"the cosmic mystic of the souffle" -Chef
To anyone who has attempted to make a souffle ever in their life, then the above quote should most definitely resonate with you. I know it resonates with me, because you see the cosmic souffle and I have a history together. Last December I threw a dinner party and made a blue cheese souffle. A few days before the party I decided to practice just in case...I made two souffles that night...two for lunch the next day...and two more for dinner that night. They either fell flat, or came out perfect and then fell in 2 seconds, not enough cheese, the list goes on. Finally on the night of the dinner party I was just crossing my fingers that it would turn out and taste good, especially since I was taking a bit of a gamble on sneaking in the 'blue cheese factor' with my friends. I guess the souffle has a bit of a sense of humor or may be felt the magic of having so many people I love in one room, but it turned out perfect and everyone loved it. My 6 hour lecture and practical on sweet souffles went great. We learned how to make Souffle Chaud, Pudding souffle, and Crepes Souffle, needless to say they were amazing. Since we could not take them home with us for obvious reasons we all just stood around our huge marble slab table top in the practical kitchen with spoon in hand and ate all of what we had made that day.
At school we call it the $4000.00 exam....the dreaded practical exam at the end of term that determines whether we pass our class or not. First we take a written theory exam where we must know everything form last term and our current term, things from recipes to the densities of sugar to the chemical bonds that form during tempering chocolate. Once that is over we all frantically start memorizing our recipes for our practical exam. Let me walk you though this exam....first we line up outside of our practical kitchen, then as we walk into the kitchen and draw a recipe out of hat and we have 15 minutes to write down the recipe, a detailed method of production, and a sketch of the end result. Then we all must leave the kitchen and walk into the kitchen in 5 minute intervals. We have EXACTLY 2 1/2 hours, if you go over time you automatically fail. If you fail the practical class your fail the entire class and you must take the class and pay for it again. No pressure right?! The cake that everyone was dreading pulling was the Sabrina cake....guess who picked the Sabrina...yup that is the cake I got. To be honest during class it took us a really long time, but in the final it was not that bad. There were naturally things wrong with my cake, I mean how can there not be with that kind of pressure, but over all I finished with plenty of time to spare. It was a bit of an empowering moment. Our results don't come out until Wednesday, I am fairly confident that it is a cruel joke to have us all worried for a week. Beside the fact that my chocolate top looked like a car ran over it and my chocolate piping was definitely too thick, I was really proud of the rest of the cake. Fingers crossed everyone!
My final grade for my Intermediate term is the celebration cake. So anyone remember that fruit cake I made 2 months ago...well now its time to decorate it! I made all of my elements out of gum paste and then painted them with edible colored dust. My design is a wood bucket with wild strawberries inside with a yellow butterfly perched on one of the wood slats. I had the design in my head and I was ready to go shop for supplies with my friend Nicole. That afternoon when I got home all my flatmates were showing off all of their new lovely 'high-street purchases' they had made that day and I was showing off my new baby rolling pin and boarder cutters.
After going to Jane Asher, a cake decorating store here in London, my knife kit has grown exponentially and my bank account has shrunken exponentially. Butterfly cutters, have to have them. Sugar flower sculpting tools....essential, tiny rolling pin and small cutting board...I mean I would not be able to call myself a pastry chef without them. The edible glitter was definitely when my purchase got a little out of control and a shop-o-holic intervention was needed.
At school we call it the $4000.00 exam....the dreaded practical exam at the end of term that determines whether we pass our class or not. First we take a written theory exam where we must know everything form last term and our current term, things from recipes to the densities of sugar to the chemical bonds that form during tempering chocolate. Once that is over we all frantically start memorizing our recipes for our practical exam. Let me walk you though this exam....first we line up outside of our practical kitchen, then as we walk into the kitchen and draw a recipe out of hat and we have 15 minutes to write down the recipe, a detailed method of production, and a sketch of the end result. Then we all must leave the kitchen and walk into the kitchen in 5 minute intervals. We have EXACTLY 2 1/2 hours, if you go over time you automatically fail. If you fail the practical class your fail the entire class and you must take the class and pay for it again. No pressure right?! The cake that everyone was dreading pulling was the Sabrina cake....guess who picked the Sabrina...yup that is the cake I got. To be honest during class it took us a really long time, but in the final it was not that bad. There were naturally things wrong with my cake, I mean how can there not be with that kind of pressure, but over all I finished with plenty of time to spare. It was a bit of an empowering moment. Our results don't come out until Wednesday, I am fairly confident that it is a cruel joke to have us all worried for a week. Beside the fact that my chocolate top looked like a car ran over it and my chocolate piping was definitely too thick, I was really proud of the rest of the cake. Fingers crossed everyone!
My final grade for my Intermediate term is the celebration cake. So anyone remember that fruit cake I made 2 months ago...well now its time to decorate it! I made all of my elements out of gum paste and then painted them with edible colored dust. My design is a wood bucket with wild strawberries inside with a yellow butterfly perched on one of the wood slats. I had the design in my head and I was ready to go shop for supplies with my friend Nicole. That afternoon when I got home all my flatmates were showing off all of their new lovely 'high-street purchases' they had made that day and I was showing off my new baby rolling pin and boarder cutters.
After going to Jane Asher, a cake decorating store here in London, my knife kit has grown exponentially and my bank account has shrunken exponentially. Butterfly cutters, have to have them. Sugar flower sculpting tools....essential, tiny rolling pin and small cutting board...I mean I would not be able to call myself a pastry chef without them. The edible glitter was definitely when my purchase got a little out of control and a shop-o-holic intervention was needed.
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| after working on these for almost 10 hours I still have a few more finishing touches to make them look natural ...this is the point where I could see my cake start to take shape A very wise literature teacher of mine once told me to never put a title onto a paper or essay until after you have written it in it's entirety. Only then can you properly give a name to the piece. I am taking the same approach to this cake. So for now it is just called "Fruit Cake No-Name" and is celebrating heaven only knows what, but you can never rush the creative process right?! |
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