Week 3:Pate a Choux

After spending two weeks working on bread (that's 32+ hours), I was certainly ready to move on to more traditional pastries. This week we learned pate a choux, the dough used for cream puffs, eclairs, etc etc. I had made it once before in my recreational course, so I was excited to make something that I had actually done at least one before.

But, after getting last pick for this week's lab, I was left with the most complicated recipe. It turned out to be a great thing for me. After having the rug pulled out from under me at work earlier in the day, it took a project like this to get mind on anything other than work.

I was tasked with making the St. Honore (name for the patron saint of pastry chefs!). The dessert consists of several components, which is what makes it such a time consuming project.

First, I started by making puff pastry for the first time. Because this is only used for the base of the cake, we made a 'blitz puff' (insert joke here) which was less time consuming:

Puff pastry, rolled out after. After being chilled it's cut into rounds

Next up is the Pate a Choux itself. Its actually a surprisingly simple recipe. After boiling the water, butter and salt you add it to the flour in a mixer. The trickiest part is adding eggs one at a time until you get the desired consistency:

Pate a Choux

At this point you can pipe the pastry into a variety of shapes, such as eclairs.

You also have to option to add cheese (and other fine, savory items) to the dough and either bake them or fry them into blintzes. The blintzes were too delicious to be willing to put one down to take a photo-sorry folks:After cutting out the puff pastry rounds, you pipe the pate a choux in 2 stacks that trace the shape. The final baked product looks like this (I preferred the mini guys):

Next came the most petrifying moment of the night-making caramel. which only requires sugar, water, and corn syrup. But with temps at 220, dipping the cream puffs into the pot was a bit scary. That, and the dish you are left with.


 The final step is to fill the shell with a cream made of pastry cream, with gran marnier and whipped cream folded in (yum!): Here's the final product:

Here are some other pate a choux creations completed by my classmates:

Chocolate Filled Cream Puffs with Vanilla Fondant

Profiteroles with Ginger Ice Cream and Chocolate Ganache

Cream Puff Swan

Divorce: Two Cream puffs, one coffee & one chocolate, held together by buttercream. 

This is the Paris-Brest, name for a bicycle race from Paris to Brest (not cause it's shaped like a boob, which was my original thought). It's baked with almonds and was filled with a hazelnut praline cream that was truly scrumptious

Paris-Brest

Probably the best named dessert of the night is the Religieuse, named so because allegedly, it looks like a nun. Chef Delphin insisted that the top cream puff not be filled so that it was 'empty like a nun's head. Gotta love a fresh french man with my sense of humor:

Stay tuned for Classic Doughs!

Weekend Baking: Gingered Carrot Cake Cookies

As we continue to learn more refined pastries in school, I find myself gravitating towards baking comfort foods on the weekend. Last weekend, in lieu of practicing breads like I should have, I decided to try this recipe for Gingered Carrot Cookies from the Brown Eyed Baker.
Plus, I needed an excuse to try the new mixer I finally broke down and bought:

Isn't she a beauty?

 Growing up with Jackie Wright, I didn't even know that brownies could be made from a box until I was in middle school. So, owning a mixer always seemed to be reserved for the lazy. But, after 3 weeks of recipes from a Master French Pastry Chef that involved a mixer, I finally felt I had permission to buy one. Plus, the few recipes I've made by hand have resulted in a right pectoral muscle akin to those Hulk arms they sell at toy stores.

But, I digress.

I was really excited to make these cookies, hoping they'd taste like carrot cake, just smaller in size. In reality, these cookies are much more like a scone. And to be honest, I preferred the batter to the final product. With the carrots, raisins, pecans and coconut, doesn't the batter look pretty?







The final product turned out to be much more like a scone than a cookie. Surprisingly, it also wasn't terribly sweet. Regis said they'd make a nice breakfast treat, and I agree. If you want to try these and home and want something a bit sweeter, I'd definitely add some more sugar. Also, I roasted the pecans but I'd suggest doing the same for the coconut. Finally, to prevent the raisins from drying out, I'd recommend soaking them in some rum to kick it up a notch.

Hope you enjoyed!

Non-pastry things I learned at Pastry school this week

In the immortal words of MatchBox 20-'it's 3 am and I must be lonely'. Having just returned from class, I'm unable to sleep despite exhaustion. This happens every night. Rational me wants sleep; but my body and head need about an hour to wind down before I can get my sleep on.

 As a result, here I am, sharing a few non-dessert things I've learned this week:

[*Disclaimer*-to the maternal figures in my life reading this blog: I apologize for any and all crude comments made henceforth. I promise to maintain my ladylike nature by vowing to never get acrylic nails or booty shorts, or pregnant in high school]

1. It is possible to live on pate a choux (cream puff dough). Cheese benets for dinner and a profiterole for dessert can start to seem like a 'normal' meal.

