Home-baked goods keep patrons happy

  • Published
  • By Lois Walsh
  • Team Eglin Public Affairs
EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. --  For more than a decade, Stuart Llewellyn has been satisfying the sweet tooth of Eglin Airmen. 

As the baker at the Breeze dining facility, Mr. Llewellyn uses years of experience to supply the homemade baked goodies that are on display in a refrigerated case in the main facility. 

Mr. Llewellyn brought eight years of food service experience to the Air Force when he enlisted more than thirty years ago. He became the first pipeline instructor in food services right out of basic training; and, after a stint as an aide for a general whose wife loved baked goods, he found his niche. 

After retiring in 1995, Mr. Llewellyn turned his creativity to the ovens. The Air Force provides basic recipes for the sweets, but some, like the pecan pie on the menu, has been upgraded by incorporating some tips from the Culinary Institute of America. 

"The nice thing is I'm given a lot of freedom to revamp (the recipes) to make them better," he said. "It's all about customer service; I want to make darn well sure the pie will be accepted." 

Mr. Llewellyn said the Air Force's standard recipes can be scaled to make the amounts needed to serve more than 400 Airmen per meal. Amounts can be adjusted when there are more customers on base, like when the Ground Combat Training Squadron has a class on the ground. 

"Pies outsell cakes," he said, "like my chocolate cream pie, any cheese cake, cookies and brownies. They want something sweet." 

Mr. Llewellyn thinks the Air Force is the leader in being calorie conscious; he switched to low-fat milk and whole egg substitute when the recipe allows. 

"But never in pecan pies," he said. "They'll blow up like a volcano." 

Besides six pies and large sheet pans of brownies each day, the bakers also make specialty cakes and lots of goodies for the holidays. Mr. Llewellyn currently trains three food service Airman in baking. 

Airman Erin Rich said she used to bake with her mother and loves to cook. Among her responsibilities are setting the schedule for the day and projecting baked good needs for the next day. She said desserts are arranged by color because "people eat with their eyes first." But it's the aromas that bring a smile to her face. 

"I like the smells the best, like the smell of fresh bread baking," she said. 

Senior Airman Roselyn Cooper has a challenge because she's a vegan by choice. She doesn't eat any eggs or milk, but lets Mr. Llewellyn be her taste tester for the goods she bakes. 

"I crave it because it smells so good, but it's against my beliefs to eat any of it," she said. "It does make the job more challenging." 

Airman Rich said the cookies and cobblers are fresh every day which is a good thing because customers keep coming back for more of the home baked treats like mom used to make.