03/19/2001

03/19/01 - Didn't feel like working the hotline tonight so I spent the evening upstairs making pastries. Started with pastry cream. It is very important to not skip the sugar listed on the recipe. If you do, you make a second batch. The second batch of p

03/19/01 - Didn't feel like working the hotline tonight so I spent the evening upstairs making pastries. Started with pastry cream. It is very important to not skip the sugar listed on the recipe. If you do, you make a second batch. The second batch of pastry was much better. I split the cream into two batches, ¾ in one, ¼ in the other. I melted chocolate and added it to the ¾ container, added Grand Marnier to the ¼ batch. After the pastry cream I made an Italian meringue and folded the chocolate pastry cream into the meringue. I piped them into molds and threw them in the freezer. The frozen meringue will be set on circle of pate a choux, topped will a couple crème puffs filled with the Grand Marnier pastry crème and dipped in caramel, then topped with lattice made from pate a choux. So in short, I made the special dessert for Friday night. Also made a Grand Marnier chocolate sauce. Finished the night with a plate of rabbit with polenta, black trumpet mushrooms and a balsamic sauce. That's a great way to finish a night. 3/22/01 - Got a nice break this morning. The Chef made the pate a choux, the fig tarts are no longer on the menu and we had plenty of apple tarts already made. I baked off the apple galettes and made Madelines. Didn't use enough non-stick spray on the mold the first time so they stuck. Second time they fell right out. Next I moved onto our new dessert (replacing the fig tart), which is an Orange Flower Water Semolina Cake. The final thing I did was bake off Russian Tea Cookies. I left at 12:45pm and headed over to the second restaurant. I was kinda beat so I only put in another 1.5 hours. But that did give me enough time to make Cinnamon Pastry Cream and Cinnamon Chocolate Mousse. Saw what a broken pastry cream looks like and how to fix it. Learned the different stages of melted sugar (soft ball, hard ball, soft crack, hard crack). It's a bit tougher to work in the second restaurant because of the facility. It is very small and things aren't always easy to find. I get tired of asking where things are and I don't work there enough to know where everything is. Fortunately, the Pastry Chef is a patient guy. -Logan

Add to: Facebook Myspace del.icio.us | Digg Google Furl reddit