Sydney's favourite pandemic pastry chefs prepare for a big Valentine's Day By CALLAN BOYS​

One of the silver linings of COVID, at least for anyone with a fondness of slices and tarts, has been the rise in dessert businesses delivering sweets from oven to door."We were getting a bit bored being in lockdown, so we started creating cakes and tarts for delivery," says former Rockpool pastry chef Isabella Leva who founded Earlwood bakery Pane Dolce with her partner John Laureti in 2020.Like many new dessert businesses to launch in the past two years, Pane Dolce is home-based, eliminating the barrier to entry of needing to sign a commercial lease."I'm very lucky to have a dad who works in construction, so he sectioned off a small space in the garage and we fitted it out with a deck ovens, a dough sheeter and big spiral mixer," says Leva. "It's definitely not what you would call a 'home kitchen'."Pane Dolce's morning buns and weekly-changing pastry boxes were big sellers through lockdown. "Then restrictions were lifted and whole cakes became popular because friends and family could get back together," says Leva.The business has been such a success that Leva and Laureti and now renovating an old shop in Lewisham to open a brick-and-mortar site next year.