Florian Bellanger is a pastry chef and co-owner of Mad Mac Macarons, "the Authentic French Macarons and Madeleines." Mad Mac serves the retail, food service, and hospitality industries, and has been recognized as a leader in quality and innovation in the macaron industry. Before starting his own company, Bellanger was the Executive Pastry Chef at Fauchon, and oversaw 24 other pastry chefs at its Tea Salon flagship store in New York City. Chef Bellanger was named one of the 10 Best Pastry Chefs in America in 2003 and 2004 by Pastry Art & Design magazine. In 2000 and 2001, the James Beard Foundation acclaimed Bellanger's accomplishments with a nomination for "Outstanding Pastry Chef." He has been featured on many networks, including CNN, NBC, Food Network, and Martha Stewart Living, and served as a judge on the Food Network’s competition series Cupcake Wars. Chef Bellanger will also be a judge on the upcoming show Buddy vs. Duff, also on the Food Network. Bellanger is a member of City Harvest's Food Council, and spends his free time donating to charities such as C-CAP Careers Through Culinary Arts Program, CCAP, the Wolfgang Puck Charity and the Jean-Louis Palladin Foundation. In this episode you’ll learn about: How Chef Bellanger landed the job that every other pastry chef wanted His experience as opening Pastry Chef at Fauchon in Qatar His first opportunity in the U.S. – Executive Pastry Chef at Le Bernardin Opening the Fauchon flagship store in NYC Becoming an entrepreneur: finding his niche and opening Mad Mac How he became a Food Network star along the way And much, much more!