove from heat and chill.

After custard has chilled fill Cream Puffs by slicing them horizontally.