PHOTO BY LAURA PETRILLA

Zoe Peckich
Executive Pastry Chef, Monterey Bay Fish Grotto

By the time she was a senior in high school, Zoe Peckich had decided she wanted to be a pastry chef and appear on TV’s Food Network. Her dreams came true.

Peckich earned a degree in food and beverage entrepreneurship from Johnson & Wales University and went on to study gelato making in Italy and work as a chocolatier in Charlotte, North Carolina. After the pandemic, she moved back to Pittsburgh and got a job as a server at Monterey Bay Fish Grotto on Mount Washington, where she eventually rose to pastry chef.

About a year later, the Food Network invited her to appear on its “Summer Baking Championship,” a competition she went on to win. The entrepreneur now owns High End Sweets, making custom cakes and other treats, and she participates in charitable foodie events around town, including working with Music for Autism, baking while children play musical instruments in a sensory journey.

“I think teaching and showing children that doing what you love to do is the most important thing in your life,” she says.