English Toffee & Chocolate bars

As a third quarter student, I work on candies and chocolate in chefs room.  I have made both hazelnut toffee, and almond toffee.  As well as white chocolate bars.

The toffee is spread onto a slipat on marble to cool.

After it has cooled it is covered in chocolate, combed and broken into pieces.

Then bagged and sold, with samples of course.

Once the white chocolate is in temper, it is poured into mold, then left to set until firm.

They are then brushed to a shine

After this they are packaged, and sent to the Clark College Foundation.

Bloody Eye Balls!

These short bread cookies were dipped into white royal icing, then colored royal icing was piped on to make them more haunted.

Cake Decorating - Halloween

This week in cake decorating we were preparing for Halloween

We started with dipping  fingers(short bread) into blood (royal icing)

More blood drips will be added later.

We then moved on to decorating cupcakes, Allison demonstrated how to do a mummy, vampire, werewolf, and monster.

This is one of my monsters, he's my favorite

My more normal monster

My mummy

Warewolf, which was the most difficult to frost

The vampire

My friend also celebrated her birthday this weekend, and I decorated cupcakes to look like Tiffany's boxes

Petite Danishes

For the Presidents breakfast the bakery was asked to make petite danishes, They were too cute, so I had to share with everyone.

MONKEY BREAD!

In the bread station, I convince Melanie, our instructor to let me do research and development for monkey bread, or pull apart bread.  I found a recipe from Alton Brown for a sweet dough, covered in butter, brown sugar, raisins, and rosemary.  This dough was very similar to bern brot dough, which we were already producing and making other products out off.  After a bit of trial an error I ended up with this:

After it is baked, it is turned upside down.

Monkey Bread is now available in the store for I think 2.25

Bread Station- Specialty shapes, and breads

This quarter I had more of a chance to make different kinds of breads, and well as shaping breads differently.

This bread, although not much of a specialty, is very special, because it tastes so GREAT.

This is 6 braid bern brot

It is proofed in the proof box, and egg washed to achieve the high gloss

This is a circular epi

And these are french rolls shaped to look almost like mushrooms

Bread Station-Scoring

I feel like this quarter I have made leaps and bounds in bread station.  I have learned so much, and have made great gains when it comes to shaping and scoring bread.

The shaping and scoring of this bread is great, the tension was tight, and the scoring at the right angle, so the cut sprung open, and allowed for a large amount of oven spring.

The same goes for this French bread, as well as evenly spaced cuts.

This is just a small cute mini loaf with excellent scoring and shaping.

This is sourdough walnut raisin bread.  This score was used to achieve the most oven spring.

Cake Decorating

During the normal school year, Allison teaches a cake decorating class, where we learn her techniques, and have fun!

Here is Allison demonstration of everything we should be able to do well by the end of the class

My first attempts

We then learned the basic's of icing roses

For the second class we practiced what we previously learned

And decorated our own cakes

Here are my fellow classmates cakes

Bavarian Fruit Torte

In theory chef demonstrated the assembly of a bavarian fruit torte.

First a spring form pan is lined with acetate, then sponge cake brushed with simple syrup is placed in the bottom, next fruit flavored bavarian cream is layered in, then another layer of sponge cake is place on top, and fruit glaze is poured on top. After the cake has set up, the pan and acetate is taken off. 

A white chocolate design is piped on top

Colored white chocolate is piped onto acetate

And then white chocolate is poured over top, and then it is placed around the cake.

Isomalt is then rubbed is with color, and placed in the oven to melt

And after magic has happened it can be broken up into smaller garnishes

The cake is then garnished with the isomalt, white chocolate curls, and blackberrys.

Here is a mango version of the bavarian fruit torte

Gateau St Honore

In theory chef demonstrated the assembly of Gateau St Honore

First profiteroles (small pate a choux) are filled with flavored pastry cream.

They are then dipped in carmel, and placed on a puff base.

After they are all placed on the base, the pastry cream is spread on the bottom, then a thin layer of sponge cake is placed on the pastry cream, and it is brushed with simple syrup.

Then the center, and gaps are traditionally filled with chiboust cream, but here filled with plain, and chocolate chantilly cream.

The almost finished cake

Then a fancy spun sugar tool, or just a whisk with the ends cut off is used to make spun sugar.

The rest of the carmel is used to make the spun sugar, the whisk is dipped in the carmel and drapped over 2 handles of spatulas, or wooden spoons.

It is then balled up, and placed on top of the cake.