Tarte Alsacienne

This is yet another apple tart...but this one is quite different. Firstly, we cooked the apples first. To do this, we cut them in wedges sauteed them in some butter and, once they were browned nicely, flambeed them in calvados. Flambe-ing is a bit scary the first time, but really cool! As the chef said, it's fancy pyrotechnics. Then we put them in a blind baked tart shell and poured a simple uncooked custard over them. We baked that until the custard was set, and voilà!

That really sounds much easier than it was. It wasn't the most difficult thing we've made, but it certainly wasn't easy. I suppose leaving out the rolling, docking, lining, and blind baking of the tart shell (not to mention making the dough) and the process for making the custard is what made this seem so much simpler. I digress.

This wasn't my favorite tart. It was really quite nice. The apples were wonderful and the crust was excellent. My problem was with the custard. It tasted really good, but I'm not sure about the texture. It was a little jiggly for my liking (but those of you who know me will know that I'm weird with textures.) Anyway, with the amount of tarts we are making in this unit, I can afford to be picky!

Baked Fruit Tart, con't

Here's the photo I promised. It looks a little rustic, rather than neat and clean like the other tarts we've made. I quite like it though!

Baked Fruit Tart

This fruit tart resembles the fresh fruit tart from last class, except it is baked. Basically it's a pâte sucrée crust filled with pastry cream (flavored with vanilla and a little kirsch) and topped with plums. Apparently any stone fruit works, as well as some other types. Then you put it in the oven and bake until the crust is golden and the fruit is cooked. So it's the same crust and similar filling--minus the crème d'amandes and with different fruits--as the fresh fruit tart had. And wow it couldn't be more different! Baking it like that makes a huge difference in the texture of the pastry cream and the flavors come together much more because the juices from the fruit do, to an extent, flavor the rest of the tart. Unfortunately, it wasn't as pretty as the fresh fruit tart, perhaps because I really needed an extra plum to fill in the center better or perhaps because a couple of my plums exploded a little, making it all look messy. Even though it didn't look quite as impressive as I would have liked, it certainly tasted excellent. And I suppose with food that's what counts!

By the way, I'm very proud of my little pastry class team--we work in teams of two to make some of the recipes, like cookie dough or custards, to save on time and ingredients. This is only the second time we've made pastry cream, which is a lovely stirred custard. The first time it came out quite well indeed; this time it came out nearly perfect! I'm very proud of the two of us!

P.S. It's quite late I'll upload the photo tomorrow after work.

P.P.S. We also made another type of apple tart, cookie dough--for cookies that we'll make next class to serve with our pots de crème--and even more tart dough! I'll write about that tart tomorrow or Wednesday morning.

Tarte Bourdaloue

A tarte bourdaloue is a pear and almond tart, and it is incredible! The crust is pâte brisée, which is flakey, buttery, and not very sweet. It's filled with the same crème d'amandes as we used in the fruit tart. Except, instead of a very thin layer, it's a nice thick one. And then on top, we put five pear halves, sliced and fanned. In between the pears are sliced almonds; they toast up all nicely when the tart is baked. Before baking, we coated the pears with melted butter and vanilla sugar so they caramelized really nicely. Then we just spread apricot glaze. This was incredible, if I do say so myself. The crust was close to perfect, the crème d'amandes was tender and delicious, the almonds on top were a wonderful complement to the almond in the tart, and the pears were tender and beautifully sweetened from the vanilla sugar and glaze.

Fresh Fruit Tart

Today in class we made two tarts and pots de crème au chocolat. We didn't actually get to finish the pots de crème, we will do that Monday. I can't wait until we do, they looked great! In the meantime, we did make and get to take home the two tarts. The first was a fresh fruit tart. We used the pâte sucrée shells we made last class. Then we filled them with freshly made crème d'amandes. We baked them. Unfortunately, the walls of my shell collapsed. Apparently I'd pulled them in a little too far when I trimmed the excess dough. I think I did it because my apple tart's walls had bent over the ring a little, making it difficult to take out of the ring, so I over compensated this time. Ah well, it was still going to taste good, but I was a bit worried about how it would look (and also how I'd "fill" it.) So when we filled them with pastry cream, I had to be careful, since it wasn't so much filling as topping. I managed okay and kind of hid the messy edges. Then  we learnt how to section citrus properly, peel and cut kiwi, and slice strawberries (that, I already knew). We decorated the tarts next. That was fun! I think mine looked quite pretty. I used the orange slices and kiwi around the edge to help cover up the collapsed wall. Then I did some nice stuff with the berries in the center--partly because I love berries, partly to distract from the edge. It really worked. The chef even said mine looked good, and he liked what I did with the berries. Then I just glazed the top with apricot nappage (basically heated apricot jelly). You know, a fresh fruit tart looks like a simple thing. Turns out, it really isn't!

We also made tarte bourdaloue, I'll write about it soon.

Banana Cream Tart

It's so pretty! Shame there are bananas hiding under all that goodness...

Today we made banana cream tarts (as well as dough for gingersnaps and two more tart shells). We blind-baked tart shells, filled them with bananas and crème légère, and decorated them with crème chantilly. The tarts shells were, again, made with the pâte sucrée dough. The bananas were thinly sliced and laid in the bottom of the cooled, cooked shell. The crème légère is basically a combination of pastry cream flavored with rum (or anything else you like) lightened with whipped heavy cream. Crème chantilly is sweetened whipped cream, basically. I liked all the components except the bananas--as those who know me can attest to, I hate bananas in all forms, even when covered in cream. Overall, not my favorite...but pops, who loves bananas, loved the tart!

