Bagels

We made bagels today! I love bagels. They are one of my favorite types of bread and certainly my favorite non-viennoiserie bread. The trick is you have to boil the bagels before you bake them in the oven. After you boil them, you can dip them in toppings while they are still sticky from the water. I tried sesame, poppy seed (my favorite), and onion. My only issues with these is that I only got to make six.

Musli Rolls

These were nice, not my favorite, but really nice. Basically they are rolls that are studded with the same dried fruits, nuts, and grains that make up musli...yum.

Croissants, revisited

These were nice, but I definitely liked the croissants we made in level one more. This recipe was different and, I think, not quite as good. Granted it was slightly easier to make--only two double turns instead of three single turns--but really, once you are doing turns does it make much of a difference? I still really liked them and the double dose of chocolate in the pains au chocolat really is incredible.

Cornbread

I love cornbread and this was no exception. It was a little sweeter than I usually love for cornbread, but the light texture and other-than-the-sweetness perfect taste made up for that. Plus it is amazingly easy to make! The chef said that you can cut down on the sugar or even cut it out and add savory flavoring (like rosemary or cheese) to it. I'll have to try that!

Brioche Rolls

How beautiful and shiny!

I love brioche, so there wasn't much of a chance of me not liking filled brioche rolls. Still, I was surprised at how much I liked them. We made both savory and sweet rolls. The sweet ones, called craquelin, are rolls filled with sugar cubes that have been soaked in orange zest and liqueur. When they are baked, the sugar dissolves and infuses the middle of the bun with sticky, orangey goodness.

The savory rolls are filled with walnut pieces and roquefort. Yum! I have to admit, I actually liked these much more than I liked the sweet ones. There's something about the buttery brioche with the sharp blue cheese and the crunchy nuttiness of the walnuts.

The inside of a savory roll. See the walnut peaking out!?

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving a.k.a eat-as-much-as-you-can-because-calories-can't-possibly-count-on-a-national-holiday day!

Ok, not really, but still, I love Thanksgiving because it's really a holiday about food (and giving thanks, obviously).

So we always make turkey with excellent stuffing (my mom makes it with apples, apricots, celery, onions, mushrooms, and italian sausage), gravy, cranberry sauce (jellied and, this year, real cranberry sauce too), mashed potatoes, veg, and some sort of roll. The last few years I've made biscuits. This year I did the same. I used a recipe I found on the food network website for the Neely's buttermilk biscuits (it's the same recipe I used last year). I think they were slightly better this year.
       

I also made apple pie with crumble topping for dessert. The recipe was from the William-Sonoma Pie and Tart cookbook. It was very easy and really good! The only problem--if you can call it that--is that the recipe made enough apple filling for two pies. Well the pie crust I made was enough for two pies (or one double crust pie) so I just rolled out a second crust, made extra crumble mixture, and voilà two pies for almost no more effort than one! I just served it with some vanilla ice cream. A simple, delicious dessert that's perfect after a rather large meal.

Viennois

Apparently, a viennois is the mother of the baguette. I'm not sure how convincing that story is. We haven't made baguettes, but from what I know about making them, the only real similarity between the two breads is the shape. Regardless, I love the viennois. It was tender and ever so slightly sweet. It sort of resembled a brioche, but with somewhat tenderer and more savory. We each made four loaves, so I had plenty of leftovers after Thanksgiving, and wow it made incredible turkey sandwiches.

Irish Soda Bread

Well, we started level 2 tonight, the night before Thanksgiving. Since I have to get up tomorrow to help make Thanksgiving dinner, I'm going to keep this short.

We are back to making breads, which makes me very happy! This is a traditional Irish Soda Bread. While it isn't my favorite thing, I really do enjoy it. It's a savory bread and the predominant flavors are a tangy-ness from the baking soda and buttermilk and an earthy but slightly sharp note from the caraway seeds. The currants, while not terribly sweet, help balance the other flavors by adding a note of sweetness.

Cakes 1 Exam

This test marked the end of level one. It was not easy, but it went pretty darn well! Basically the task was to make a plain genoise cake, slice it into three even layers, put jam between each layer, ice the cake with vanilla buttercream, and decorate it with marzipan roses and a marzipan plaque on top and slivered almonds around the bottom edge.

