Like many, when lockdown hit, Astrid Roussel reached for her Kitchenaid and thought she'd try her hand at baking. While most of us failed to get our sourdough to resemble anything near artisan and put the mixer back in the cupboard, she's bucked the trend and not only kept it up, but made a new career out of her picture perfect patisserie and breads. Astrid, 44, arrived in Wales 16 years ago "for love" and now lives in Newport .
Despite her French roots, she had never baked in her life before lockdown. "When you grow up in France, you get sent to the bakery every single day. It's an integral part of French life.
My son is eight, and when I was eight, I was sent with 10 Francs to go bring back a baguette, that was my task. But I'd never baked, I don't come from a baking family," she said. After the first lockdown in 2020 she had to quit her job as a project manager to juggle childcare for her young children, as her daughter was then 14 months old and her son was three.
"Obviously, as it was Covid times we couldn't travel and baking was a little escape from looking after the kids all the time. I love them to bits but they were very very young and extremely full on. More to the point because we couldn't travel I wanted them to experience a little of the French way of life, because we couldn't travel to see my family.
So I started to bake baguettes and brioche at home, not particularly well but I got the bug I tried other hobbies like origami, but baking stuck because the benefit.
