The Sweet Life

Dana Iannelli’s Story Takes the Cake

Dana & Michael’s Wedding Reception last October, Sunset Flower Farm, Belleplain, N.J.

“Every recipe has a story,” Dana Iannelli says, “so when you’re baking it’s like a trip down memory lane.”

One particular recipe story of Iannelli’s was played out in public. It was the day in September 2018 when she literally baked beneath a tent in the hot California sun in front of the Food Network’s cameras as a contestant on the second season of “Wedding Cake Championship.”

Iannelli and fellow pastry chef and good friend Cara Albertelli teamed up to produce a tiered chocolate wedding cake with coconut pastry cream, fresh raspberry and chocolate ganache filling, and vanilla fondant on the outside. It was finished off with gold detailing. They knew the blazing heat could potentially be a recipe for culinary disaster.

“If the ganache filling melted, it could have stained the white fondant,” says Iannelli, executive pastry chef of Shorebreak Cafe and the food and beverage director for Ludlam Bar & Grill at the Ludlam Hotel in Sea Isle City.

“The experience gave me more confidence.”

Over the course of two weeks and four episodes, which aired in June 2019, Iannelli took away life lessons, like:

Grandma’s Sour Cream Chocolate Cake

Chocolate Chip Cookies, Stuffed Fluffernutter Cookies, and Cherry Danish

Don’t be so hard on yourself.

Every day has its new set of challenges.

Be positive to get through each day.

Stay calm and don’t let emotions get out of hand.

To audition for Food Network, Iannelli and Albertelli were given six hours to bake a cake featuring a superhero. They chose Disney’s Dumbo, perhaps an unlikely choice, but they say they admired his courage and that he could fly. The gamble paid off and their creation earned them a place in the competition. Each episode featured a challenging element for a celebrity couple’s wedding cake. The first episode highlighted husband-and-wife puppeteers, and so the cake needed to incorporate a puppet. The second episode spotlighted two dancers.

“They wanted movement, so we wrapped sheets of fondant icing around the cake and pulled it back to look like ocean waves,” says Iannelli.

Though they won the first and second episodes, they took home second prize in the finale. She remains proud of their work, especially their level of artistry.

“We learned a lot about ourselves under pressure,” says Iannelli, who just a few years later called on that strength. There was the joy of becoming engaged to Michael Robarts, a native of South Africa. But only a few weeks later, the United States was shutting down due to COVID-19. With Robarts on a work visa, he was facing deportation.

The couple leapt into action.

“On April 13th, we got married in a civil ceremony in Florida. We moved to the [Sea Isle] area in February. On July 11th, we opened Shorebreak,” says Iannelli, who from May 2013 until 2021 served as executive pastry chef at Addison Reserve Country Club in Delray Beach, Fla. She and her husband met at Addison Reserve and began dating as coworkers, even though it went against company policy.

The newlyweds knew they wanted to relocate to her beloved Garden State to be closer to her family. Luckily, Iannelli was offered the sweet position of running the bakery. Robarts’ role is general manager of Ludlam Hotel at Shorebreak Resorts. Iannelli’s brother Al, co-owner of Diamonds Liquor Store, helped drive the couple’s rented U-Haul from Florida to New Jersey.

16 homemade ice cream flavors

For summer 2022, the bakery’s most popular offerings making a comeback are: crumb cake, cinnamon buns, key lime pie, and one of its specialties: crumb cake bites. And for those hot Sea Isle summer days, try their homemade ice cream.

“The bakery is a true reflection of who I am. And I treat it as my own. I am creating the menu. Chris Glancey is the owner, but he has entrusted me to run the business. He hasn’t turned me down on anything,” says Iannelli, who uses the finest ingredients, including 83% European butter and Valrhona gourmet French chocolate.

She adds, “We always look forward to seeing our regular customers.”

Among them are Arthur and Lisa Iannone, owners of Sands Department Store.

“It’s so fun and it’s so delicious,” Lisa says.

Before opening the door at Sands, they have a morning ritual of coming to Shorebreak for coffee, and to split the Lemon Currant Scone.

“The Lemon Currant Scone is good, crisp and sugary on the outside,” says Arthur.

“It’s sweet, but not too sweet,” adds Lisa.

Iannelli credits her parents for her strong work ethic: her father, Alfred, operates a lucrative trucking business, while her mother, MaryAnn, previously ran a day care out of the family’s home. Dana always loved being in the kitchen and loved to cook. She also observed the home creations of her grandmothers, Lola and Anne. They were famous for their Christmas cookies and Easter bread.

As a student at Washington Township High School in Sewell, she enrolled in the continuing education program for cooking. During the summer of her sophomore and junior years, Iannelli landed an internship at Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City, with the help of Buddy Logan, a family friend who was an executive chef at the hotel. Her internship satisfied the required hours in a professional kitchen to be able to apply to the Culinary Institute of America (CIA). While at Trump, she met Chef Tom Vaccaro, who advised her the CIA was the only place she should attend if she was serious about a career in the culinary industry. She followed his advice.

Dana Iannelli and Cara Albertelli, partners in the Food Network competition.

Iannelli was accepted at the CIA in Hyde Park, N.Y. She intended to specialize in cooking, but a pastry course altered her plans. After graduating in 2004, she attended CIA’s Napa County campus in St. Helena, Calif. There, she earned a certificate in baking and pastry. In 2007, she returned to Hyde Park for her bachelor’s degree in hospitality management.

Her career trajectory has taken her from pastry positions at Westchester Country Club, in Rye, N.Y., to working under a prestigious cake designer in Brooklyn, to Winged Foot Golf Club in Mamaroneck, N.Y., to Addison Reserve, where she worked under the tutelage of Chef Zach Bell. He became a mentor and helped toughen her up for the real world in the food business.

On a typical day at Shorebreak, you might find Iannelli baking banana bread, her homemade granola, or creating signature cream cheese spreads. Meanwhile, when her husband isn’t at the hotel, you can find him by his wife’s side as he prepares breakfast sandwiches, while Evelyn Wines and Kim Hallenbeck work the front of the house. Meanwhile pastry sous chef, Cassie DeShong assembles one of the cafe’s most popular pies, an homage to a Girl Scout cookie. The concoction consists of a fresh baked tart shell with French coconut filling, a layer of chocolate ganache topped with dulce de leche, finished with toasted coconut and whipped cream.

“I like baking for people,” Iannelli says. “It makes me happy because I think it’s going to make someone else’s day when they eat it.”