Slacker...Only Regarding the Blog

So, as you, my one reader, may have noticed...it has been awhile.  I'm not sure if I have just been so busy going to school and running FancyPantsPet, or if the end of April + the beginning of May were just not my favorite weeks.  Maybe I just did too much celebrating around my birthday.  Who knows.  In light of my neglect, the three weeks spent in Viennoiserie and Laminated Doughs are going to be communicated primarily in photos.  You will have to just make do without my witty comments.

We did have some good news at the beginning of the block - we are now down to 10 students.  I don't have to say who is not longer with us, just that we are all happy to be a class of 10.
Viennoiserie and Laminated doughs encompass all things puff pastry, danish, croissant, phyllo, strudel, brioche and various breakfast pastries baked and fried.  It was an interesting class, not my favorite.  It was also a kind of weird and difficult 3 weeks.

I learned that there is a reason a good, all butter croissant can be so expensive and why many places do not make their own puff pastry.  I also remembered why I have never made puff pastry at home.  Talk about time consuming.  I don't really have the counter space for it either. I should have taken photos of the process involved with some of these products as the rolling and stacking and rolling and folding and rolling and folding...you get the idea...is quite extensive.

Chaussons aux Pommes

Pithivier

Week one was all puff pastry.  Classic puff pastry, reverse puff pastry and blitz puff pastry.  They are all made with basically the same ingredients, just put together in different ways and used for different purposes.  For the most part, they are interchangeable for look and feel.  As one might imagine, blitz puff pastry is the quickest and easiest to make, it just does not puff quite as high.  With these 3 types of puff pastry we made Chaussons aux Pommes (apple turnovers), Pithivier (2 rounds of puff pastry filled with frangipane), Tarte Tatin (puff pastry topped with sauteed apples and caramel), Mille Feuille (Napoleons - small rectangles of puff pastry layered with pastry cream and topped with fondant).  Somehow, there are either no photos of the Tarte Tatin and the Mille Feuille or I did something with them.  That was a difficult day, so maybe I didn't take photos.

Salmon en Croute

During week one, we were also able to make puff pastry with savory applications.  Lobster Newburg was very tasty along with Salmon en Croute and Brie en Croute.

Lobster Newburg

Baklava

Danish Pinwheel

Danish and Croissant

Week two was filled with Danish dough products and Croissants.  Danish in various shapes with various fillings were fun to make and delicious to eat!  We also made croissant au buerre, pain au chocolate, almond croissant and 3 kinds of savory croissants.  That Thursday we worked with phyllo dough to make Spanikopita and Baklava and made Crepes Suzette, which were delicious but very orang-y for me.

Spanikopita

Crepes Suzette

 Week three was primarily Brioche products along with Hot Cross Buns, Palmiers, Apple Strudel, Doughnuts and Beignets.  We made Nantere, Galette, Saucisson, Pain Perdue, Pain au Raisin, Courrone and Modane with brioche dough.  The strudel was interesting to stretch and I wish I had a photo of that.  We had to stretch that dough with a partner so thin that you could almost see through it.  I ate so many beignets (fried dough) that my gall bladder-less self didn't feel too great the rest of the day.  No fried foods for me for a bit.  The Pain Perdue was DELICIOUS.  I wanted to eat all of it.  The brioche products were interesting and pretty tasty, with all that butter in the dough, of course they were!

Beignet

Courrone

Galette

Nantere

Pain au Raisin

Palmiers

Saucisson

Doughnuts

Modane

Pain Perdue

I did very well in the class and am maintaining my 4.0 while learning a lot!  Thanks for reading, I won't fall so far behind again.  We are on to International Patisserie, Custards, Fillings and Creams, so I will write about that very soon.  Hopefully I will survive to bake another day.  Until then, ciao!

-The Queen of Tarts-