Baked cheesecake, chilled cheesecake

I was blog hopping and I read this entry on my brother's blog, in chinese. I was blown. I never never realise he can write. Wow. Maybe he will become a writer one day. (JD, i know your head must be swelling right now. ) He does express himself better on paper though talking to him is such a pain in the ass. (there, i just burst your bubble :) )

Et viola, cheesecakes for my last lesson in basic. It is official that I passed, the whole class passed in fact, and we will be getting our basic patisserie certificate in 6-8 weeks. But knowing the miserable productive capacity of the Adelaide office, Sam concluded that we will only get our papers by the end of 15 weeks. Owells, I can wait.

Cheesecake, oh cheesecake, the ever popular favourite. XY would love those we made today. It puts the cheesecakes we have in Singapore (NYDC, Coffee club, Coffee bean etc.) to shame. The flavour, the lightness, the texture and the appearance are all very well presented in both the baked and the chilled versions. (I like the baked one better though. My tongue likes it better.)

Chef Micheal's creations. Very beautiful, aren't they. These are all chilled cheesecake, presented differently. Baked cheesecake, on the other hand, should not be decorated in any way except when to be plated.

Swiss military in strawberries, haha. I am so over fed with strawberries. We had like 6 punnets of strawberries on the table for the fruit jelly and for deco. I just kept stuffing my face with them. My own creation of an individual sized chilled cheesecake. :D

A trayful of them.

Two large baked cheesecake that my bench partners did. B-E-A-U-T-I-F-U-L tasting. I got to bring one of them home. :DWho ate my cheesecake?! oh, it's Chef Micheal's. haha

End.

Buttercream Gateaux

Here comes the heart-attack cakes! 2kg worth of butter! and I never want to see buttercream again. Urghh, the thought of it irritates my stomach. It also reminds me of the hazelnut mousseline for Paris Brest. Regurgitation is not the best experience.

Anyway, after all the mise en place from yesterday, we made the italian buttercream and tried to assemble at least a decent looking cake. To make a buttercream gateau, you need, 1 genoise sponge, 1 japonaise (optional), lots of buttercream, punch and some chocolate decorations (optional). First, you slice the genoise sponge into 2-4 equal parts, depending on how high your sponge rises. Then, you brush the base layer with punch. Third, slather an even layer of buttercream on it. Repeat these steps until your last layer then you start to even out the rough edges with your palette knife. Chill it till buttercream hardens a little. Followed by another layer of buttercream as the outer (decorative) layer. Decorate with more buttercream and chocolate designs. Done. It may sound easy but getting that nice finish takes years and years of experience. And my chefs can do it like within minutes. I am in awe.

These are some of their designs, traditional to modern 2008 designs.

And this is mine. No chocolate deco for me. :( We were too slow in the kitchen, therefore didn't have time to produce chocolate work. But at least I managed piping. :D I gave one of my buttercream gateau to the cleaning ladies (we each made two). I don't think I can possibly stomach buttercream anymore. It is like eating one tub of sugar and two tubs of butter in one sitting. No wonder chef Karin calls them the heart-attack cakes.

Le Pain Entre- Plaited loaf, Brioche, Croissant.

I am going to do this all at once. All three lessons worth of bread squashed into one entry. Yup. And this is it! This is what you have been waiting for! Croissant, Brioche, Plaited Loaf! French breads in essence. These breads are surprisingly easy to make given the right environment. Making croissants in a non-airconditioned Singapore kitchen would be hell though. Imagine all the melting butter running round your table like little ants and sticking all over your hands. Eew. But in Australia's winter, croissant-making is very fine indeed.

Croissant and brioche, what is their difference? Well, the main difference in both breads is that one (croissant) has butter folded into it while the other one (brioche) has butter kneaded into it. The ingredients and function are pretty much similar. I'm sure you guys know alot about croissants, they are so easily available in Delifrance all over the world. You eat it with jam and butter, tuna mayonaise, egg mayonaise, the list goes on. What about brioche? It is a breakfast bread too. In France, they eat it with foie gras. Yes, foie gras. No wonder we don't get as many brioche in Singapore as they do in France. Who eats disgusting duck liver pate? I do sometimes. :D

My breads! Plaited loaf (3 strands and 5 strands), brioche with pearl sugar on top, cheese and ham croissant, chocolate croissant (or pain au chocolate), brioche loaf.

This is the $1 dinner we had. Like ultra super-value meal. It came with the ticket for Billy Elliot the musical. The musical + dinner ($113) was worth every single dollar, down to the very last cent. It can't get any better than this. Haa.

Seafood Paella. 2 orders for Stella and I.

120g sirlion with bacon-wrapped foie gras, on top of a caramelised onion tart. This was clearly the winner of the day. Cynthia and Hodrigo's (I don't know if i spelt it right. He is Cynthia's Brazilian gay friend. :D) dinner.

