Elevating Culinary Excellence at Enkusero Mara, Kenya
Client Overview
Enkusero Mara is a luxury tent camp located in the Masai Mara in Kenya. Locally run and owned, this intimate establishment strives to offer a top-tier experience to guests from around the world.
Surrounded by stunning wildlife, the camp not only highlights the beauty of its location but also provides a comprehensive safari experience, including delicious local food freshly made daily with minimal equipment.
Challenges
Enkusero Mara faced several daily challenges:
- Limited ingredient supply
- Solar panel electricity with restricted daily power access
- An old gas oven with no proper baking equipment
- A pastry section managed by an employee without formal training
- Cultural differences with varying norms
Solutions
We began by identifying which areas of the menu needed improvement. After a comprehensive review, we decided on a global approach and selected a list of recipes to incorporate into the menu, considering ingredient availability and guest preferences.
Key steps taken:
- Recipe Selection: Chose basic French recipes that are elegant, timeless, and versatile, a lowing the chef to create a variety of desserts.
- Equipment Upgrade: Installed an electric oven to ensure high-quality desserts could be made. The gas oven remained as a backup for electricity shortages.
- Tool Provision: Provided a list of essential tools and equipment to the owner, ensuring the pastry chef had everything needed for the new dessert offerings.
- Training Adaptation: Conducted training considering local constraints such as weather and power shortages. Taught how to adapt recipes with different fruits or flavours and how to use the new oven effectively.
- Documentation: Supplied a recipe book with detailed notes and drawings from the training. Provided photographs of each new recipe to ensure consistency and offer visual examples.
- Daily Planning: Created specific daily schedules to maximise training time, teaching how to combine recipes efficiently and preserve ingredients in their unique environment.
- Recipe Improvement: Discussed how to elevate existing recipes with small changes.
Results
The training led to significant positive outcomes:
- Immediate positive feedback from guests, with two mentions in guest reviews just weeks after the training.
- Satisfied owner, confident in the improved dessert offerings for his guests.
- A confident and creative pastry chef ready to deliver high-quality desserts.
- Improved daily baking organization and efficient use of ingredients.
- High quality, durable equipment.
- Differentiation from nearby competitors by offering fresh, crafted baked goods and desserts daily.
Testimonial
“I was looking for a pastry chef to train my resident chefs at a remote African Safari Camp in the Maasai Mara National Reserve in Kenya when I came across Charlotte’s Instagram handle. I was immediately struck by the clarity in her content “Accessible and uncomplicated French pastry recipes that could be replicated anywhere in the world”. After a couple of video calls I offered Charlotte a proposal to fly to Kenya to train my chefs. Charlotte curated a set of recipes using ingredients and equipment that could be easily sourced anywhere in the world. Over the course of 2 weeks, Charlotte displayed a tremendous sense of professionalism and pride in her work to completely overhaul our entire pastry and dessert offering at camp. I was blown away by the quality of the end products. Charlotte is a super friendly and easy going personality, but above all a consummate professional. She was able to improvise and adapt to the challenging conditions that were on offer. I’m grateful to have enlisted Charlotte’s services and will highly recommend her to anyone looking to learn the fine art of French Pastry making.”
Mahesh YEGANATHAN, Owner
“I really appreciated your efforts and support in regards to the pastry lessons we undertook together. I believe that the skills and knowledge you passed to me will do alone to improve my job. Thanks for your time and support for this project I have enjoyed much.”
Jennifer, Pastry Chef
“The impact of Charlotte’s pastry training at Enkusero was very impressive! I was able to visit the safari camp both before Charlotte’s training, and during. Before, the desserts were nice, but presentation was lacking and nothing was particularly memorable in terms of taste or diversity. Which honestly was understandable considering everything was being baked in the middle of the African bush in a solar powered “tent” kitchen! But I couldn’t believe the quality and diversity of desserts that the team made with Charlotte’s training — mini eclairs, buttery croissants, delicious homemade breads every meal, custards, even macrons, and so many other delicious treats… I looked forward to what would be served every day, and was continuously impressed with the level at which each pastry was prepared and presented. You could see the staff enjoyed what they were learning, and we got to see their creativity and confidence expand during Charlotte’s training as well. Even with challenges like frequent power outages, not being able to source certain ingredients, and a broken oven, Charlotte was calm, patient, and able to constantly adapt and be resourceful — no guest would have ever noticed anything was amiss. Having Charlotte’s pastries served at every meal was one of the highlights of my stay at Enkusero!”
Alexandra Saper – The Wayfaress
Travel & Lifestyle Content Creator
Inspired by Our Success with Enkusero Mara?
Imagine the transformation we can bring to your resort’s dessert offerings. Contact us today to schedule a consultation and see how our personalised on-site pastry training can elevate your culinary experience. Let’s create unforgettable moments for your guests together.