Sugar 1

The sugar unit consisted of making objects out of edible things that did not taste tasty. It was pretty much a sculpture class, and as far as units go it was pretty boring. I don't know if it was because I have an art background, used to work for a cake decorator, or if this shit just doesn't really interest me anymore and I don't find it that important, but I was just not into it. Regardless, I still want to get the most out of schooling, so I mustered up whatever enthusiasm I could find and made the best of it.

One of our first projects was to make a nougatine basket with marzipan fruit. I don't really get marzipan. Sure, it tastes ok, but would you eat a golf-ball sized piece? I guess the answer for some would be yes, and they would like to spend 10 bucks for it too. We molded little fruits out of marzipan, and airbrushed them to further the illusion that you were eating something of nutritional value... but wait... it's almonds and sugar! FOOLED! Then we made a nougatine basket, which is caramel and sliced almonds. That sounds easier than it actually is. In our first attempt at making nougatine, my partner... dear friend Rachel, dumped caramel on my pants, shoes, and floor. God saved my skin from burning, probably because I am destined to be a foot model or something.

Anyway, we made the nougatine and the marzipan fruits. I even made a label for it saying "fruit" as part of the trick. OH MY GOD IT IS FRUIT!

After this, we made sugar paste with Ron Ben-Israel, the *fabulous* cake designer who charges people out the asshole for cakes that they will subsequently not appreciate and destroy. He showed us how to make flowers out of sugar paste, and have them look just like real flowers. I worked for a very talented wedding cake designer for a year, making sugar flowers. It is a scam. People getting married pay a ridiculous amount of money for a cake with sugar flowers made to look like real flowers that they won't eat, when they can just pay less money for a cake with real flowers. Anyway, I forgot to take pictures. My bitterness clouded me. Suffice it to say that my wedding cake will be a chocolate fountain with a pile of doughnuts. Much tastier. A lot cheaper.

The next project, I actually had some fun with. Our assignment was to make a cake stand to support a 6" cake 6" off the base out of pastillage, with 4 favor boxes. We had to choose a theme, and go all out. To make this more interesting for myself, I chose a meat theme. My base was a butcher block, and I made a ham, froie gras, chicken legs, sausage links, chorizo, bacon, and a T-bone surrounding the base. On top I had my 6" cake, with butcher twine around the base, and 2 crossed lamb chops on top. My favor boxes were speck and prusciutto rolls. I actually had a fun time making this, and I thought it turned out pretty well. Ended the unit on a positive note.

Plated Desserts 1

By the time I actually get around to posting anything, a month has passed.

Plated desserts was one of my most favorite units. We finally got to put components together, and feel like we were working in a kinda sorta kitchen. Each team made their main component, plus a couple of extra side components to the dish that we all would share. This allowed for independent work and some creative freedom. The composition was up to Chef Jae, and wasn't dependant on our hard and fast curriculum. This freedom was welcomed, and we got to make some cool stuff, which I'll get to right now...

Our first plated dessert was a chocolate marquis (triangle thing), with dyed spun sugar (troll hair on top), toasted marshmallow, mint creme anglaise, blackberries, and shortbread crumbs. I wasn't a fan of the texture of the marquis, but the flavor was good. Didn't like the dyed spun sugar. Mint creme anglaise was on point. Overall, I didn't really see all of these components going together. Seemed a little scattered from a composed dessert. Not the worst start, though.

Creme brulee with shortbread cookies. All of the components were super tasty. But I really don't like them together. I like my creme brulee with some fruit or some kind of acid. Not some other rich-tasting sweet thing.

Creme caramel, with pineapple compote, mango salad, tuile, caramel sauce, mango coulis. Rachel and I must have burned our caramel a bit because it was NASTY BITTER. However we did make the pineapple compote and it was BOMB. All of these things would have tasted delicious together had our creme caramel turned out well. However I don't like putting sprigs of mint on shit for the sake of putting some mint on shit - ya dig?

Fig tart, port reduction, vanilla bean creme chantilly, olive oil ice cream. Figs were mushy, I suspect they weren't the best quality. Port reduction on point - made with a dry caramel with a bottle of port, slowly reduced. Olive oil ice cream delicious! I love making ice cream. From this point forward, Rachel and I volunteered for every ice cream opportunity- which kicked our ass because it was time consuming. After realizing how easy it is to make ice cream, my mind has since exploded with ice cream ideas.

Chocolate crepes with chocolate ganache filling, carrot orange sorbet, candied carrots, chocolate sauce, creme chantilly. The sorbet was great, didn't really think everything went that well together, though.

Orange crepes with orange pastry cream filling, vanilla ice cream, vanilla orange caramel sauce, caramel sauce. Hated the orange pastry cream, everything else bueno. I didn't like the way he presented the caramel sauce - looked too 80s.

Kiwi and milk marmalade tart. Puff pastry, milk marmalade, lemon-cashew frozen yogurt, kiwi cookie, kiwi salad, kiwi coulis. I liked the "milk marmalade" (I hated the name) and kiwi paired together. The frozen yogurt was way too tart. But the acidity of the kiwi cut through the richness of the puff pastry filling. Like texture combinations too.

Manjari chocolate tart, toasted coconut ice cream, coconut creme anglaise, chocolate sauce. Chocolate tart was good, don't like chocolate sable as a crust. Toasted coconut ice cream - maybe the best ice cream ever. SO GOOD. Good textures, good flavors. Didn't like the sauce presentation.

Spinach and mushroom jalousie, scallion bechamel, chives, parmesan. Thought this was pretty tasty. Very rich though. I accidentally put too much salt into our puff pastry (didn't know Rachel had put it in already - whoops), which revealed, lets say a saltine-like flavor.

Lemon tart, basil creme anglaise, berry sorbet, berry coulis, basil powder. Lemon tart was super tasty - Adam deemed it the best lemon tart ever. Loved the basil and berry flavor with it. Good acid, not too sweet. Maybe my favorite dessert of the unit. I brought 6 lemon tarts home with me, because it is Adam's favorite dessert. The next morning, Adam decides to eat one for breakfast while getting ready for work. From the bathroom, I hear "uh-oh" to find that while putting on his deodorant he stuck his arm up, sticking the lemon tart to the ceiling. Good thing we had 5 more for back-ups.

Sorry these pictures are shitty. Rachel took these and sent them to me because I forgot my camera.

Banana macadamia financier, granduja ice cream, creme chantilly. These were awesome. Really nice flavor, kind of heavy.

Mini raspberry charlotte russe, red currant ice cream, red currant sauce, candied rose petal. Meh.

Pineapple tart tatin, orange butter sauce, mojito frozen yogurt. Didn't like the frozen yogurt. The crust and the pineapple part on the tatin was too separated - I wish we had baked them together.

Apple raisin charlotte, apple sorbet, caramelized macadamia nut, apple caramel sauce, currant sauce. This was a real hodge-podge of stuff. I made the green apple sorbet, which was a FAIL. Chef told me not to strain it, and the resulting texture was like frozen applesauce. We were also introduced to stabilizers that class, and so it had a weird aftertaste. Lindsay called it booger sorbet (she always adds a touch of class to our group). Apple charlotte = good, other components = weird.