Days 6 and 7: Strawberry Shortcake

Back to the kitchen!  We learned how to make a cake called a Fraisier.  The French word for strawberry is fraise.  It is similar to an american strawberry shortcake, but lighter and creamier and just much tastier.  The fancy factor of the Fraisier is seeing the sliced strawberries inside the cake on the outside edge which is achieved by tedious effort when layering the cake.  I took pictures of the Chef's Fraisier as he was assembling it.

The first layer was a light yellow spongecake that was once again baked flat on a cookie sheet.  It was placed in the mold and had a ring of cream piped around it.  The second step was to line the edge of the mold with strawberries that were cut in half.  The third step was to pipe cream in between the strawberries to hold them tight against the edge of the mold.

Step 3, Step 1, Step 2

After piping the cream in between the strawberries we went around and smoothed the cream up to the edge of the mold filling in any and all cracks.  The fifth step was to pipe a spiral of cream on top of the spongecake and the sixth step was to layer halved or quartered strawberries on top of the cream.

Step 4, Step 6, Step 5

After layering the strawberries the next step was to loosely fill in the top of the cake with more cream and then place a top layer of spongecake on top like a lid.  You push down the "lid" of the cake to firmly seal it up and then cover the cake with a very thin layer of cream almost like a crumbcoat and put it in the freezer to set.

Step 7, Step 8, Step 9

When the cakes had set we finished them with decorations of marshmallowy italian meringue.  We fired the meringue to make it extra tasty like perfectly roasted marshmallows and then decorated with strawberries and ground pistachios.  This could possibly be the BEST cake I've made so far.  I couldn't bring it home with me because I knew I'd end up eating the entire thing!

My Fraisier

All of the cakes in my class.

Until next time Au Revoir and Bon Appetit!

Loire Valley

As promised, I've been traveling the French countryside and have a few adventures to report.  My friend Maggie and I were off from school January 11th and 12th and didn't have class on the 13th until 6:30pm so we took the opportunity to visit some of the castles of the Loire Valley.  Since we wanted to explore an entire region of France we decided to rent a car, drive to a city called Tours about two hours from Paris, and then take short trips from there.  We were advised by French and American people alike not to drive in Paris so we took the RER train, similar to the metro, for 20 minutes to Versailles and rented a car there.  Everything was going as planned and we were at the Hertz office, Starbucks in hand, about to begin our adventure at 10:00am on Tuesday when we found out that our rental car was a stick shift!  Most cars in this country are manual, but it didn't occur to me to request an automatic when I was making the reservation online.  Since Maggie informed me that she didn't know how to drive a stick shift the driving chore fell on me for the three day trip.  I guess there's some good luck in the fact that I drove a stick shift BMW in Connecticut all last winter, at least I had some recent experience.  So, off we went in search of castles, wine, and more delicious french cuisine.

Our first stop was the town of Chambord.  We saw the biggest most well in tact castle I've ever seen.  It was built by King Francois I in 1518 and was finished in 1543.  The castle has 440 rooms, 365 chimneys, and 15 staircases.  It is an incredibly grand castle.

Chambord Castle

One of the many fireplaces. 

A model of Chambord

The bedchamber of Francois I

The Queen's bedchamber

The next stop on our travels was a town called Blois.  The castle Blois was built by the Count of Blois in the 9th Century.  It was bought by the Royal Family in 1397 and they continually added on to the structure.  Both King Louis XII and King Francois I spent time at the castle Blois.

The Hall of the States General from the original castle.

The intricately painted ceiling of the Hall of the States General.

The Louis XII frontage from around 1397

The Gaston d'Orleans wing built from 1635 to 1638 with the famous
Francois I grand staircase on the right built in the early 1400s.

One of the fireplaces with the salamander seal of Francois I

The King's Throne

On Wednesday we visited the remains of the castle Chinon.  This castle was one of the main fortresses of the Counts of Anjou and the kings of England.  It was also the residence of Charles VII and the place where Joan of Arc met him before going into battle.  The castle has been damaged over time, but is still a very magnificent place set high on a hillside overlooking the river Vienne.

A view of the town from the castle on the hillside.

The narrow slit that archers shot arrows out of whilst remaining protected. 

The bread oven!

All in all our trip to the Loire Valley was a huge success, minus the part where we drove down a very, very, very steep old cobblestone road and got stuck in the middle of the hill and couldn't turn the car around.  That was the only bad part, but a very nice older French speaking gentleman who looked like he probably raised sheep in his backyard came along and helped us out.  The French in the countryside were much more friendly than the Parisiennes.

Until next time Au Revoir and Bon Appetit!

Days 4 and 5: Jamaica

First things first, I've had several requests to see pictures of the Peniche so I've done my best to take a few pictures.  I don't have interior pictures to share yet, but I walked across the Bir Hakeim Bridge the other day and found that I had a perfect view of Adriana at the foot of the Eiffel Tower.  Definitely something amazing to see!  More pictures will follow as soon as I get my act together.

Adriana

And here are a few pictures from the sidewalk walking up to the peniche!

Day 4 was Monday January 10 and we watched a demo on how to make a cake called a Jamaica.  Day 5 was Thursday January 13 and the practical class when we finally made our own cake.  I guess it is called Jamaica because it is made from tropical fruits, but other than that I'm not really sure.  The base layer and sides of this cake were a Joconde biscuit sponge.  It was a chocolate based batter that we sprinkled with finely chopped pistachios, almonds, and coconut.  We baked the batter flat on a cookie sheet like a texas sheet cake and when it had cooled we cut out shapes to assemble the cake.  We cut a circle for the base and a long rectangle that we wrapped around the circle to create sides for the cake.  The assembly was similar to the Pear Charlotte I made in basic pastry.

