An Insatiable Appetite for Perfection: Pastry Chef Dru Tevis

After graduating with a degree in communication from New York University, Dru Tevis intended to wield a camera not a whisk. The Westminster, Maryland, native was headed to film school at American University. His course changed between undergraduate and graduate school when he bartended at a Rehoboth Beach restaurant.

During restaurant week, he asked the chef if he could make a dessert. Tevis had fallen in love with pastry while studying in Italy, and he’d already baked his way through a pastry cookbook.

The diners’ enthusiastic response to his confection led to more creations. Instead of going to film school, Tevis enrolled at the French Culinary Institute in New York (now the International Culinary Center). He graduated as the class valedictorian.

While in the Big Apple, he worked under Chef Kierin Baldwin at The Dutch and Christina Tosi, the chef/owner of Milk Bar. Back in Rehoboth, however, finding a dedicated pastry job was challenging. He juggled gigs at several restaurants before landing a steady position with La Vida Hospitality, which operates Fork + Flask at Nage, a catering division and the Crooked Hammock Brewery. Still, the long-range opportunities for advancement along the coast seemed limited.

He considered returning to New York despite meeting husband-to-be Chase Cline. After Cline proposed, Tevis took a year off to travel and study. “I wanted to have new experiences, get away to refresh myself and then decide if we would move somewhere else,” he explains.

He took continuing education classes at the French Pastry School and the Chocolate Academy, both in Chicago. In Boston, he spent time at the Flour Bakery and with pastry chef Brian Mercury at Oak + Rowan.

Rested and renewed, Tevis returned to Rehoboth to join the team at SoDel Concepts, which has 10 restaurants, including one with a large event facility, and a catering company. SoDel already had a sommelier and Cicerone (a professional certified in beer service). Why not a pastry chef? “It benefits them to have someone with my skill set, and I benefit from being part of the hospitality group,” he says.

The win-win arrangement benefits dessert-loving diners, whom he tempts with frequent Instagram and Facebook posts of his artwork. His feeds are also peppered with shots of him at the gym. The fitness enthusiast proves that you can savor a slice of beet-and-honey cake with cheesecake buttercream and still sport a buff physique.

Trends and Tips: An assortment of gourmet brownies, blondies and shortbreads are hits on a dessert buffet—with or without a centerpiece cake. Also popular: cream sandwiched between oatmeal or gingersnap cookies. For novel shower place cards, he says, use cookies depicting a calendar, which is piped on the surface with icing. An X marks the date for the big event.

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