In the immortal words of Colin Farrell (in his straight to video film):
'This is breakfast, lunch, and motherf&ing dinner right here'

2. Alternatively, it is possible to go from 4:30pm to 3:00am without eating, drinking, or peeing.

3. There are many new, creative, ways one might considering torturing their foes; this can range from pouring hot caramel on them to chasing him/her with a blow torch. You may also consider constant dish duty.

4. In the 17th, dwarves would be put into large pies at ceremonies. Seriously: http://whatscookingamerica.net/History/PieHistory.htm. How messed up is that?

5. Finally, as it relates in my free-association heavy mind: you can find the world's tiniest contraceptive in pastry school:

 Good night, moon!

It's the little things

Scene: 11:30 pm, loopey after an evening of making creme puffs. While making whipped cream, Paul (more on him later) is dissatisfied with the texture of the product. 

Paul: Meh,  it's just a little....

Me: Loose?

Paul: I was gonna say gloopey

Me: Ah, so you like your women like you like your whipped cream?

Paul: Yes, gloopey.  

It's the little things like that that get me laughing after a particularly not fun week of work. Thanks to those who can put a smile on my face-no matter what :-)

Week 2, The Goods: Enriched Breads

"Bread, milk and butter are of venerable antiquity'. They taste of the morning of the world"~Leigh Hunt

Who knew that some British writer had come up with the concept of 'breakfast dessert' 200 years before I did? For those of you who aren't familiar with my strange eating habits, I'm a firm believer of dessert with every meal, breakfast included. It can range from a bite of chocolate to a piece of leftover birthday cake. The cereal/oatmeal/whole wheat toast is just a necessary evil before I can enjoy breakfast dessert with my coffee.

So I was thrilled to learn we'd be making brioche-a gateway to bring breakfast dessert to the masses! Shockingly, I've never actually had brioche before. During my 48 whirlwind trip to Paris I exclusively ate croissants and nutella crepes-there simply wasn't time for this brioche business.  But, I'm happy to report it is delicious. I can't wait to try it at home and use the leftovers as french toast!

Parisian Brioche:

After mixing the sponge of yeast, water, flour, you mix in the eggs, flour and salt until fully mixed. After that, comes the fun part; the butter. You take room temperature butter (and a lot of it) and squeeze it through your fingers bit by bit until it is fully incorporated. It's a fantastically icky, but fun, exercise.



As a class, we made a ton of variations: cinnamon raisin, dried fruit, chocolate hazelnut-yummy yummy!

Here's the final product-well worth all the waiting around:

Brioche for days

Dried Fruit Brioche

Cinnamon Sugar & Raisin, with Apricot Glaze

Next up I made baba, or savarin. There are two reasons I like this cake. 1. It is something I'll be able to say, even when drunk; alternatively it sounds like a Harry Potter House. 2. It is soaked in alcohol. After the cake bakes and slightly cools, you submerge it in either rum or kirsch (a cherry liquor).
Again, this was my first time tasting, nevermind making, this cake. But what can I say, I fall fast!

Here are a few other goodies whipped up by my classmates:

Pain au Lait

Kugelhopf (questionable spelling)

A slightly phallic Challah

The final products

Week 2, The Goods: Basic Breads

The subtitle of this post should be 'How to give yourself Celiac Disease in 72 hours'. I've eaten more bread than I thought humanely possible this week, so much so that I actually craved a vegetable when I got home at 1230 on Thursday night. But, then I had a glass of wine and quickly got over it.

This week's labs started with Basic Breads-which are essentially yeast breads with stuff in it (stuff here being cheese, seeds, nuts, etc etc). They also use a starter, or a liquidly bubbly tub of flour & water, which help give them a lighter structure. Jaimie and I partnered up to make the following:

Red Pepper and Olive Bread:
My love affair with olives is still pretty fresh, so I jumped at the chance to make this bread. We made some basic rolls, as well as the 'daisy' shape using a pastry ring. Finally, our instructor showed us the 'fougasse' technique-flattening out the dough and cutting in decorative designs. It's pretty, but I don't really get the point for actual consumption. Furthermore, I was brought back to my anxiety-ridden, December days in 2nd grade when I *could not* manage to cut a pretty snowflake. It's ok, I'm almost over it.

Next up is Chestnut Bread:

Petit Carres Dodus

Now, I'm not sure why you'd want to eat a roll with a chestnut in the middle, but when Delphin tells me to 'blanch those nuts' I respond ' Yes, Monsieur'. And I try really hard not to giggle.

We also used kitchen scissors to cut slits in the dough, flipping them inside out to create this shape. Seeing my work next to my instructor's demo was a nice slap in the chestnuts. 

Finally, we made some benoiton-essentially a sweet Italian bread. Since neither of us were fans of anise, we used cinnamon & nutmeg, and found some poached pears in the fridge (yum!). The result was a delicious smelling twist. However, as soon as my partner pointed out that the pastry cream and diced poached pears looked like bacon and eggs, I lost my appetite. Ah well, there's always next time, and perhaps a bit of foresight.





