Intro to Pâtisserie and Baking: Week 3 and 4



I have been in school for 4 whole weeks now! : ) I can't even believe i have been here that long already. time is passing so quickly! anyway, i am loving school! here's what we've made in the past two weeks:

(note: do not look at on an empty stomach)

 

MUFFINS!

 

these ones are raspberry which i made with my group in class. guess what? they tasted NASTY! want to know why? the recipe in our booklet was wrong and called for too much salt and baking powder. ha ha ha. we get wrong recipes a lot in this class.......remember those blue macaroons from my last post? yeah. did you also wonder why they had holes all over them? the recipe was wrong. don't worry, i redid them and have pictures below.

 

these are chocolate chip muffins that i redid with some fellow classmates in the practice kitchen after the ones in class failed. yeah, see how some of them don't have many chocolate chips on top? well, one chef walked in while we were sprinkling chips on the top of our muffins and he grabbed handfuls of large chips and started piling them on!...so they sunk in. nothing irritates me more than when people interfere with projects i am working on. um, but that's ok, they tasted good anyway : )

 

this is a blueberry muffin loaf i made for my second practical. 

MACAROONS!...again.

 



i know these look like hamburgers but they aren't. they are macaroons. they are what macaroons are supposed to look like when you add the right amount of sugar. : )

 oh and these are orange flavored with chocolate ganache filling. delicious!

 

APPLE STREUSEL

i made two of these apple pies in the practice kitchen one day last week. some lucky girl got a whole pie to take home! anyway, the practice kitchen is awesome and i go in there usually about 3 times per week. it is fun to bake in a kitchen that isn't crowded and do whatever i want! : ) 

 i redid this apple pie because the one my group did in class didn't turn out because we were finishing right as class was ending and we ran out of struesel...so we piled cinnamon and sugar on the top...it wasn't very pretty...

 

FRUIT TARTS!

aren't these the cutest? they were so fun to make! and they just look so pretty! oh and i just had a thought, you should know what we make every element of every recipe ourselves. so, our group made these shells and the pastry cream inside. we did not, however, grow the fruit. : } but we did slice them and i decorated these four! 

 

 

 

 

 we also made a big one, but i don't have a picture of it quite yet. i will include it on another post when i get the pic from my teammate!

 

CHEESECAKE!

(heather, you would have died if you ate this. so good.)

this cheesecake involved lemon juice and lemon zest, but our group used orange instead. holy cow. orange cheesecake is the best cheesecake! 

PATE A CHOUX!

(what's pate a choux you ask?...)

 



swans filled with whipped cream and pastry cream! 

eclairs! my absolute favorite (next to croissants. once i learn them both i can drop out of culinary school because i will have no need for it anymore...just kidding of course.) 

cream puffs! 

pari brest. no this is not a giant doughnut, it is much much better. anyway, it was created and named for a bicycle race in paris in 1891. it is meant to represent a bike wheel. 

 

 

 

don't even try to tell me that these aren't the cutest eclairs and creams puffs you have ever seen! i actually made all of these delicious pastries in the practice kitchen on my own because the ones my group made were not picture worthy...not our fault though!...the oven temperature for the oven our pan was in in class was too low so ours didn't puff up. they didn't look as cute but they still tasted good. anyway, so i went in to the practice kitchen and remade these and the chef in there told me to make mini's...so we piped a few out and guess what? there is actually filling in them! SO CUTE! ahhh

 

 

APPLE STRUDEL!

mmmmmmm... 

oh and i just thought of one thing...you know how i said earlier we make everything ourselves? well, we did not make the dough we use to wrap these babies up with. it is called filo dough and is actually impossible to make by hand! it has to be made by machinese because it is so thin!...seriously, when we pick it up to layer it it looks just like tissue paper. so weird.

 

 

ok folks, that's that! my 3rd and 4th week. on friday we made creme brule but we still need to finish them off by burning the sugar on the top! i will add pictures up in my next post.

 

also i started a job this week! i now work at a place called Panificio's! it is fun so far, my boss lets me bake whatever i want to sale!...and i get paid to do that. i feel so lucky lately. i go to the funnest school and have the coolest job!

 

alright! shabbat shalom! if anyone wants to try any of my goodies come visit me in boston! : )  ...it will be worth it i swear.

