Coen’s Meyer lemon polenta cake, with pickled blueberries, honeycomb, brown butter ice cream, and an almond-oat crumble. Photo courtesy.

When Molly Coen accepted a job at The Fig Tree back in June, she was to become the Elizabeth restaurant’s assistant pastry chef. At the time, Coen was living in Pittsburgh and planning to move to Charlotte at the end of September to start her career in the kitchen. When Sam Allen, the restaurant’s then-pastry chef and Coen’s boss-to-be, decided to focus fulltime on her upcoming mobile bakery Wentworth & Fenn, she called Coen’s old boss at The Ballantyne Hotel to ask if Coen was capable of taking the lead.

The answer was more than capable, and so Allen called and offered Coen the job of pastry chef.

Molly Coen, The Fig Tree’s new pastry chef. Photo courtesy.

At 22, Coen’s desserts already show talent and creativity. And while she may be young, she has spent most of her life on a path toward her current position. In sixth grade, she did a project about what she wanted to be when she grew up, and the answer was to attend Johnson & Wales and become a pastry chef.

She did just that, graduating from Johnson & Wales in November of 2017. A year later, she’s the pastry chef at one of Charlotte’s best restaurants. The Fig Tree has long been a favorite among diners for its knowledgeable staff, consistently good food, and stellar service. Allen took the dessert program to a new level with her creations, which often unite spicy and sweet. Before she left, Allen helped transition the restaurant’s pastry program to Coen. Coen still seems surprised and honored that Allen chose her to continue The Fig Tree’s pastry evolution, but is confident in her ability in the kitchen.

“They wouldn’t offer me something I couldn’t handle,” Coen says. “It was a good challenge for me; it is a good challenge for me.”

Coen slowly began adding her creations to the menu, phasing out Allen’s desserts one by one. The current desserts are entirely Coen’s. One example is a chocolate cremeaux with poached pears and a mascarpone diplomat cream. Coen says she tends to play tart and sour or salty against sweet elements in her desserts, something evident in her amaretto mousse tart. The dessert features an amaretto cake with tarragon-white chocolate ice cream and orange-marzipan crust.

“I have to make myself not eat it because I’ll eat the whole thing,” she jokes.

Since she learned that she’d become the restaurant’s pastry chef, Coen has been thinking up desserts. She says she’ll start pushing herself more as she’s been in the job longer. Coen often adds unexpected elements to desserts, like the pickled blueberries on the cake photographed above—something creative, but not weird enough to scare people away from trying it.

Sara Zanitsch, who owns the restaurant with her chef husband, Greg, says the staff already loves Coen. The feeling is mutual.

“It seems like I’m stepping into the family and being taken in well, so I’m excited to be there,” Coen says.

See the full dessert menu here. —Kristen Wile