The cake was simple enough and mine came out very nicely. The buttercream was a bit harder. I don't know what I did, but I completely destroyed a batch of it, so I had to remake it. Luckily I had time and the second batch came out perfectly. The marzipan roses and leaves were easy enough. We only needed to make one but I had time to make a second little bud. The plaque was made already, but we had to write "Happy Birthday" on it. That could've gone better. The thing was just so small and it's so hard to write with chocolate anyway (at least it's hard for me). Compiling the whole thing went very well. The jam between the layers has to be held in place with a dam of icing, which is simple enough. The crumb coat was simple enough, since it doesn't really have to look nice. Then the icing proper was hard to do, but I obsessed over it a bit and it came out really well. I'm not totally happy with my icing rosettes on top, but they were fine and the marzipan decorations hid the worst of them.

So, here's what the chef said about my cake: The sides were smooth and straight and the top edge was pretty much perfectly squared off, as good as any professional cake place would do. (After this, everything else could have been terrible and I still would have been happy.) He said my rosettes could have been finished off slightly better, but overall were good, and my marzipan roses were very nicely made and the edges of the petals were well thinned. He was surprisingly nice about my sloppy writing (though he did say that parts of it had gone a bit wonky). The dam of icing was the perfect width and cake was well filled. He said the taste of the cake and icing were good as well (after the icing disaster, I was very happy to hear this!) The layers, apparently, were not cut perfectly evenly, which I'd been afraid of because I had a little trouble cutting it straight. But that's really the least of things to go wrong. I'm very happy with what the chef said and how my cake came out!

Chocolate Hazelnut Cake

According to everyone in my family who tasted this, it was incredible. I, however, wasn't enthralled. I liked it don't get me wrong (what's not to like about chocolate hazelnut cake?) I just didn't love it. Perhaps it was a reflection on making it. I had a lot of trouble--the cake layers were slightly under baked and the mousse (which we used as filling and frosting) wasn't quite thick enough--and maybe that just turned me off the cake. The outside was fun to decorate, at least. We made the decorative chocolate sheets with different chocolates (milk and dark) and stuck them to the mousse to decorate the cake. I would have used larger pieces that stuck up more, but we were running out of chocolate, so I couldn't; I still think it looks good though.

Flourless Chocolate Cake

This gluten free cake is somewhat absurd, but all the better for it. We made a flourless chocolate cake and I thought to myself, this is a really nice, simple, chocolate cake. Then the chef said we're going to cover it in creme d'or (made with very dark chocolate). Ok, still nice but no longer simple. Then we baked chocolate meringue logs (which tasted somewhat like cocoa puffs, but better) and used them to cover the sides and top of the cake (what a great idea for decorating a cake). Now it wasn't at all simple, but it was certainly nice and very, very chocolaty!

Dobos Torte

This was a very unusual and delicious cake. It is a five layer cake made with pancake like plain cake and chocolate buttercream. I think the buttercream was a little bit too sweet, if I made it on my own time I'd leave out some of the sugar, it was still nice though. The top is decorated with icing rosettes that a final layer of cake wedges coated with caramel lean on.

Sachertort

This is a traditional Sachertort made with chocolate cake, apricot filling and glaze, and chocolate glaze to finish it. Apparently this is technically a Sacher-equse Tort or a quasi-Sachertort. As it turns out, by law in Austria there are only two restaurants in Austria that are allowed to call their cakes Sachertorts. Who'd have thunk? Anyway, this was really very nice. The cake was dense and delicious, the apricot glaze was tasty, and the combination was excellent.

Pecan Streusel Coffee Cake

This was very nice, but not my favorite coffee cake. This was a little bit plain and I tend to prefer more umph in my coffee cakes (such as the raspberry sour cream coffee cake or the chocolate coffee cake). The crumble topping was incredible, I could have just eaten the top off and been very happy. (That said, I still ate the cake and enjoyed it!)

Carrot Cake

This carrot cake was surprisingly good. I'm not a huge carrot cake fan but this was an exception to that rule. I think that's because most carrot cake I've tried is dry and bland and/or has raisins in it. (By the way, I love raisin...just not in cake.) This was moist and flavorful and had no raisins! Plus the frosting (which is always the best part of carrot cake) was incredible! It was a proper cream cheese frosting and there was more than enough to put on a nice thick layer. The side is coated with crushed walnuts and the top is decorated with the cutest marzipan carrots (which I made myself.)

