Ana Sofía Pino’s first shift as the pastry sous chef at beloved French spot Lutèce was the Saturday after Valentine’s Day last year. It was also the first weekend that head chefs Matt Conroy and Isabel Coss formally opened the Popal Group’s Pascual, their Mexico City-influenced restaurant across town.
“That week is a big week in the industry. I think it was the right way to start. We just hit the ground running,” she told Eater. A Silver Spring, Maryland native, Pino has been making sweet confections across D.C. and Baltimore for almost a decade, combining her traditional French pastry training at the Culinary Institute of America with the mid-Atlantic cuisine at NoHo Hospitality Group (Rye Street Tavern) and Alfred Restaurant Group (Duck Duck Goose). Pino had been hired initially to start the job at Lutèce in three weeks but Pascual was unexpectedly packed right after opening, so she jumped in immediately and has been building the famously intricate desserts in the Neo-bistro’s basement kitchen with chef pâtissier de partie Savannah Velasco-Kent ever since.
Pino says there was a “lot of growth” when she joined the pastry team, but “I’m never afraid of that, no matter how long I’ve been in the industry.”
Lutèce/Kelsey Shoemaker
A blood orange upside down cake covered in pistachio, from Pino’s March dessert menu.
Lutèce/Kelsey Shoemaker
Now, Pino is taking over five-year-old Lutèce’s pastry department as the head pastry chef, filling the revered post that won Coss Food & Wine’s title of Best New Chef in 2023 and nominations for many regional and national awards.
Coss was impressed by how Pino “took on a big job with such grace and such professionalism,” when Lutèce needed more hands on deck in early 2024. The Mexican-born chef has been hailed as a rising culinary star, but she is adamant that “you need such a good team behind you and your team needs to grow with you” for a restaurant to be successful. That’s reflected in how she’s collaboratively worked with Velasco-Kent and Pino over the last year, encouraging them to “show me what you can do” and truly believing in the power of “ping-ponging” ideas off each other.
“Honestly, I think Isabel reminded me to have fun in the kitchen again. I think it’s very easy to, like, put that to the side, or sometimes things become a little monotone,” Pino explained. The three pastry chefs were constantly FaceTiming from the kitchen, texting at 3 a.m. when inspiration struck, and even sending back and forth ideas they found on social media. Velasco-Kent, who trained under Coss for over two years, loves to look back at all the “intimate teamwork” that goes into every seasonal dish they create, describing fleeting dishes made with produce like figs, blood orange, and perfectly ripe strawberries as creatively fulfilling “flings.”
Pino and Savanna sometimes add up to six delicate garnishes for one dessert.
Lutèce/Kelsey Shoemaker
Pino builds impressively large layered cakes in the tiny underground kitchen.
Lutèce/Kelsey Shoemaker
Pino and Velasco-Kent plan to stick to the modern adaptation of French pastries and desserts that have always been Lutèce’s trademark, but a bit of their own style has already bled into many confections over the past year.
First, Pino loves a dramatic layered cake. After working in Southern kitchens where “big tall cakes and tall pies” were the norm, she’s currently obsessed with a Paris-Brest, where choux pastry (like the outside of a cream puff) is layered with custard and topped off with something crunchy (like nuts or crumbling cookie pieces), and entremet cakes with vibrant layers of jam and mousse encased in a shiny glaze.
Second, they both have a painting background (Pino as a hobby and Velasco-Kent pursued an art degree for a short time) and are constantly discussing the colors, shapes, and even heights of each confection they build. A pomegranate vasherin cake with layers of ice cream, sorbet, meringue, and cream that Pino dreamed up this winter. The vibrant red pomegranate shining through all the layers of snowy white was “an artistic visual for me when it started out and it took me time to get exactly what I wanted,” she explained.
“We’re always thinking, what if someone orders all four desserts,” Velasco-Kent says. “How does the whole table look?” This question prompted them to add dashes of color to dishes when they were starting to look too brown last fall.
The honey semifreddo is lightly sweet, buttery, and has plenty of contrasting texture from the mountain of shaved cheese and crunchy honeycomb.
Lutèce/Kelsey Shoemaker
Finally, they are ready to make one of the most quintessential dishes on the dessert menu their own: the honey semifreddo topped off with housemade honeycomb candy and a pile of thinly shaved comté cheese.
Anyone who has tried the two-year-old confection has exalted its unique brilliance. Coss says the semifreddo was created in response to the traditional French cheese plate that is usually served with dessert. American diners were far less likely to order the restaurant’s cheese platter, so Coss got to work reimagining it.
“We weren’t the first restaurant serving a cheese plate, but we were reinventing something that, you know, no one had reinvented,” Coss reminisces. Playing off the honey that often accompanies cheeses and marrying her ice cream knowledge from working at the Creamery at Union Market (a passion project that had her working from 4 a.m. through dinner service), she paired a lighter honey semifreddo with the nutty comté cheese.
The dessert isn’t only a regular diner’s favorite, it embodies Coss’ vision of taking French classics and seeing how far her team could push them. While Pino and Velasco-Kent love the innovative dessert, they “are itching for a change” after making the same batch of semifreddo every day. Another ode to a cheese course that pairs French cheese with strawberries and black pepper is currently in development.
While Coss will still try to visit during weekend brunch, saying that it’s “important to check on product and to check on people too,” she hopes that she’s instilled “being good towards each other” and professionalism in the pastry department.
“Savannah is going into this part where she’s prepping and starting to do developing. For her right now, all she needs to do is absorb,” she said. “And then Ana, jumping into a pastry chef, now is her time for teaching… they’re taking care of each other, and also, cooking good food.”
Pino brûlées a dessert set in a real shell.
Lutèce/Kelsey Shoemaker
Velasco-Kent, left, and Pino, right, outside of Lutèce’s inviting blue exterior.
Lutèce/Kelsey Shoemaker
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