Saturday, February 16, 2013

As most of you know last weekend the East Coast was hit with a huge snow storm! Well, while we were snowed in we were extremely productive!...we made endless amounts of Valentine's chocolates! : P My roommate Diana and I spent 3 days making these little cuties for all the people we love! : )
 
Just a preview of all the chocolates we created!...
 
Our favorite little fancies! These ones are raspberry and orange truffles.




 Our love bars, dark and milk chocolate filled with either heath bits or caramel.




Scrolled hearts, dark and milk chocolate filled with either peanut butter ganache or chocolate ganache.




XO's and lips. All made out of colored white chocolate. The lips are filled with mint chocolate ganache.


Peanut butter truffles.
 
 
Painting special messages on the chocolate molds.
 

Chocolates made with love <3

for my fake fiance...















 
The special chocolates all wrapped up!
 
 
 
 
 
 
All the chocolates sorted and prepared for boxing!

Into the boxes!






 
Hope everybody had a lovely Valentine's Day! <3


International Pâtisserie, Cake Formula, and Assembly: Week 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, AND 6!

Well, I still can't believe how behind I have gotten on my blog but I guess now you can just enjoy my whole 3rd block all at once! This class was pretty fun, we made a lot of different cakes and assembled lots of tortes! Also, I was lucky enough to get partnered with my friends Mackenzie and Hilda for the second time in a row! We like to call ourselves the dream team : ). Anyway, I still love school just as much as when I first started! There are some things I would change about how things are run at Le Cordon Bleu, but all in all I like it. I look forward to going to school most every day and have a lot of fun while I'm in class! Also, good news: I got a job in the practice kitchen this week! I am going to be a peer tutor, which basically means that I sit in the practice kitchen for 4 hours each day ready to answer questions students may have. Easy peezy! But I am allowed to bake while I'm in there, so basically I am going to be getting paid for baking in the practice kitchen...which I already do 3 times a week. : ) Oh and also I am still going to be working at Panificio's baking goodies for them. Oh and one last thing, I am past halfway done with school! Crazy right!? It actually makes me pretty sad. I am going to miss it a lot I just know it...but I won't think about that now. Anyway, that is just a little update for you. Here are the pictures!...

Crepes




Souffle


Frozen Souffle
 


Gateaux St. Honore
This is eclair dough filled with creme diplomat (which is pastry cream, whipped cream, and flavoring...we used orange), on top of a pate brisee, topped with chocolate and vanilla creme chantilly, and decorated with pulled sugar.



 

Bread pudding with an orange bourbon sauce

 Pots de Creme


Bavarian Torte
Layers of chocolate sponge cake, apricot and vanilla bavarian cream, and creme chantilly all wrapped in a ribbon sponge cake.


 


Charlotte Royale
Basically jelly rolls filled with raspberry bavarian cream.
...we had a little trouble with our sponge cake so this is not the prettiest one ever made...
 


Vanille Ice Cream


 Tiramisu
For those of you who don't know, this is ladyfinger sponge cake soaked in coffee syrup layered with mascarpone mousse, decorated with cocoa powder, all wrapped in more coffee-soaked ladyfingers. 



 
Raspberry Sorbet

 L'Opera
The layers go as follows: chocolate, layer of jaconde sponge cake, french coffee buttercream, another layer of sponge cake, whipped ganache, another layer of sponge cake, french coffee buttercream, then topped with ganache.


Chocolate Mousse Torte
Holy chocolate. This one was delightful! It is layers of chocolate butter sponge and chocolate mousse covered with chocolate glacage and decorated with whipped ganache and chocolates.


 

Dobos Torte
I think that this is one of the prettiest things we have made so far! It is just soooo nice looking. It tasted pretty good too, but not my favorite. It is six layers of dobos sponge cake with chocolate french buttercream in between then masked with toasted slivered almonds. The triangles are made from the last layer of sponge cake with caramlized sugar poured on top and then cut.








Black Forest Cake
This is a layer of devil's food cake, cooked cherries and vanilla creme chantilly, devil's food cake, chocolate creme chantilly, devil's food cake, then all covered in vanilla creme chantilly, and decorated with curled chocolate and cherries.






Sacher Torte
Two layers of sacher sponge with apricot marmalade in between and all covered with whipped ganache then chocolate glacage.




Carrot Cake
Obviously just layers of carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. These little carrots were made with marzipan.