How sweet 'Spike' is

When Tucson dessert diva Karen "Spike" Ames set out to build a bread pudding for Montana Avenue restaurant, she didn't just soak some stale bread and raisins in milk and sugar and eggs, then bake it.

Instead, the Fox Restaurant Concepts pastry chef combined pieces of eggy brioche, vanilla custard, and sour cherries cooked in simple syrup, and baked that. Then she concocted a maple bourbon sauce of maple syrup and two kinds of bourbon — one smoky, the other not. Candied pecans and vanilla-flavored, lightly whipped cream decorate each meltingly sinful bite.

"I generally make stuff I'd like to eat," Ames said of her food one recent afternoon at Wildflower restaurant, her base. "I don't ever want to be above my guests. . . . We want it to be comfortable, fun, but with a little bit of an edge to it."

From the day 10 years ago when she was the first employee hired by a new restaurant called Wildflower, to the recent opening of Zinburger, the 24th eatery in the burgeoning Fox empire, the 36-year-old known to all as Spike Ames has defined desserts for young pastry chefs who have spread her influence to at least four states.

But for Tucson diners, Ames is the woman who creates sophisticated knockout desserts that neatly combine comfort food with the professional flare that can make eating out a delicious adventure.

"She has had influence in every part of the sweet side of Fox Restaurant Concepts," said Christopher Cristiano, the Fox vice president and chef who landed Ames back in 1997.

At Zinburger — the new upscale hamburger haven located in the former Bistro Zin quarters — diners are offered a milkshake and dessert menu that is a sort-of Spike's greatest hits. Her signature desserts — vanilla crème brûlée, bananas foster, even the killer chocolate Bars of Zin from the late bistro — appear here as new-fashioned soda-fountain-style shakes. A gimmick? Sure. But the results taste terrific.

"She might not be physically working at Zinburger, but she has had input in making our sweet section a success," Cristiano said. "We would do anything to save Spike — and many in town have tried to capture her in the last 10 years to come over and do dessert."

The woman behind the plaudits is an avowed chocolate addict who is frequently mistaken for a hairstylist, courtesy of a fashion sense that includes full makeup and bright purple clogs — as well as a black cap covering her dyed-red hair — in the kitchen. Caffeine is her major vice — so much so that restaurant lore claims she is on a first-name basis at every Starbucks in town.

The baristas call her Spike. Ames blames her mentor, former restaurateur and radio host Alan Zeman, for attaching the moniker in honor of her rooster comb of variously colored hair. Cristiano says the name stuck because of her habit of spiking every dessert with some sort of alcohol. "I've called her Karen probably a dozen times in 10 years," Cristiano said.

Ames concurred. "I don't even introduce myself by my real name anymore."

The Bridgeport, Conn., native and youngest of three children moved to Tucson during elementary school. "I was always interested in food, always," Ames recalls.

Her Canadian-born mother came from a large farming family and cooked and gardened constantly. By the time she was 12, the future Spike was peeling potatoes in a Canadian summer camp run by an aunt with a catering business. At age 16, she took over the camp kitchen, bossing a batch of much older employees. "Which was weird," she said.

When she graduated from high school, Ames applied to the Culinary Institute of America, a premier U.S. school for serious would-be chefs. Then she met Zeman — and took what turned out to be a permanent detour directly into professional kitchens.

Zeman was the chef at the Sheraton El Conquistador resort — now in the Hilton chain — and had an active apprenticeship program when Ames, a teenager, applied for a job in his kitchen.

"She came in, just this little kid, with her mom, for the interview," Zeman said. "At first, I just saw a naive, vulnerable person that hopefully I could mold and do things the way I wanted them done. . . . But she caught on fast and was a quick learner. She's not full of herself. She is very much into learning and figuring out new ways to do things. She really developed a very natural talent and was always very creative."

Zeman persuaded Ames to postpone culinary school until she had more practical kitchen experience under her apron. She's still waiting — although she did eventually enroll in some short-term courses at CIA's Napa Valley campus. "They were embarrassing," Ames said. "I was paying $3,000 a week to make cookies."

When Zeman moved on — first to Anthony's in the Catalinas, then to his own now-closed Fuego, he eventually brought Ames along. At Fuego, he talked her into trying breads and pastries.

"What's funny is, she was so insecure about it. 'I could never do that.' 'What were you thinking?' " Zeman recalled. "Look at her now."

Ames now has a firmly established reputation for desserts that are sophisticated and pretty without being far out. Edible orchids often decorate her creations; her bill for top-of-the-line fresh berries is mind-blowing; she won't make anything with artificial sweeteners, even by special request.

Her desserts, like that bread pudding, may call to mind an old-fashioned favorite. But they attain a level of elaboration few home cooks would dream of trying. Fruit crisp, for example, is normally about as homey a dessert as there is — just fruits baked with a crumble topping. This fall's seasonal crisp at Wildflower included vanilla-poached pears, fresh berries, golden raisins, dried berries, cinnamon and black pepper, and a hazelnut topping. Crème fraîche gelato topped each serving.

Unlike many pastry chefs who are drawn to the artistry and relative autonomy of cooking a course that has little to do with the rest of the kitchen, Ames even today is torn between line cooking and desserts. "When I'm baking, I want to cook. When I'm cooking, I want to bake," she said.

At Wildflower, she's involved with both. During the main dinner rush, Ames can frequently be found working as the expediter — the person who makes sure each order goes out with the proper dish and sides, the appropriate garnish, and the overall presentation that it is supposed to have.

She reverts to desserts after the rush.

She has learned — and is still learning — to trade off some of her pastry-making to others. "To me, it's pretty personal. I take everything way too seriously. . . . But I don't really think perfection exists anymore. . . . I'm less vocal about sometimes not everything being exactly the way I would have wanted it."

These days, Ames has a certain settled air. She is spending less time traveling to new Fox ventures around the West and more at her base at Wildflower. Two years ago, she bought herself a home in Catalina, where her sister is a neighbor. She has room to play Frisbee with the three dogs that spend most of her working hours at her parents' house near Wildflower, and has taken up bird-watching. Horseback riding lessons or gardening may be next.

"I think her dedication and her loyalty is by far some of the best in the business — and it shows, " Cristiano said. "Spike is part of our culture."

• Name: Karen "Spike" Ames.

• Age: 36.

• Family: Single with dogs.

• Home: Catalina.

• Culinary school: Culinary Institute of America courses.

• Favorite color: Purple.

• Car: White Land Rover Discovery – "I love my car."

• Favorite holiday: Thanksgiving.

• Last meal she'd like to have: A big slab of Valrhona bittersweet chocolate.