The first layer inside the cake was a coconut mousse made from milk, coconut milk, and whipped cream.  The second layer was chunks of fresh pineapple soaked in simple syrup and rum. The third layer was a mango-passionfruit mousse made from mango puree, passionfruit puree, whipped cream, and italian meringue.  Each time we added a layer we put the cake in the freezer to firm up the cream so that the layers wouldn't run together.  The last step was to decorate and glaze the cake.  This cake can also be decorated like the raspberry and passionfruit tart, but is traditionally topped with a pineapple ring embedded in the top of the mango-passionfruit mousse.

Nothing about this cake sounded very appetizing to me as I'm not a huge fan of coconut and I generally like my pineapple fresh (or soaked with Stoli), but I was surprised to find that this cake was delicious!  It was very light and all of the flavors really complemented each other.  The chocolate sponge crust was subtle and really held the whole thing together well.  I was pleasantly surprised and would definitely make this again.

Until next time Au Revoir and Bon Appetit!

Day 3: Passion in Paris

Looks like I've been less than diligent with updating my blog this term and it has NOT been because I'm too busy with school.  I only have about 4 classes a week which leaves me with a ton of free time.  The problem is that it's been hard to sit down and write when I am constantly running around exploring Paris and France and doing fun things.  So, while I'm going to commit to blogging at least three times a week starting today, the French Confection will no longer solely be about pastry school, it will also be a sharing of my adventures in France.

Let's begin by rewinding to Friday January 7th.  I was 4 days into living on the Peniche and loving every second of it.  My friend Maggie and her friend from home Whitney were staying with me and we'd been drinking wine and watching the Eiffel Tower sparkle every hour on the hour nightly from the downstairs window in my living room.  Friday was a doubleheader for me so I had a 3:30 demonstration class followed by a 6:30 practical class.  Two classes Friday meant no classes on Saturday providing me with my first complete weekend in Paris without school in weeks.  The dessert we learned to prepare was called a Tarte Passion-Framboise, in other words a Passionfruit and Raspberry Tart.

This tart was AMAZING and finally, a break from pears and apples!  My tart was just as delicious as the tart Chef made in the demonstration.  I was very proud of it.  It was a regular sweet pastry dough crust similar to the crust for an apple tart layered with a raspberry coulis and a passionfruit fruit cream.  After assembling and chilling the tart we covered it with a shiny jelly glaze and decorated it with different fresh fruit.  When decorating most of our cakes the chefs always encourage us to create height on the dessert and make sure our decoration shows movement.  I used half of a passionfruit, strawberries, raspberries, and red currants to create movement and a little bit of symmetry at the same time on this tart.

My Tarte Passion-Framboise

Looking ahead it seems like we will be making one cake per class for most of this session.  Just like this tart all of the cakes will have several steps and layers so I'll be sure and take pictures of the progress when assembling the cakes and not just the finished product.  I can't wait to share all I'm learning with you all in the next few weeks!

Until next time Au Revoir and Bon Appetit!

Intermediate Days 1 and 2

I'm finally back!  I landed in Paris on Monday morning at 9:30am and I moved into my new abode, Peniche Adriana, at 4pm.  For those of you that don't know, a peniche is a boat, or more aptly a river barge.  My peniche is located on the Seine River right in between the Bir Hakeim Bridge and the Eiffel Tower.  The Bir Hakeim Bridge is notable for being in a few movies, most recently Inception.

On Tuesday I received my schedule for my intermediate pastry term and had my first demonstration class at 6:30pm.  On Wednesday I had my first practical class at 3:30pm. We made an almond cake and an Apricot Streusal Cake.  Since I am not enrolled in the intensive program this term my schedule seems to allow for a lot more free time for visitors, travel, and just exploring Paris.  I'm really looking forward to it, but the only downside is that I'm back at square one with school friends.  My two Israeli friends went back to Israel, my friend from Sweden went back to London until at least March, and my friend Lydia from Arizona/Australia had Visa issues and just went to Tennessee for 6 weeks to work it out.  It looks like right now Maggie from Ohio and I will be taking Paris and the rest of Europe by storm ourselves while looking for new friends!

Since this is not the intensive program there are a lot more students everywhere.  We have 6 sections of intermediate pastry as opposed to 3 sections last time.  I only know about 3 people in my demonstration group and I don't know anyone in my practical cooking group.  The first demo was good but a little slow.  The first practical class was not one of the better ones I've experienced.  I didn't feel like I had a groove at all.  It was like the kitchen was lonely and not fun.  Since my schedule is so spread out I'll probably only be cooking 2 to 3 times a week, but it won't be anywhere near as fun to cook without a group of people who really work well together.  I was lucky to have so many fun people in my group for the intensive program especially since we were seeing each other 6 days a week.

The results of my baking were not as hot as usual either, but also not my worst failures.  My almond cake fell apart when I turned it out of the mold, but I fixed it back up and used powdered sugar as decoration to cover the cracks and my apricot streusal did not have a very pretty edge, but it did taste delicious.  I brought my cakes home and had dinner with a few friends and also made Madeleines for dessert after dinner.  All in all the first few days of class were successful and I know the next few weeks are going to bring many adventures in baking and otherwise.

My Almond Cake (can't find the cracks can you)

My Apricot Streusal

Until next time Au Revoir and Bon Appetit!