The first thing we did today was work on our puff pastry from the last section. We cut it in two and rolled each piece out to a square that was the length and width of 3/4 of a rolling pin. Then we took our largest cookie cutter and cut out as many circles as we could out of the squares of dough, putting them in the blast freezer for a few minutes after they were cut out. After this, we rolled them out into more oval shapes. We egg washed the bottom edge, placed a spoonful of apple compote in the centre, and folded the other half of the pastry over, and pressed down the edges. We used the not-sharp edge of a slightly smaller cookie cutter to press on the dough enough to seal in the filling. Then we flipped them over onto a baking tray and egg washed them. After this, they went back in the fridge to rest.
The next thing we did was actually part of our new section [pastry]: a chocolate hazelnut caramel cake, but only the cake part, which was almost like a sponge or genoise. The main difference is that the egg yolks and the egg whites are mixed separately, which creates even more volume. It also required a LOT of egg yolks -- 250 ml per person. First, we heated the egg yolks and sugar to room temperature and then whisked until light, then scraped this into a bowl. After washing out our bowls to ensure there was no egg yolk left in them, we heated up the egg whites and sugar to room temperature and then whisked those just until stiff peaks started to form. This mixture was then folded into the yolk mixture, followed by the sifted flour, cocoa powder, and ground hazelnuts, and then the melted butter. Once everything was folded in, we poured the batter into a medium and small cake ring and baked them in the deck oven at 350 for about 40 minutes.
We don't actually have class on Friday now, so we have one less day of this section and since our piping test is on Thursday instead of Friday, we actually have one and a half days less than we thought in the semester. So, Jean-Luc wanted us to get a lot of the cakes baked off today so that we would have time to decorate them tomorrow. So, next we made the carrot cake. It was fairly simple, aside from the fact that we had to peel and grate a lot of carrots. Luckily, the KitchenAid has a carrot grating attachment. The mixing method for this carrot cake is the "muffin method" which means that you mix your dry ingredients and mix your wet ingredients, and then you add your wet ingredients to your dry ingredients and mix it all together. Once that was done, we folded in the carrots, and then poured these into cake rings with foil on the bottom so the batter wouldn't spill out from underneath. Then they went in the deck oven at 350 for also about 40 minutes.
The last cake of the day was the New York Style Cheesecake, which I was vaguely familiar with, because I made little ones for the Chocolate Affaire. First we mixed our graham cracker crumbs and melted butter together and pressed that into our parchment-paper covered springform pan. The instructions for the cream cheese mixture were pretty straightforward; mix cream cheese, sugar, and cornstarch just until blended; add eggs; add sour cream and vanilla. The mixture still looked pretty lumpy when we were done, but it's also important not to overmix cheesecake, because the more air you incorporate into the batter, the more likely it is to rise and crack in the oven. Also, the lumps of cream cheese would melt in the oven. Each of us made two small cheesecakes. We cooked these in the deck oven at 300 for about 40 minutes as well, placing a tray filled with water between the two trays of cheesecakes in the oven.
Once the cheesecakes were in the oven, we pulled out our apple turnovers so we could bake them off. First, we egg washed them again, and then we took the back of a knife and made diagonal lines going one way and then another, creating a sort of criss cross pattern along the puff pastry dough. We baked these in the convection oven at 350 for about 15 minutes, until golden brown. Then, as soon as they came out of the oven, we glazed them with a little bit of decoration syrup, just so they could have a bit of shine. They were SO good. The apple turnovers are the only photographic evidence I have from today, because they are the only thing that we finished. Once they were done, we put all but one tray in baskets and took them out to the cafeteria. The last tray will be for the restaurant service tonight.
And, after that, it was time to clean up. I'm not sure if we'll get through everything in the section, but we have done some of the stuff in the booklet already (e.g. the pumpkin cake). Also there are a lot of different cheesecakes, so maybe we will opt to not do one or two of them. Jean-Luc said that if we don't manage to finish everything then we could finish some things off at the beginning of next semester. Honestly, I can't believe half this course is practically over. I know that I have gained so much knowledge, but still...
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Today's Recipes
Chocolate Hazelnut Cake
Carrot Cake
New York Style Cheesecake
Puff Pastry
Apple Compote
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