We started this morning by making pâte à choux. Water and shortening is put into a pot, and brought to a rolling boil. Then we dump in sifted flour and stir until the flour has absorbed all the water and has gelatinized. It’s done when it clears the side of the pot. To avoid a...
Thanks to great prices at BookCloseouts.com and an irresistible impulse to collect reading material, I now own the following:Forever Summer by Nigella LawsonOn Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen by Harold McGeeJacques Pépin Celebrates by Jacques PépinThe Sec...
Filling looked lumpy. Strong coconut flavour (Aroy-D makes thick coconut milk). Caramel too runny and cloying. Crust holds up well. Deteriorates rapidly after second day.
Soft bread rolls was the goal of today’s class. We began by dissolving fresh yeast with water to form a yeast slurry. All of the breads I’ve made in the past used instant yeast or active dry yeast, so this was something new for me. Fresh yeast is faster acting than the others ...
Crème caramel was our first product today. Chef began by demonstrating how to melt sugar to produce the caramel. After heating a pot on the stove, he tossed in granulated sugar a bit at a time, waiting until the previous handful had melted. This, he explained, along with a min...
The first thing our instructor said this Saturday was that of the ten classes, today’s would be the most boring. The session would be devoted to cake decorating exercises. We began by learning how to use the mixers to make royal icing. The icing is a mixture of water, meringue...