Apple Tart

On Sunday I made a practice apple tart; this is the official one! It's made with pâte sucrée crust, which I rolled out slightly too thick last class. Before we baked them, we loaded them with the apple compote (that was a perfect texture, but a little too sweet, I think) and put sliced apples on top. We coated the whole thing with butter and vanilla sugar and put it in the oven until the crust was browned and the apples were lightly caramelized around the edges. It looked great and tasted pretty darn good as well!

A note on slicing the apples. I learnt how to properly slice apples into thin slices. In theory we are supposed to halve and core the apples (which is what I did on the practice tart...that's why there are the little round notches out of the center of each slice.) However, the chef just told us to slice off lobes of the apple, so we had straight edges instead. They looked nicer this way. And they browned better with the butter and sugar on them.

Practice Apple Tart

The color is a little funny on the photo, it wasn't quite as yellow in person.

On Friday we made apple compote and pâte sucrée for our apple tarts, but we didn't actually make the tart. I wanted to practice making compote and slicing apples. Plus I wanted to try making pâte brisée, which we are going to make on Monday. So I made an apple tart with the pâte brisée. The apple compote came out a little overcooked (it still tasted great, it was just on the mushy side) and there wasn't really enough for the whole tart. I don't know if that's just because I used a 9-in tart pan rather than an 8-in, but it did say there should be enough for either. Ah well, it still tasted good.

The pâte brisée came out great, I think. In any case, it tasted really good and didn't shrink away from the sides.

The apple slices on top weren't perfectly even, but I assume that comes with practice. They didn't caramelize like they should have. I don't know if that's because my oven isn't the most even of if I should have done the optional sugar on top before I baked it. It still looked nice though, and the taste of the whole thing was great! I'm really happy with how well this came out! I can't wait for class to make the official one.

My first Pastry Arts class at the French Culinary Institute

I just finished my first class! It was amazing!

They gave us our tool kits. They are chock full of every tool we could need, and most of them are really impressive quality, brand name, etc. For example they gave us a giant silpat and good knives. But then they gave us the worst vegetable peeler ever. That's alright though, I'll get a new one when I go and buy the one piece of equipment we have to have that they don't give us: an electronic scale. 

We learnt all about working in a professional kitchen and tons about procedures in the school kitchens. 

We also made pâte sucrée, a sweet tart/cookie dough that we'll roll out next class. We rolled out already made pâte sucrée to make apple tarts, but didn't have time to actually make them, we'll do that next class too. We learnt how to use a knife properly and diced apples to make an apple compote for the tart. The chefs actually made the compote, but they did teach us how to do it.

They also served us dinner, as they will every night. The dinner is made by the culinary arts students. It was really good, though apparently it isn't always...it's made by students, after all.

I'm exhausted, but I can't wait for the next class!

FCI Orientation

I was oriented today! Seriously, I had my FCI orientation. I got my uniform: a chef jacket, pants, cap, neckerchief, apron, and side towel. I also got the textbook for level one. It's a giant binder filled with literally hundreds of recipes--and that's just for the first of three levels!They took my ID photo and shockingly I looked good in the photo, so we'll see what happens when they print it...but I may actually end up with my first decent looking ID photo ever! We met some of the important people in the school like the head chefs in the pastry program and people from student affairs.

I also got my first homework assignment: to read about professional kitchens and look over the recipes for the components of a tarte aux pommes (apple tart). That's homework! Makes a welcome change from having to read entire books and writing 2 page response papers in a weekend for just one of four or five classes.

Classes start on Friday. I can't wait!

Restaurant Week at the Fives

I took my mom to restaurant week lunch at the Fives at the Peninsula for her birthday. It was really good. The appetizer and main were impressive. The main course, a steak BLT, was huge! It was't the usual small restaurant portion. It was a large piece of steak on a large piece of bread with a few thick pieces of bacon plus tomato and lettuce, of course. The desserts were good, but not quite as impressive.

I had the warm chocolate cake. It had a hint of ginger and was quite chocolaty, which was nice. But it was a little dry. I don't mean to say it wasn't good or enjoyable; it was good and I did enjoy it. It just wasn't anything all that special. What was special was the sauce on the strawberries that were sort of a garnish. It was something with vanilla bean and it was really good!

My mom had the raspberry mousse cake, which was sort of a frozen mousse. It was really nice, as was the raspberry sorbet on the side (which was actually more than nice). The cornmeal cookie like thing underneath was a little on the chewy side, which wasn't great.

Overall, a thoroughly enjoyable meal.

Chocolate Pudding Cake

My mom loves chocolate cake and pudding, so I thought this would be the perfect birthday cake for her. It's from Francois Payard's Chocolate Epiphany and it is absolutely amazing!! I think I may have overcooked it slightly, because the center wasn't really very puddingy. Ah well, it was really, really good anyway. It had a rich chocolate taste and a dense, moist crumb.

The glaze on top was almost puddingy in its own right. I really liked the glaze, but I think I may leave it off next time. Only because it takes a lot longer to make the cake when you do the glaze. Also, I feel somehow like I'm being good (calorie intake-wise) if I'm leaving something off! I suppose it is being better, but, let's face it, it is in no way being good.

I'd write more but I have to celebrate my mom's birthday now!

I served it with nice fresh raspberries. It was a very nice combination.

Thin and Crisp Chocolate Chip Cookies

These aren't your typical Toll House style chocolate chip cookies; they are thin and crisp and quite sugary (but not overly sweet, the sugar is slightly caramelized tasting). The recipe is Jacques Torres' and it's in the South Beach Wine and Food Festival Cookbook. An aside, the cookbook is quite nice, I've not used it very much yet, but it has some fun recipes in it. Back to the cookies. They were really good. Honestly, they were not my favorite, but I like a chewy, gooey chocolate chip cookie, not a thin one. That said, as thin ones go, I think these are my favorite. They remind me a bit of Tate's chocolate chip cookies, though I like these better.