Advanced Pâtisserie: Week 3, 4, 5, and 6! : )

So, most of you probably realize at this point that I am stuck in my house on lockdown because the Boston Marathon Bomber is on the loose in Watertown where I live. Yeah, yikes!!! But anyway, I figure since I am trapped in here for the day (no school wahoo!) that I have no more excuses not to update my blog! SO...here ya go! And for all those other Bostonians, maybe browsing through these pictures will keep you entertained while you are on lockdown! : )

 

Tart Tatin

What the whaa you ask? Tart Tatin. It is an upside-down tart involving puff pastry, apples, and caramel! This plating also includes a quenelle scoop of ice cream, chocolate rings, a sugar spear, gastrique sauce, raspberry sauce, and candied hazlenuts.

 

This plating was really quite fun and kind of tricky to keep standing, as you can see, since it has very vertical elements. The tart tatin is easy to make, you just fill a tin with caramelized sugar, place a peeled and cored apple on top, stuff it with cranberries and hazlenuts, lay a round cutout of puff pastry on top and throw it in the oven!

 

The chocolate rings were probably the hardest part of this plating! I don't think I have explained tempering chocolate yet on this blog but man, is it a process! So, the gist of it is that you have to heat chocolate up (115 to 126 degrees generally) to melt all the different fats and crystals in it. Then you must cool it (around 82 to 84 degrees) in order to align the crystals to form as many of the most stable type as possible. Then you must warm the chocolate up to a good working temperature (88 to 90 degrees). Tempered chocolate cools nice and hard and will have a good snap, which means you can use it to make all sorts of stuff for decorating...like rings! Anyway, to make the rings you spread out the tempered chocolate into a thin even coating and allow it to partially cool. Then you punch out the rings and wait until it completely cools, then just pop them out, course being careful not to break them. Then you just glue them together with melted chocolate.

 

 

Poached Pear

 

This next one was fun to plate and pretty...but I'm not a fan of the poached pear. The ice cream on the other hand.... : P mmmmmmm. Anyway, at this point the sugar spear is old news but this plating also involved a sugar starburst which was made by caramelizing some sugar, once again, pouring it onto a piece of parchment paper, then dragging it out with a metal spatula to create points! And there you go...a nice pretty edible ice cream dish!

Along with the sugar starburst, sugar sphere, and poached pear, there was cinnamon creme diplomat, cranberries, candied hazlenuts, and a cinnamon phyllo nest.

 



Chocolate Teardrop

 

This is a teardrop dish/shell made with tempered chocolate filled with white chocolate mousse, ginger snap cookie crumbs, dacqouise, and dark chocolate mousse topped with an orange supreme and a raspberry. On the plate is piping chocolate, chocolate sauce, raspberry sauce, and passion fruit sauce.

I love how this one turned out and it was also fun to make! But the chocolate leaf and cigar were quite tricky to get right!

 

 

Chocolates and Chocolate Box

 

By the time we got to this assignment a lot of people were already sick of tempering chocolate, because it is so time consuming, but not me. I mean, we had all that chocolate available to us to nibble on and smell all through class! Who wouldn't love that?! : ) Anyway, here are some pics of chocolate making and finished candies...

preparing the shells

 



 

filled with chocolate ganache

 

raspberry white chocolate filled bon bons

 



FIN! : )

 

We've got some marbled fudge, brown sugar toffee, orange truffles, coconut truffles, hazlenut truffles, dark chocolate truffles, raspberry white chocolate truffles, solid chocolates, caramels, passion fruit truffles, and mint truffles!



And here is my chocolate box!!! : )

 

The box itself was of course made using tempered chocolate. See how shiny it is? : ) The piping was done using piping chocolate (melted chocolate with a few drops of water added to it) and the roses were made with modeling chocolate (chocolate and corn syrup).

 

So, when I went up to get this graded I was nervous and was hoping for a 100% since I had worked so hard on it. Anyway, I got up to Chef G and first thing he says is "So, what do you think is wrong with it?" I was confused, thinking there was something obvious, so I respond with "Mmm I don't know. The chocolate is definitely tempered because it has a nice snap and I can see it is shiny and I have all the required chocolate inside..." After a long silence all he said was, "you're right, there is nothing wrong with this." Then he wrote down 100 on my grading sheet! Then he told me it was superb! : ) Now, you have to understand Chef G. He is quite a funny guy, always crackin stale jokes in class, but he is also kind of unpredictable and sometimes hard to please! So it is kind of an accomplishment when you can force a compliment out of him!

 



 

 

Creative Plating Final Assignment:

 

The Golden Hot Fudge Brownie Sundae

 

Chocolate fudge brownie layered with dark chocolate orange ganache, orange fudge swirl ice cream, and a fresh raspberry. Includes an extra scoop of French vanilla ice cream in a boule de chocolat revealed when raspberry hot fudge is poured at tableside. Topped with sprinkles and walnuts and finished with dark chocolate decorations, orange zest, raspberry sauce, and orange sauce.

 

I didn't include this in the menu description but my dessert was also decorated with edible gold leafing. Yep, 23k gold : P

 

Guess what grade I got on this?!?! 100%! Wahoo! I got a 100's on most of my other platings but this one was extra rewarding because I worked so hard on it! I started planning and researching design and recipe ideas 4 weeks ahead of the due date! And in the end, it came out exactly how I had imagined it would so I was extremely happy!!! : ) : ) : ) Also, Chef G told me this could sale for $30! Could you imagine? $$$ hahaha



I couldn't resist putting some gold leafing flakes in the chocolate jimmies and walnuts to sprinkle onto the sundae! : )

 



 

This is my boule de chocolate after I poured on the raspberry hot fudge...the top layer of the chocolate sphere melts away, revealing the ice cream inside!

 



Devoured. : ) (good wasn't it Mackenzie?)

That is one costly walnut bit. : )

So here is the chocolate sphere in action...

 

These were the extra brownies, ice cream rectangles, and golden chocolate plates, so I set them up for my roommates to enjoy. They are so lucky to have me! ; ) 

This is me working on my plating during class. 

I can't tell you how nervous I was while I was putting this plate together! I don't really know why, I had it all planned out. I just wanted so bad for everything to go as planned! Luckily it did. Anyway you can tell in this pic how red my face was because I was so shaky and nervous! AH!

 



 

Here are some pictures of my classmates platings as well so that you can see some of the cool things people came up with! : ) : ) : )

 

I am so obsessed with this sugar twisty! So awesome!

 



This was one of my favorite plates. Nice and clean. And the coconut mousse was also ridiculously delightful!

 



 

My good friend Mackenzie's...so scrumptious!

 

 

Loved the creative way Michael did his flower!

The cutest and most creative flavored lil' cheesecakes you'll ever see! We've got vanilla and chipotle, strawberry and basil, and chocolate and bacon.

Loved this one as well! So refreshing even just to look at!

 

Nice and clean. I love how the sauce was plated!

  

Some pretty sugar decorations!

 

One of my classmates candied rose petals...so pretty I had to take a picture!

My friend Amy's little chocolate mousse and strawberries turned out perfect. It was super tasty!