It was Kevin Pannier’s worst nightmare — an expensive wedding cake delivered to the wrong reception.

He was 22 years old and had only recently been made executive pastry chef at the Fairmont Grand Hotel in Kiev, Ukraine.

The cake cost more than the entire wedding of the thrilled bride and groom who received it.

Fortunately, he realised the error before they cut into his masterpiece. As a courtesy, he allowed them to take a photo with it before swapping it with the small tart that was theirs.

“I was quite young for the position,” he said. “The average age for an executive pastry chef would be [at least] 30 years old and I had quite a bit of staff under me. I knew pastry but I didn’t have a clue how to manage a kitchen. Thankfully, there was a very kind chef there who showed me the ropes and I learnt quickly.”

He worked as executive chef at the Fairmont Bab Al Bahr in Abu Dhabi, the Fairmont in Dubai before moving to Hamilton Princess, Bermuda, seven months ago.

“It was difficult at first because I was missing some staff. Now I have three new people in my kitchen who I worked with before. They just arrived one week ago, so now it is better.”

The French chef will share his expertise as part of a hotel workshop this month.

“I won’t be teaching anything particularly French,” he said. “It will mostly be a hands-on class and we will be making three different kinds of desserts. The first will be ginger, cinnamon and cranberry macaroons. We will also be doing mince pies and a chestnut parfait.

“The course will be followed by a dinner where these desserts will be served. Participants will get to take the macaroons home. It won’t be boring with me standing there lecturing; we’ll have fun.”

How the desserts are made usually boils down to the chef’s preference, he said.

“The secret is to start with good ingredients,” he said. “The temperature to cook them is different depending on the climate. For example, in France the macaroons would be cooked at a slightly lower temperature. Here, making caramel is a big, big challenge because the caramel melts easily. In Dubai, because of the dryness, making bread is very difficult.”

The traditional Christmas treat in France is a yule log cake filled with mousse or ice cream, the 27-year-old said.

“They are so popular that when you go into a pastry shop in France, all you see is yule logs. Between the 23rd and the 26th of December, you can’t find any cake or anything else. The place I worked at, many of the yule log cakes were stuffed with ice cream or sorbet. That was a little complicated to make because the buyer needed to get it home before the inside melted.

“The only bread you can get in a French pastry shop at Christmas is nut bread and lemon bread. We eat it with oysters.”

Mr Pannier is in the middle of a revamp of the pastries and desserts on offer at the hotel.

“It wasn’t because I didn’t like what was here,” he said, “I just wanted to put my own stamp on things. I think that is great for the guests. I hope when there is another pastry chef coming he will change things again.”

Among the desserts now on offer at the hotel’s Crown & Anchor bar are six types of pralines with different flavours and a special dessert, Paris to Bermuda.

“It is based on a traditional French dessert,” he said. “It has hazelnuts, white chocolate ganache, cream, coconuts and lemon grass.”

Mr Pannier trained at Olivier Bajard’s Ecole Internationale de Pâtisserie in Perpignan and at the International Le Cordon Bleu School in Paris.

He hopes to stay in Bermuda for a few years and then move on.

“I might go back to the Middle East to work,” he said. “I’d eventually like to work my way back to France.”

His family are of Corsican heritage, but he was born in Versailles. As a child, he loved cooking with his grandmother.

He wasn’t a particularly good student so at 13 he took a vocational route, becoming an apprentice in a pastry shop for four years.

“We had five days of training,” he said. “On day five the chef wanted me to try pastry making. I didn’t want to do it because I thought I already knew what kind of cooking I wanted to do. I’d never really made desserts before. As soon as I glazed a cake I fell in love with it.”

He worked from 2am to 3pm six days a week. One week a month was spent in school; the rest in the kitchen.

“I love the freedom and the challenge of pastry cooking,” he said. “It can be hard, but you can do anything. You can make something funny out of chocolate, you can make it into candy and you can drink it.”

One of the attractions to the business was his own sweet tooth.

“I really loved sweets,” he said. “But now, working in a pastry kitchen all the time, not so much. You smell it all the time and it becomes boring.”

The pastry class is $58 and will be held at Crown & Anchor on December 20 from 2pm to 5.30pm.

• Reserve a spot on 298-2028 or ham.diningreservations@fairmont.com