Chocolate Mousse Cake

This was excellent! The base of the cake should have been chocolate cake but we were running short on time so we used plain cake...bummer...I bet it would have been even better with chocolate The outside of the cake is a very thin layer of cake that is decorated with pâte a cornet (an almost brownie-like mixture that you can spread over a stencil to create a pattern, then remove the stencil, chill, cover in cake batter and bake...how cool?!) The whole thing is filled with alternating layers of dark chocolate and white chocolate mousse and then topped with whipped cream rosettes and curls of chocolate (we used gianduja--hazelnut flavored--chocolate but anything would work) for decoration. The mousse was thick and so rich, the cake was, well, cake and the gianduja chocolate is so delicious and decadent. Yum!

Look at those beautiful layers of mousse!

Miroir aux Fruits

This was very impressive looks-wise, not so much taste-wise. The bottom edge of the cake ring is lined with cake slices that have been layered together with jam. Then a layer of plain cake lines the bottom of the ring. The whole thing is filled with black currant mousse (isn't the color of the mousse just amazing?) and topped with nappage (apricot jam that is thinned with water and used as a glaze) that is colored with creme de cassis. Unmold and voila a beautiful, centerpiece-worthy cake! Unfortunately, the mousse wasn't great; in my opinion it was too light and the taste was only so-so since I'm not a huge fan of currants (not that I dislike them, just they aren't my favorite fruit) and the nappage and jam between the cake layers was too sweet. Ah well. We brought home two and a half other cakes today so there's no lack of cakes!

Charlotte Royale

A charlotte royale is also known as a brain cake due to it's appearance (it's apricot jelly rolls) and the fact that the center is gelatinous (it's filled with vanilla bavarian). This wasn't my favorite cake. It was a bit too sweet and I don't tend to be a fan of gelatinous things. Overall though, I think it is a very impressive looking cake and it's tasty.

Lemon Loaf

This was really quite nice. The lemon-y flavor came from lemon zest, lemon glaze, and lemon pieces mixed into the batter. I have to say the lemon pieces were quite unexpected, I've never seen them in a lemon loaf recipe before, It was tart yet sweet, tender and moist yet not too crumbly, yum!

Marjolaine

A marjolaine is the most decadent, insane cake I've ever made (or eaten), and gosh darn it was incredible! From bottom to top the layers are: chocolate genoise, dark chocolate ganache, daquoise (remember those?), crème d'or (remember that?), daquoise, praline buttercream, daquoise, stablized whipped cream, and another daquoise. Then it's iced with more praline buttercream and covered with chocolate glaze. The top is decorated by making a crosshatch pattern in the partially set glaze with the back of a knife. Chopped hazelnuts line the bottom of the long edges and a line of candied hazelnuts (always a nice decoration) finish it off. See what I mean about decadent?

A close up of the layers.

Pear Charlotte Russe

This charlotte russe was made with pear Bavarian cream and topped with a poached pear and whipped cream. The outside is made of homemade ladyfingers and a layer of genoise serves as the bottom.  I don't know how it turned out taste-wise, because we only made one per team and it was my partner's birthday so I let her have my half. I'm not a huge Bavarian fan and it didn't seem like it would last the trip home cut in half, plus it was her birthday!

Chocolate Ganache Cake

This was a very nice cake. It was three layers of chocolate genoise (a French "sponge" cake...although sponge in the sense that it is dry and porous, not like an American sponge cake) sandwiched together with whipped chocolate ganache. This is assembled in a cake ring and then chilled so that the ganache sets up. After it's unmolded, we poured chocolate glaze over it. Yum! We were supposed to decorate it with sugared rose petals and chocolate curls, but we ran late and couldn't. So when I got it home I decorated it with chocolate covered cocoa nibs. It was very pretty and quite delicious.

James Beard Auction and Gala

A very blurry Mario Batali walking by my table!

