Cakes and more cakes

Hey everyone! So it seems that every time I write my blog now, there's about a month or more in between each entry. So very sorry for that, but I'm very excited to show yall what I've been working on. My class is now in our 3rd module, which is cakes and cookies. It really has been the most delicious mod thus far...and the most difficult for me. I had never actually decorated a cake before now--shocking, I know. So this has been an incredible experience for me to try and pick up all of this as fast as I can. As we go along, I've gotten more comfortable with all of the different cake making and decorating techniques, and I've come to really enjoy all of the work you have to put into the final product. Here's some of the projects we've been working on...

Orange meringue cake

Vanilla cake, layers of orange curd, buttercream and marmalade and torched Swiss meringue on the outside. Garnished with torched meringue and candied orange rinds.

My chef's personal carrot cake recipe. Carrot cake with cream cheese icing and garnished with cake crumbs and pecans.

Small almond frangipane tarts with fresh raspberries and blueberries. Topped with chopped almonds.

This is cheesecake I made for my family over Thanksgiving--plated with raspberry and chocolate sauces I made.

Toasted coconut cake. Vanilla cake, layers of whipped cream and toasted coconut. Vanilla buttercream on the outside, garnished with toasted coconut and almonds. Buttercream piping on the edge.

Closeup of the cake.

Chocolate hazelnut cake. Chocolate cake with layers of chocolate ganache. Glazed with a rich chocolate ganache. Garnished with gold dusted hazelnuts, white chocolate shavings and white chocolate piping.

Another view of my piping on the chocolate hazelnut cake.

Petits fours--layers of cake and chocolate ganache, cut into 1.5 inch squares. Glazing fondant poured over them, then chocolate ganache piping details.

Dobochetorte--one of my favorite things we've made. Very thin cake layers, chocolate buttercream inside, spread over the torte and piped along the sides. We then poured a dry caramel over one of the cake layers, allowing it to set and become smooth then cut into 12 pieces to make the pinwheel shape.

Another view of the dobochetorte.

A rich chocolate mousse cake glazed with chocolate ganache. Toasted coconut on the sides and white chocolate piping on the top.

Bouche de Noel--a classic French dessert meant to be served at the holidays. It's a bisquit cake shaped into a yule log with chocolate buttercream meant to look like wood. Then garnished with painted meringue mushrooms and marzipan holly leaves and berries. And I added a little green worm with a Santa hat, just to be festive! 

Mango miroir. Mango mousse surrounding two vanilla cake layers inside. These are put into a blast chiller to allow the mousse to set, then they're un-molded slightly. Then a glaze is poured over the mousse to create the shiny top layer. I garnished with a strawberry on top.

This is one dessert a couple of my classmates made while I worked on another. But I love how these turned out so I decided to include it. Chocolate and orange pastry cream layers alternated with cake layers. Topped with torched meringue.

Symphonie cake--layers of hazelnut cake, hazelnut buttercream and rich chocolate ganache. Glazed with ordinary chocolate ganache and garnished with white chocolate piping and gold leaf.

Tiramisu--alternating layers of rum soaked cake, whipped cream and coffee buttercream. Cut into triangles and sprinkled with cocoa powder.

My favorite thus far--a chocolate ribbon cake. These are a chocolate mousse cake allowed to set in the blast chiller. Then the outside is covered with modeling chocolate which creates the smooth texture on the side and the ruffles on top. Then I painted the edges with gold.

Another view of the chocolate ribbon cake.

Thanks for reading and HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Pastry dough

Hello again! I'm oh so sorry to have been MIA for quite some time. Life has gotten the better of me recently, and my very noble intentions of blogging once a week have taken a back seat to everything else. Nevertheless, here I am ready to share with all of you more from my wonderful time in baking school. We've been working on pastry doughs used for tarts, pies, croissants, danish, puff pastry, and lots more.  

Small tartlettes filled with either pastry cream, meringue or chocolate ganache, and then decorated using fresh fruit and chocolate. 

Raspberry and almond tart with a lattice on top.

This is called a Gateau Pithivier. It's puff pastry filled with almond frangipane, which is a filling that is like a moist cake-like texture when baked. 