Billy Elliot rocks.

End.

Tarte Tarti, Creme Brulee.

I am lagging in posts. So many posts behind time. haha. I am going to do it all today! yes! Okayy, liver looking pear tart was yesterday. Today, we've got baby poop looking tarte tartin. A banana tarte and a apple tarte. Tart tartin generally means a puff pastry base with baked fruits on top. Traditionally it is done with apples but in the modern world, you can put anything on it, pineapple, peaches, prunes, apricots, figs, blah blah.

Banana tarte tartin was something extra Chef Micheal made. Looks great and taste better than the apple tarte tartin. Ofcourse, the more ripe the bananas, the sweeter the tarte, hence better tasting. We've only got half green bananas. --_--

The real baby poopy tarte tartin. haha. Taste great too.

You bake the apples on a bed of sugar and butter, then you bake your puff pastry base. Put them together, you get tarte tartin!
+

Creme Brulee. Burnt sugar. Taste like egg yolks when hot, eew. On the other hand, taste like heaven when chilled. End.

Poached pear tart.

Poached pear tart for Tuesday. It is a rather troublesome pastry because it takes two days to prepare it. But the process of making it is quite simple to carry out. So, haha, I shouldn't complain. :D This flat little thing consist of a short pastry crust, pastry cream, dacquoise base ( A dacquoise is a dessert cake made with layers of nut meringue and whipped cream or buttercream. -wikipedia) and ofcourse, pear poached in red wine. 4 different parts put together to give a lovely tart. It is quite a nice tart, sweet and full of flavour, thanks to the red wine.

Here, Chef Karin put pistachio nuts and almond nuts on the rim of the tart so as to be different from others. The contrasting colours of the pears and nuts do give a pleasing effect.

Hohoho, this is my tart. I was so unfocused that day. I spoilt my pastry cream by forgeting to add cornflour to it and as a result I stayed too long on the fire. Burnt my cream. haha. Then the bring-over effect starts. Because I wasted too much time on my pastry cream, I didn't get to make the dacquoise base myself (my bench mates did it for me). Then I think I lost my nerves somewhere, and lost that self-confidence completely. I over-worked my short pastry dough (my pastry dough was very fine at the beginning!) following all my other friends. I knew I shouldn't work it too much, but everyone was doing the same. haha, so I guess I succumbed to peer pressure. Lesson learnt: always trust your instinct. Anyway, my pear tart turned out fine. Pretty even. heehee. :D

Salmon en croute, Beef bourguignon pie, Chicken Vol-au-vents

Ahh, finally, some personal time. I sent my brother to the airport this afternoon. HA! Emanciation from the ninny whinny brat. HE REFUSED TO HUG ME BEFORE HE ENTER THE BOARDING GATE. And I do not forgive him for that. You don't refuse a hug from family, even when you're angry. Anyway, I packed his airbed, vacuumed the house, washed the dishes after I came back from the airport. My room and toilet was filthy. I cannot endure dirt. Dirt belongs to the rubbish bin, not my room, not in the toilet. haha. Oh yes, this morning saw us (my brother, Stella and I) to Town Hall to meet with Seok for a late breakfast. (My brother wanted to meet him as he felt some "sameness" in Seok since they both like photography. -_-) Thank you Seok for treating us to breakfast even though it cost you a bomb! :D

Okay, ermm, these were from Tuesday's lesson. We did Beef Bourguignon Pie, Salmon En Croute and Chicken Vol au Vents with the puff pastries we prepared on Monday. It was really nice to have something savoury once in a while but I really miss sweet stuff now. Where're my cakes, creams and fruit tarts?!

From left: Salmon en croute (that basically means salmon on crust in french. Fish shape= salmon pie. Chef Karin's version of nemo, which is pretty far from the real thing but it too is cute), Beef bourguignon pie (lean beef cubes stewed in red wine for about 1 hour. A very french filling for a very Australian dish) and Chicken vol au vents (with the all-important parsleyyyy).

My vol au vents without the chicken because I ate them all! Nah...we didn't make it because of time constraint. :C

My version of beef pie. I call it dog food pie since the fillings so resembles what Vicky used to eat. (I miss Vicky!)

Ma salmon en croute. C'est pas bon. Don't know if i said it right. It taste good and all but it has too much puff pastry on it because of some silly mistake I did. Owell, shit happens.
After class, we had a lecture on the different kinds of fats you can use in baking, I didn't attend the full thing though because I had to go meet Roneel and Naomi for dinner. They were so nice! They invited us for dinner so that they could bring my brother for some Sydney sights. Actually the original plan was to meet early for the sights then go for dinner. (And I was supposed to skip the lecture.) But because my brother insisted on going for the lecture, so I pushed the meeting time back. Sorry for the inconvenience! We had a good time anyway. :D

After a very large dinner of 煮炒, we ran to circular quay to catch a ferry back to Roneel and Naomi's place. We ran on a very full stomach to miss the ferry in the end. Hallelujah. No worries, we can always catch the next one. So, yup. Ferry sights.

