Certificat de pâtisserie à Paris, 29 Août 2013!

Time went so fast!!!! 

From waking up early, whisking the cream and rolling out the dough almost every single day, I finally got the certificat de pâtisserie d'école Cordon Blue à Parsi. 

Learning how to master French dessert at Le Cordon Blue was a great experience in my life, especially the class is held in Paris where everyone want to live once in their life time. Learning the skill from many great chefs in the professional kitchen, tip and tools were amazing place to be.

Not only learning how to make dessert was great here, also meeting great people from all over the world was added more interesting in the class. We had 50 pastry students who graduated in this course which they are international people. Can't wait to share this experience to my futures classes.

A very nice treat for us again and again, thanks Le Cordon Blue !!  

Alhambra or Chocolate Cake!!

I couldn't believe I made this and I will never forget this day, The chocolate signature of Le Cordon Blue or Alhambra !!it is not just a chocolate cake but delicious of the moist cocoa cake with coffee syrup and beautiful decoration;) 

Bûche pistache-chocolat!

Today the chef want us gather for the picture as everyone did a great job making a Bûche pistache-chocolat or Chocolate-pistachio log cake. This cake is made from Génoise ( the favor of the cake is pistachio ) and three layer of chocolate ganache for the filling in the cylinder mold shape and frosted again with  chocolate glaze on the outside. 

The traditional bûche refer to  Bûche de Noël or yule log which is a tradition dessert in France served around Christmas time. the basic common is a basic yellow sponge cake , forged and fill with the chocolate butter cream; however, there are so many variation of the recipes that use other favor and filling, for example the one I did below is pistachio sponge cake and ganache filling.

Pithiviers et Sacristains!

Pithiviers or Three king cake is made from a puff pastry ( feuilletage ) has three double turns. Making this cake need a muscle, especially  for the last turn that need to roll out the dough before cut into half. The challenge for this one is a right technique assemble each piece together. The most difficult woul day the curve at the finish, mark all the beautiful line all over the cake in opposite direction and had to do it quick because of the dough will get too soft as in the school always about finish on time, so you can't take your time to do it and if it take stock long your Doug will get too soft and it is hard to work with as well. The filling is a almond cream with the favor or rum a bit which just example bacause you can add on differance favors but need to make a bit dome in the middle, so will pop up nicely and don't forget to prick the top to release the moister as it will rise so hight. As I almost made a mistake , to brush the egg wah couple times to get the best golden color and the flower will go wiht good ize not too small or too big because it will rise up a lot as well.

As you know making dessert using a lot of expensive ingredients, so it is very important to not through the left over but using with other things!! For this puff pastry ( feuilletage)so I use the left over after curve the shape of three king cake to make a Sacritains or puff pastry " twist". Same dough but add the nibbled sugar , cinnamon and chopped almond would be great combination. So no wasting and eat more dessert!! 

Le Nôtre!

Having another fun day at Le Nôtre!! Making macaron is addicted- how cute and colorful their look!! Today taking a class at Le  Nôtre where is the top school of French cuisine and pastry in Paris. The school is located close to Rue de Champsylsee, the nice setting of the restaurant in the patio and inside of the building made the class even more interesting to just come to the school. 

We got treat for the first arrived with chocolate croissant and le notre' tea was perfect to start the lesson because it was at 9.30 am. The chef didn't want to say much word in English which quite challenge because of my a little French but I am survived as I did learned many lesson to make a macarons. The chef shown us how to master the macarons with using the French meringue method for making a macaroon shell and two filling we make today, cocoa and raspberry butter cream. from many class, demo and practical I did at Le cordon blue, I found that I love the Italian meringue because the shell is more stable, maintain a shape better and keep it last longer compare to French meringue. Will keep you posted for more macarons to make. 

Magador!

I was so excited after the demonstration and want to make this cake after tasted it!! Magador or chocolate génoire with chocolate mousse is a sponge cake with four layer, chocolate cake, raspberry seed jam, chocolate mousse and finish with last layer with the  both jam and the mousse. 

The sponge is using the génoire method which you want to aim fort eh moist and soft for the cake for the mousse is a lot of work because you need to prepare, whipped the cream, cook the syrub, beat the egg yolk and melted the chocolate. The order of adding and mixing in the mousse is very important to get a smooth and melted in your mouth. In addition for  the sweet tooth people, this came it will not desired you wihtout adding the imbibing ( syrup with brandy favor) to add abut sweet into the cake and  fruite brandy flavor. 

Charlotte Aux Poire!

Charlotte aux poires or Pear Charlotte is based of sponge cake method with the pear mousse filling inside. Actually the cake has three parts of using a sponge to make a shape, the round sponge around the cake is  called"  lady finger " as it looks. For the bottom of the cake is spiral and the top is a flower shape. One thing I love about the cake is soften when it bite and light sweet for the filling. All my classmate love it and did a good job, so thanks for the chef again! 

Brioches 'rich yeast bun' !

Brioche is a simply bread enriched with the butter and eggs with no filing in it!! Today, by using a same dough but so many shape you can make- big ( grande ) et small ( petit ) or pain shape. I personal don't like the taste cry much, almost no taste but this bread has a story of it. If you heard about " let them eat cake" is often quote as an example of Marie Antoninette's arrogant at the plight of hungry parisian during the French revolution. Basically, you can see it is rising so much because ofth yeast and the fermentation process for over nice , gave a dough rising in the shape.

Les secret du Macaron!

It was so much experience with the chef- Daniel Walter at Le Cordon Blue today. Learning how to master the secret violate macaroon( macaron à la violette)  If you saw my first day making a macaroon in Paris then you must know that I made it by using the Italian meringue but today I did it with French meringue. 

Why the class is named " les secret du macaroon" because of the chef has difference technique to master how to make the macaroon easy and came out very well. 

Couple things that you need to do to make a perfect macaroon are know your oven very well which you might need to try couple times to get the right one which is okay or may be you are very lucky to get a perfect one for the first try;). second, the quality of the ingredients is very important- many chef also said that even though  you hired the chef from France to make the same thing in your country but if you did not import the indigents from France the result will never be same as you had  it in France , especially the bread or pain. Well, it doesn't mean you need to to import all the ingredients from France but pick the best quality you can find from your local store. Come to meringue, as I mention that I made the French meringue for this time, pay attention when you beat the egg white with sugar to get a stiff peak and not over mix the batter when you mix it with the dry ingredients  which they are only two things, powder sugar and almond powder.so, if you got what I mentioned above then you are on the way to success making one. I don't think, I need to mention about pipe the macaroon shape because it is really an experience which it not difficult, just keep in mind if your hand is not moving when pipe it then it should came out nice and round. Today, we go very simple of the filling, chocolate ganache but the secret that you should try are adding the difference favor into the chocolate , for example honey and appellation calvados contrôlée add up a lot of just chocolate ganache. The decoration was gives a nice touch at finish-the crystallize violets. Merci chef for sharing us a secret!!!

Croissant & Croissant aux chocolat !

These are what I was looking forward to make as it known as difficult and the best in Paris- Croissant! 

croissant or any puff pastry dough are known for their flakiness resulting from the rolling and folding of the dough and butter of the same consistency. the step of folding the butter-layered dough is called a turn ( tour in French). The principle of creating layer by rolling and folding the dough with butter is future enhanced with the rising power of yeast. To make a croissant, you need at least three turns and never give more than 4 turns. 

Another important thing to know is if you want your croissant is more flavor than you should fermented the dough or leave it over night to give it rise volume and better flavor.