Intro to Pâtisserie and Baking: Week 1 and 2!

 so, it has been 2 weeks since i started school and I LOVE IT! : ) it is very tiring and time consuming, but is so fun! we didn't waste any time our first week and started baking on our second day. everybody in the class was put into a group of about three and we do all of our baking in class with our group. luckily, i got a great group and all our stuff has turned out pretty good! here are some of the things we've made:

spritz cookies

 

 

 

chocolate chip macadamia nut cookies



 

brownies with chocolate ganache

our second week was much more stressful. i had two exams and one practical all in one day. the exams were pretty easy and the practical was chocolate chip cookies, so it wasn't very hard at all. the only thing that is stressful about it really is that our class is so crowded and table space and bowls are hard to come by...but that's what makes it exciting i guess. anyway, here is the stuff we made this week! : )

 

biscotti

french meringue macaroons

almond macaroons

icebox cookies

biscuits

blueberry pie

apple pie

Two Things.

First, I need to post my last two wedding cakes!!! : )

In August two of my very best friends got married to each other!...and I got to make their wedding cake! : )

the most cake i have ever made! that bottom layer was 14"!!! this thing was HUGE 

all stacked and dirty iced 

froooostin 

DONE! let me tell you, buttercream is the way to go! it is so much easier than fondant and also tastes a lot better!...oh and it looks pretty as well! 

: ) : ) : ) 

This next one i made for my friend Laina in May before I left for Tanzania for the summer!

ready to be decorated! 

...just starting 

so many pearls!!!!!!!!

 

 

each pearl was placed one by one with royal icing...i wish i knew how many i used! 

 i remember i started this at like 9 pm and this picture was taken sometime the next morning...see how it's getting light outside through that window? but don't worry, all nighters aren't boring when you watch the whole 4th season of prison break! : )

DONE! 

at the reception!

 

 

Second, this blog is now not only about cakes but also my adventures in culinary school....cause guess what?!?! I START TOMORROW! Just in case you didn't know, i now live in Boston and am going to Le Cordon Bleu for Patisserie and Baking. So I will keep you updated on any new and exciting things i am learning and creating! : )

...special surprise.

so, i finally have enough confidence in my cake skills to include on this blog the first cake that i ever decorated. i was super excited to make this birthday cake for my boyfriend at the time and so i looked up a recipe for fondant on cake central. well, i ended up finding this recipe that had great reviews (what an absolute joke) and i decided to try it because everyone said it was so easy. the recipe involved marshmallow fluff and a few other ingredients. marshmallow fluff. really? yeah, it didn't work. who came up with that recipe? the fondant over the cake looked decent in the beginning and was smooth but over time it just kept creeping and stretching down the cake. like it was melting. the loops for the bow on the top wouldn't even dry! fondant is supposed to be soft but it has to get kind of hard too or it just doesn't work properly!

one last thing i have to defend myself on...the polka dots and color scheme. oh my heck. i can't really explain myself out of that dotsy gift wrapping, i mean, i guess i just hadn't seen many ideas to spark my cake decorating imagination yet and that was all i could come up with. as far as the colors...i am going to blame those choices on the fact that i only owned the basics in my wilton gel dye kit.

so...after feeling completely embarassed and ashamed by this cake ever since i created it, i am finally going to just post it on here and finally let everybody see it! ha...the funny thing is, in hindsight this cake is a good representation of my relationship with the boy i made it for: it had some good parts but mostly looked like a disaster from the outside and with all the ingredients that were involved it was destined for failure.

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may the future be filled with desirable cakes and even more desirable men! : )

cake catch up!

so...i have been slacking on updating this blog so here are some cakes that i have made since my last post! : )

this one was Heather's birthday cake!...it looked even cooler with the sparklers in it

this is a dummy cake i made at a Carrie's Cake class! it was a cricut class so i learned how to cut out those snowflakes and other things with my new cricut gum paste cutter!

this cake was for my cousin Abby's birthday. she turned two and she is a little princess : )

this was my cousin Jackson and Hunter's birthday cake! we even had some extra fun this year making cake balls : P mmm

and this cake i just did this week for my darlin friend Carissa! she is getting married in June but i will be in Tanzania so i won't be able to make her a wedding cake! : ( so i threw her a bridal shower instead and made her a cake anyway! : )

so while i have been away i have made all these cakes and have learned lots of new techniques by researching online and experimenting! in a few weeks i will be making a cake for Amanda's welcome home/me and Heather's going away party and then a wedding cake for my friend Laina! I will have to take a break from May to August though because i will be gone gone gone to Africa...but when i return home i will be making Manda's wedding cake and then hopefully be heading to Le Cordon Bleu Boston to go to culinary school for baking and pastry! : ) : ) : )