Sydney Opera House , nicely blurred.The theme park which is more suited as the setting for Ju-on 4. -_- I really don't see how people can actually design and build this scary face as the entrance of a theme park. -Luna park

In the end, we reached home at 10.15pm. Thank you Naomi and Roneel for the ride and the Japanese language materials! I was sooo tired. Morning- school, afternoon- lecture, evening- dinner, the next morning- school again (at 7.30am!). I need redbull.

End.

Paris Brest

Paris Brest is a pastry that is traditionally made from choux pastry and is filled with praline mousseline and decorated with silvers almonds.

Well, that pretty much describes this round lovely pastry. Some background infomation regarding this pastry. It is created in France to commemorate two independent bicycle tours, randonee and audax, which is a race from Paris to Brest and from Brest back to Paris. Hence the pastry name Paris Brest.

Wednesday lessons are particularly easy. I don't know if it is the chef? Or the fact that it is our third practice day on the same product? Maybe it is both. I always feel better and much more confident on Wednesdays. Needless to say, my Paris Brests turned out fine. :D

Chef Michael's Paris Brest. He piped an additional layer of fresh cream on the top of praline mousseline that made it real delish. I didn't get to eat much of the Paris Brest he made though. (even though there was quite alot!) Not even one whole slice of it. (One Paris Brest was divided into 8 slices.) My classmates are pretty ravenous this morning. It was like 12 super kiasu aunties fighting for the great Singapore sale. So yeah, for revenge, I ate two whole Paris Brests that I made. Nearly vomited the whole thing back out. urghh..
One of the two Paris Brest I swallowed.

Takeaway.

End.

Eclairs

Tuesday was a pleasant day despite my not so successful eclairs. We watched Iron Man! haha! My first movie viewing ever in the land of sun and beaches. And we (Stella and I) had the whole cinema to ourselves. A giant screen (from floor to ceiling) cinema. For $9.50 per ticket. Yes, that is the only drawback. Freaking expensive movie ticket even on a "discounted" day.

Eclairs, eclairs. They will be part of our assessment. :( This little pastry that people don't usually think about is very labour intensive and time-consuming to do by hand. We have to make the choux pastry first, bake, then make the pastry cream, cool, then make the fondant icing and assemble all three of them together. I think eclairs are under-appreciated.

Do you know how hard it is to pipe a perfect eclair finger? Pipe it too thin, you'll get a lady finger. Too thick, you'll get a swollen finger. Not attractive at all. Plus you have to pipe it straight. We definitely do not want worms for eclairs.

Fill in the flavoured pastry cream and glaze the eclair top with flavoured fondant. By Chef Karin.

Plate and decorate it. By Chef Karin.

By Heidi. :D My not so successful eclairs. I had swollen fingers for eclairs, my fondant was too runny and my pastry cream was too warm to be used so I took kimmy's. At least they look alright.

Essentials.

End.

Choux Pastry- Profiteroles

Choux pastry (pronounced as "shoe") is a light pastry dough used to make profiteroles, eclairs, croquembouches, French crullers etc. It contains only water, butter, sugar and eggs. Its raising agent is the high moisture content, which creates steam during cooking, puffing out the pastry. -courtesy of Wikipedia.

Choux pastry is really a versatile thing. Once you know it, you can use it to make a dozen different products. In basic patisserie, we make the 3 most common choux products: profiteroles, eclairs and paris brest. Today, I present you with the profiteroles.

Profiteroles. This little ball-shaped pastry is a wonderball. Make a few hundred of these and you can use it to make this magnificent, super-popular, Italian wedding cake, croquembouche. A good sized croquembouche would need about 300 of these little darlings. Or you can use it to make a St. Honore gateau. Cool or what. haha.

To make a choux pastry, we must first make a panade, which is gelatinised starch containing water, flour, butter, sugar and salt. Then we add the eggs to adjust its consistency before piping them onto the baking trays. While baking, never never! open the oven door. Or at least wait for about 15mins for the structure of the profiteroles to set first before taking a peep to see if it is cooked. Open the door too soon, your profiteroles will just loose its steam and flatten out into god-knows-whats. So, please do take note.

Chef Keith and Chef Angelo went so far as to plate the profiteroles with piped chantilly for us. Profiteroles dusted with icing sugar, profiteroles with spun sugar, profiteroles with melted couverture and profiteroles with raspberry coulis. They were really enthusiastic this morning. Must be the caffeine huh?

I call them little wonderballs. You can use them as croutons for soups and salads as well.

My version of wonderballs. :D And I think I did them right. A little cracking on the top is desirable. Chef says it gives more character.

Me and mini-me. :)

End.