Baking 211 Day 6

Today was loads of fun. Before I get to the fun part....I'll post my plate. I did not like this plate at all today. But, I ran out of time, and couldn't change anything. I made a raspberry chiboust and froze it overnight. For some reason, it did not set up all the way, so it was partially melted. I plated it with lemon madelines, and a blackberry compote sauce. The sauce thickened up way more than I expected it too. It didn't work for me like I wanted, which was part of the reason I don't like this plate. Even though I was frustrated with it, I recieved a lot of complements on the plate.

After plating, Chef passed around a bowl full of little pieces of paper. On each paper was written a different candy bar name. Chef told us that we had to take the flavors from that candy bar and make a dessert. She gave us all day to work on it, and we will have an hour tomorrow to finish it off and plate it.

I received Peanut Butter Cup!!! I was so excited when I saw that. I had a lot of fun with it. So many different ideas banged around inside my head, but I finally chose one.

Come back tomorrow to see what I made! =D

Read more...

Baking 211 Day 6

I absolutely love this class. It is my favorite so far. Chef said that a lot of people dread this class. I can not imagine why! It is amazing!

We started our day by making more garnishes for our upcoming plates.
Yesterday, we made a frozen dessert named Julianna. It is made of praline cream and vanilla cream with layers of Genoise (sponge cake) on the inside. We finished the desserts today with a glaze before plating them.
After each student presented her plate, we worked on a dessert for tomorrow. I got done early, so I tempered chocolate to make chocolate garnishes. I managed to get chocolate everywhere. It is so messy. I hate tempering chocolate, but it is something I need to get used too.

One thing I really do not like about this class, is that the school only provides round plates. There are no square, rectangle, or triangle plates. This morning, I convinced Kyle to let me borrow his square plate, just for one day.

I got loads of complements on my plated dessert. Everyone, including Chef, loved it. I am happy with the way it came out. =)

Yesterday, my partner and I made chocolate squares with a woodgrain pattern. I shingled those against the base of the cake. I used caramel and chocolate for the sauce. For garnish I used a poppyseed wafer, whipped cream, and a blackberry.

Read more...

Baking 211 Day 5

Today, each student plated a Monte Carlo. It is a frozen dessert made of almond cream, a meringue disk, a chocolate almond sponge cake, and apricot compote.

Here is my plate

While I was waiting on the other students to finish, I played around with some garnishes I had made.

The rest of the day, we made another frozen dessert we will be plating tomorrow. 

Read more...

Candy Cane Workshop

Kyle and I had a blast today learning to make candy canes. It really is so easy. Very doable at home.
They ran out of peppermint oil, so we used strawberry and lime to flavor our candy canes. Very sweet!

Sugar before it is pulled.

After it has been pulled

Candy Canes!

Yumm!

Read more...

Baking 211 Day 4

We didn't have time yesterday to make chocolate garnishes, so that is how we started our day today. I usually hate tempering chocolate, but I didn't mind it today. I had fun with it! After we finished making chocolate, sugar, and cookie garnishes, we plated the cakes we made for our practical last Monday. Chef critiqued each plate, and then we made a small dessert named Monte Carlo. It is a frozen almond cream cake with a meringue disk, an almond chocolate sponge disk, and an apricot compote on the inside. We are going to plate it Monday.

Chef is doing a candy cane workshop tomorrow. Both Kyle and I signed up. I can't wait! I love candy canes and we are going to have a blast learning how to make them!

plated dessert from today

Read more...

Baking 211 Day 1 Advanced Patisserie Techniques (Plated Desserts)

Today was possibly the best day of class so far. It was our first day of the plated dessert rotation. Each student got a "mystery basket". Each "basket" (it was really a half sheet pan) had three different flavors in it. Each student was instructed to come up with one plated dessert using all of the flavors.

My basket contained almonds, strawberries, and dark chocolate. Today showed me just how much I have actually learned. At first, I was a little stressed about the whole mystery basket thing, but I had a blast! It really surprised me.

I chose to make a Chocolate Genoise (Chocolate Sponge Cake) with Almond Mousseline (kind of like almond whip cream). I maseraded the strawberries in a bit of almond extract and sugar. I used the juice the strawberries made to soak each layer of chocolate Genoise.

It turned out pretty good. It was very almondy.

Even though it needs a lot of work, I got a lot of compliments on the plate.
Tomorrow we are working with chocolate! We are learning more sauces and garnishes. =)

Read more...

Baking 114 Day 15

No pictures from the past two days because we have been working on our entremet practical. We finished it today.

A Chef instructor from Le Cordon Bleu in Ottawa, Canada is going to be in and out of my classroom all week. He did a demo today on a very yummy looking strawberry cake. I talked to him a little yesterday while I was doing my practical. He is very nice, but kind of hard to understand because of his french accecnt.

He told my chef that my partner and I were making chocolate garnishes with mashed potatoes.
Chef Fernandez came to our table and said, "Why did Chef Herves tell me that ya'll were making garnishes with chocolate that looks like mashed potatoes?"

Jill and I: "What??!"
Chef Fernandez:"Is your chocolate too hard?"
Jill:"Oh! When he walked by, the chocolate wasn't completed melted. It still had lumps."
Chef Fernandez: "Oh ha-ha"


We start a new rotation tomorrow. Plated desserts! We start out the class with a mystery basket. I can't wait!

Read more...