This was so much fun to make. It's called a Mille Feuille--or more commonly, a Napoleon. It's just layers of puff pastry filled with combined pastry and whipped cream, and then vanilla fondant and chocolate glaze on top.

These are called Danish envelopes. The different fillings are cheese, pineapple, almond and apple. 

Shortcake with whipped cream and fresh berries. 

This has been my favorite thing that we made so far--small tarts with either fresh fruit and pastry cream or lemon curd and meringue.

Apple tart with crumb topping.

Pumpkin pie and peach pie with a crumb topping.

I volunteered at a gala event for Action Against Hunger and got to help plate with a pastry chef from Ilili--a wonderful restaurant in the city. We literally painted chocolate onto the plate with a pastry brush, then added a small amount of coconut, crushed choc meringue cookies, cream, and coconut pastry cream. There is supposed to be a souffle on the plate as well, but I just wanted to show the part that I did. Three of us had to do 360 of these plates...it was a lot of work, but so so much fun!

I hope that everyone enjoys this post, and seriously, thank you so much for continuing to read and follow my blog!
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Bread, bread everywhere!

We started our bread module about two weeks ago, and I just haven't gotten a chance to post a blog about any of the things we've made. Thus, the huge amount of pictures and random items. Bread is seriously amazing to me--it's just flour, water, yeast, and maybe a starter, yet you can do so much with such simple ingredients. Anyone can make bread, but true artisan bread takes very specific methods. It's all about technique, which is what we're being taught right now and is so intriguing to me. I forgot to take pictures of a few things we made like baguettes, pretzels and bagels, but these are a good representation of what we've been working on. Enjoy!

Artisan French bread

Hot cross buns

Focaccia bread--made with fresh rosemary, red peppers, onions, and thinly sliced potatoes.

Homemade pizza--the first is with pepperoni, sausage, cheese and sauce; the second is a white cheese pizza with spinach and red peppers.

Fresh whole grain bread

Sourdough bread--we made sourdough starters and "fed" them over the weekend (which is just taking 1/2 the starter and adding water and high gluten flour) then made the bread in class.

Zeppoles--if you've never had them, it's basically just fried dough with powdered sugar. Amazing!

Doughnuts--lemon doughnut with lemon vanilla icing and sprinkles.

Coffee cinnamon doughnut with chocolate sprinkles and lemon doughnut with lemon-vanilla icing and rainbow sprinkles.

More doughnuts...

Yet more doughnuts...

Boston creme doughnut with chocolate icing...

Brioche--it's a sweet bread, and believe it or not, it's supposed to have the top part...it just shouldn't be crooked. It's called Brioche à Tête.

Pain Aux Raisin--we used currants instead of raisins and there's an almond spread and sugar fondant icing.

Pictures say 1,000 words

This past week has been quite busy--I had a lovely visit from Audrey and Marcello this weekend, worked at my internship, went to school and worked at my job at Baked by Melissa. So I'm just going to post pictures with descriptions this week--this seems to be becoming a pattern, but I actually kind of like the idea. I love everything we've been making in class and would love for you guys to get to see all of it. So in this case, pictures really are worth a thousand words. 

Cinnamon and vanilla ice cream shaped placed in a nut tulipe (sugar and almonds formed into a bowl shape) with a chocolate tulipe cookie. Raspberry sauce on top with chocolate fudge.

Vanilla and chocolate ice cream with a chocolate tulipe cookie. Mango and raspberry sauce. 

Frozen raspberry and Grand Marnier dessert with a meringue base. Fresh raspberries and cacao nibs on the bottom for texture.

Petit croquembouche--petits choux filled with chocolate pastry cream and glzed on top with caramel. Set together using caramel and a caramel piece on the top.

Petits choux (cream puff pastry), eclair, paris brest--filled with either praline or vanilla pastry cream or whipped cream and topped with chocolate glaze, vanilla glaze or powdered sugar. Then finished with chocolate cornet work on top.

All of the puff pastries I made.

Flour based chocolate souffle--made for a practical exam in class. Chocolate cornet work on the plate.