Lucky me, I got invited to the James Beard Auction and Gala because I won a James Beard scholarship this summer (as announced at James Beard Chefs and Champagne)! Of course it was held on the first night of the cakes unit at school, but I don't mind missing one class--it's not every day I get invited to a gala.

Mussel risotto--my favorite hors d'oeuvre of the night.

The whole thing was a ton of fun. The cocktail reception was a bit awkward--I'm not a good mingler--but the food was good enough to make up for that. At the dinner I was seated with a bunch of other scholarship winners, which was quite pleasant. The food was wonderful! It should have been; Mario Batali was cooking it. Among other things, dinner included:

A perfectly cooked sea scallop with an

incredible amount of shaved truffles

A creamy butterscotch and sea salt budino (pudding) 

with delicious pine nut and rosemary cookies

(and surprisingly good decaf coffee)

Dacquoise au Café

This was pretty darn good! It was five layers of nut meringue disks sandwiched together with coffee buttercream. Yum! Personally it wasn't my favorite thing, but I still liked it and pops, who always says he doesn't like sweets, loved this. The nut meringue disks were nice, but not quite as crisp as I would have liked. The buttercream was an excellent texture (stiff but still smooth and creamy) and the coffee flavor was delicious, but the buttercream base itself was a little too sweet. It wasn't frosted on the sides, which made it very pretty and different looking than most cakes. I suppose that this is fitting, since it's different sort of cake.

Angel Food Cake

I've never made angel food cake before, so I was very excited for this lesson. However it ended up being a bit of a let down. I guess the recipe was to blame, but I didn't really like the final product. The crumb was too damp and heavy with too much air between for my taste. I prefer a lighter, dryer crumb with smaller gaps between. But the main problem was that the cake was far too sweet. I like my angel food cake sweet, but only just, because I think of it as a base for berries, ice cream, chocolate sauce, etc. This was too sweet for that, it was really a dessert in and of itself. I suppose that's nice, but angel food cake just really doesn't stand up to the challenge of being alone on a plate. Anyway, for my tastes it was even a little too sweet (almost sugary) to be alone. Perhaps a bitter chocolate sauce would have toned it down. I didn't try though, it didn't seem worth it.

Panettone

The unmolded panettone.

Panettone is a traditional Italian Christmas bread. It is studded with dried fruit such as raisins and candied orange peel. It's quite nice, but not my favorite. My attempt at it was no exception.

My teammate and I did have a little problem with our dough; it came out too sticky. This made it very difficult to get it into the mold and it, unfortunately, didn't rise as much as it should have. However, I don't think this changed the taste or texture of the final product (or if it did, I didn't notice it!)

Beehive

Aren't the stripe-less bees cute?!

This was a lot of fun! Basically it is a cake made out of layers of brioche soaked with a honey based simple syrup and stacked with pastry cream between the layers. It is "iced" with bruléed Italian meringue piped on to look, apparently, like the outside of a beehive. Then just a few marzipan bees for decoration (strategically placed to cover mistakes in the piping.) Unfortunately we ran out of time to make the bees in class and I forgot to take the black marzipan home, so my bees didn't have stripes. Ah well, they were still cute!

The whole thing, without the "bees."

Taste-wise I loved the brioche soaked in the honey simple syrup and the pastry cream were excellent. The meringue on the outside didn't thrill me. It was just too sweet and a slightly damp, marshmallowy texture (which is what it should be, I just don't like it.)

Brioche Fruit Tart

This free form fruit tart resembled a sweet pizza. The brioche dough was used to make the crust, pastry cream was spread over it like sauce, and apricot pieces were put on top like cheese or other toppings. The whole thing got baked until the crust was baked through and, voila, a really impressive and pretty simple tart. To decorate it, we spread the top with nappage (basically heated, thinned, apricot jelly) and topped it with toasted almonds (which we also chopped and pressed along the crust.) Yum!

Pain de Mie or Pullman Bread

A pullman loaf is basically white bread. It's very nice and soft and, well, bread-like. I'm not a huge fan of the flavor of this particular recipe for pullman bread. I think it was a little blah. Come to think of it, it may not be the recipe, but rather that we didn't have time to let the dough proof as much as we should have, which may have prevented some of the yeasty, bread-y taste from developing. That said it was good sandwich bread and excellent for toast with peanut butter and jelly.