Just a little update!

Hey everyone!

I just wanted to say thank you to all of you who have been looking at my blog! It means a lot to me that I have so many of you supporting me on this journey! A couple people have said that they tried to comment on some of the post and it did not work. I tried a couple different versions. I was talking to one of my cousins tonight and asked her to try to comment to see if I fixed it. If you choose to comment, which obviously you do not have to, there is a drop down menu with a couple different options. If you choose the one that says name, it will work!

Thank you and cannot wait to show you more of what I learn in the next couple of weeks!

~Angelina

Sugar Showpiece

    This week was full of blood, sweat, and tears. Well maybe just some blisters. Sugar showpiece week was a really tough week, but we all got through it and I am so proud of my whole class. I think that everyone did an amazing job!

Let me tell you a little bit about making a sugar showpiece. After figuring out what you want your showpiece to look like you melt together sugar, water, and glucose (and coloring if you choice), to a 165 degrees Celsius which is 329 degrees Fahrenheit. You are probably thinking that, that is extremely hot. Well it is! It is insanely hot.

 Once you pour it on the Silpat, you wait a little bit and start folding the outside(the cooling edges) to the middle. This helps that middle to start cooling as well. Just like the picture on the left.

Then you start pulling it and folding it on top like the picture shown on the right. You have to do this quickly or else is will get too cold. This is hard to do since your hands are on fire.

This is my showpiece! The roses look a little more orange than the do in person. I wanted to make yellow roses because they were my grandma's favorite! There is also a hummingbird hovering over the roses!

This is Chef Joel Reno's showpiece! I thought it was amazing!

These are all the showpieces everyone made!

Petits Fours:Week Two

Opera Cake

The Opera Cake is three layer cake soaked with a coffee syrup, filled with coffee buttercream and ganache. It almost tastes like tiramisu!

Madeleines

Espresso Tarts

The espresso tart is made with a chocolate dough and filled with an espresso mix that is almost like a ganache. Then it is topped with a chocolate mirror glaze.

     
           Macarons

These macarons were filled with a mango-passion fruit filling

Apple-Nougat Tart

Chocolate Financier

A financier is a sponge-like cake that usually contains almond flour along with pastry flour. This financier it topped with candied orange peel and Gianduja (hazelnut chocolate).

Fresh Fruit Tarts

 Almond Financier

These financiers had a raspberry baked in the middle of it. 

Coconut Rocher

When I first saw this,  I was not sure what it was going to be. I thought that it was going to be similar to a Ferrero Rocher, but then I realized that we were not in chocolate candy class so that couldn't be it...haha! 

The coconut rocher is actually what we call a macaroon! Another thing that I learned is that rocher is the French word for rock and that is how it got its name. When they were first made they were rolled into a ball and baked like that, unlike how we made them in molds!

Chocolate Macarons

They were filled with chocolate ganache.

Petits Fours:Week One

        What do you think when you hear petit fours? Little cakes with icing(well actually fondant) on them, right? That is what I thought as well. This past week we started petit fours class and learned that they are just mini desserts. Well, not just mini desserts but delicious desserts.

 

Dacquoise

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 This is a meringue type of cookie. It is a meringue with hazelnut powder folded in. They are filled with a hazelnut cream.

Paris Brest

A Paris-Brest is made with Pate a Choux. It is filled with a hazelnut pastry cream mixed with buttercream.  It was invented in 1910 cycling race from Paris to Brest. The shape represents the wheels of the bicycle. 

         Chouquette








A chouquette is made with pate a choux and is  just like a cream puff. This one is filled with a hazelnut pastry cream.

        
              Salambos


A salambos is another pastry made with pate a choux. It is filled with a kirsch pastry cream and topped with caramel.

          Eclairs















This is one of my favorite pastries! I am so glad we got to make these. These eclairs are filled with a chocolate pastry cream.

                                      

       Blueberry Tarts














These are the smallest tarts I have ever made, but they are so cute and easy to make. But, I do have to say they are not the same as when my mom makes them with blueberries from my grandpap's house.







This is a cookie with chocolate ganache and raspberry jam.

Apricot and Almond Cream Tart

                                                                                                   

 Macarons

These macarons are flavored with pistachio buttercream!

Plated Desserts:Week Two

                   
                     
                          Citrus
                   Soup

 The citrus soup was mad with made with orange and grapefruit supremes and the juice from the oranges and grapefruit. It was served with honey ice cream and a grapefruit tuile.

                   
           Almond 
                Flan






It may be called a flan, but it was really an almond flavored panna cotta. It was served with berry water and fresh fruits, and a Florentine tuile.

   
       
         Pear
           Financier








The warm financier was served with hazelnut ice cream and a pear chip.It would go very well with a vanilla bean,  french vanilla, or spiced ice cream.

                                                                             
                                                                         

                    Cappuccino
              Creme Brulee



This was one of my favorite desserts! I love creme brulee and coffee, so I heard I was we were making this I was so excited!! We added a spoon full of chocolate cream, topped with cream chantilly and a hazelnut/pecan biscotti.

    Red
        Wine
             Stew




Plums, cherries, blueberries and other fruits were cooked in red wine to create a light syrup.
It was served with spice ice cream and a Florentine tuile. I was so happy because this was the first time that I was able to actually scoop the ice cream in the egg shape like this. It took so many desserts and so many tries that I finally got it down. Once you think about the technique and practice at it, it actually is not as I thought it was. Practice makes prefect!




            Crepe 
                   Suzette





Crepe Suzette is traditionally made with an orange butter and a flambe with orange liquor





      Chocolate -Tea
              Cremeux







This dessert is made up of four components, a chocolate cremeux, lemon cream(with a citrus jelly), earl grey tea ice cream, and a chocolate streusel. It was supposed to have a chocolate sauce,but with so much chocolate and the chocolate cremeux had a very strong chocolate flavor we decided to leave it off.

I Scream, You Scream,We All Scream For Ice Cream!

Ice cream week was one of the most stressful weeks that we have had so far. Stress came from the time table that we had and of course the fact that we were new at not only making ice cream cakes, but ice cream in general. In the kitchen each person needs to always work fast, yet efficient. Well, this definitely applied to ice cream week. We had to work very fast and communicate with the rest of the class or else the ice cream would melt.




                                                                                             
                                                                                     Pineapple                     Surprise

  A hallowed out pineapple filled with candied pineapple, raspberry coulis, and pineapple sorbet.

        
   
  Vacherin 

                   Ice Cream

                                 Cake

 This is actually a sorbet cake! There are layers of mango and raspberry sorbet in between to meringue bases and topped with whipped cream!

Hazelnut 
          Daquoise
                       Ice Cream Cake

Chocolate and caramel ice cream in between to hazelnut meringue. The hazelnut meringue was very interesting. Since it had hazelnut TPT(nut flour and powdered sugar) and hazelnut powder it had a cake like feel to it.















                                 


Raspberry and
         Vanilla Parfait








This had a Raspberry coulis topped with a vanilla semifredo, plus chocolate ice cream and a sable dough cookie on the bottom.