While I didn't make this garlic and parsley bread, it was too delicious not to share. Here you can see the 'folding book' technique used to incorporate the ingredients into the dough:

And the final Product:

Last, but most certainly not least, were the cheese balls. The official instruction given to form these little bundles of joy were to 'shove the cheese up their butts'. There is also melted gruyere on top, which made for a pretty intoxicating smell. As a class, we put down a pan of these suckers in no time.

I've earnestly considered making these and freezing them for the next time I'm drunk--too much?

Stay tuned for enriched breads!

The Chocolate Touch

Monday evening en route to pilates class, I found chocolate on my sports bra. I wish I was making this up.

Normally, I'd be ashamed to admit that I've been known to head to Dunks post-workout (that's Dunkin' Donuts for you people not from the Northeast) to get a Boston creme donut. I try to wait in line in an non-ironic way as I impatiently tap my running sneakers, in anticipation of indulgence. But, given that this week's seminar was about chocolate, it seemed rather topical to share with you.

Maybe he has great grandkids?

A 3 hour seminar on chocolate sounds heavenly, no? Our instructor was a new grad from BU with a degree in gastronomy, so the seminar was a bit history-dense. But, the girl was a chocolate and coffee major, and I just can't hate on a woman who specializes in two of the great loves of my life. A few interesting tidbits I picked up:

-Chocolate was only drunk (not eaten) until the late 19th century. Some cultures sweetened the drink with corn. barf.
-Randolph Lindt, Swiss chocolatier, is largely responsible for this revolution with his 'conching' of chocolate; he turned the chocolate on itself for 3 days in a cylindrical container, making the chocolate ultra smooth. .Imagine having HIM on your dance card back in 1855.
-White chocolate has the highest percentage of butter cream-or the fat of the cocoa plant. No wonder I love it so much.

We tasted about 15 different chocolates that night, resulting in a rather large belly ache. The 99% chocolate tasted somewhat like clay, I definitely do not recommend it to you dark aficionados. One of the cooler demonstrations we did was on the concept of 'terroir' or 'land'-the concept being you can taste the earth from which a product is derived (used more heavily in wine). We tasted 4 chocolates made by the same company and with the same cocoa content-the results were pretty remarkable. If you are ever feeling dorky and indulgent, I'd suggest you give it a try!

One last thing: I learned about this company called Taza in Union Square, which also recently got a shout out in Daily Candy.  It's an economically sustainable product that also buys directly from cocoa farmers in the DR-giving them a larger piece of the pie. Anyone want to go take a tour with me? Also, their drinking chocolate was DELICIOUS-I'd suggest giving it a try!

Fall Has Flung

As I kick and scream at the thought of summer being over, the one saving grace is the return of perhaps my favorite dessert: apple crisp. Don’t get me wrong, I do love the fall, wearing my new boots, and the damn foliage that people travel so far to see. But that first dip in temperature each season makes my heart hurt.

To console myself and my first weekend not spent at Crane’s Beach, I went fruit picking with the lovely Katie and Danielle. We drove out to the Shelburn Farm in Stow, where both apples and peaches were available for picking. I’ve lived in MA for 25 years and did not know up until this point that peaches grew in this state; for the first time my commitment to the film ‘A League of Their Own’ has lead me astray.  Of course, we also sampled the freshly fried cider donuts covered in cinnamon sugar as well, and I’d suggest the mini road trip for those alone.

The breathtaking Ms. Shea

After picking a peck of both Peaches and Cortland apples, I realized I had WAY too much fruit for my two person apartment.  Katie showed us how to make peach jam, which was awesome, except I realized I don’t know what I’d eat the peach jam with. Instead, I found this recipe from the Brown Eyed Baker (bitch stole my name) for Peach Crumb Bars:

Peach Crumb Bars, Sorry forgot to take a pic post-cutting

They were pretty simple and went like hotcakes at work. I will say that the fresh peaches made the bottom a bit mushy, so I’d suggest using about 2/3 the base for the bottom. I also think some toasted slivered almonds would make a great addition to the top and would contrast nicely with the soft peaches.

Saturday night, Reggie and I tackled apple crisp. He has the amazing ability to peel an apple in one strand, which cut down on prep time quite a bit. The crisp was delicious, and we did some serious damage to the pan that evening. 

Slaughtered Apple Crisp

Sunday I also decided to tackle baguettes once again (given last week’s debacle in class). The dough was super tough (we used a kitchen aid to mix in class) and I seriously think I may have bruised my hands kneading/punching the dough (is that possible?). After folding the baguettes, I forgot the crucial step of rolling them out. Hence, the funky shape. But amazingly they tasted pretty good! I also played around with the washes-you can see the different between the water (crustier bread) and the egg yolk/milk combo (darker color, but softer crust).  I also still had some issues with the scoring; maybe a year from now I’ll be able to make a loaf of bread.

As I continue to warn my retail clients about upcoming seasonality (Christimas is coming? Sales go up? No shit, Sherlock!) I can’t help think about my own upcoming gifts. Given the amount I baked this weekend, you can all feel free to buy my gift certificates to Lane Bryant this Christmas season.