Alright, everyone. Update time.
Where to begin...
Today was my last day of labs for the year. I just finished up Intro to Baking and Pastry. It has been an AMAZING time. I learned a lot that I didn't know before about doughs and the importance of temperatures. Did you know that the temperature of the room and also the temperature of the flour itself affects the temperature your water needs to be for the yeast to thrive? ME EITHER!
I did really well in this class and could rave about it for ages, but I'll just give you the highlights.
First of all, I was paired with a good friend of mine, Chris. He is super nice, does his work, and is almost as sarcastic as I am. We make a good team. We always finished things ahead of everyone else, mostly just because we stay focused. It's that simple.
In addition, our Chef, Chef Rosenbaum aka Chef Rosie, has been one of my favorite Chefs. He has a very dry sense of humor, so we get along quite well. He is great at explaining things and lets us learn by our own mistakes. Baking and Pastry as a whole has just been awesome.
Anywho. One of the objectives of the class is to make a Kaiser roll and I can do them pretty easily after doing so many of them, but I knot them a little differently than we are taught. Chef Rosenbaum noticed that I did them in the opposite hand and had me show the ENTIRE class how to do it my way. No pressure, right? But I ended up getting a 5 out of 5 on my rolls today for our exam though, so all of that practice paid off for sure.
KAISER ROLLS --->
BEST MOMENT OF THE CLASS:
On day 7 (there are 9 days per class) we made pizza, cake, and pie all in one day. My cake turned out nearly perfect (even Chef Rosenbaum came over and said, "There hasn't been a day that you haven't impressed me." Like..... what!?) So, that was awesome. The trick is to heat up your frosting a little and keep your spatula warm so it creates a smooth, glossy layer of frosting. That way, you can get really clean edges.
Shout out to Ms. Litz for making me ice all of those cakes back home!
Where to begin...
Today was my last day of labs for the year. I just finished up Intro to Baking and Pastry. It has been an AMAZING time. I learned a lot that I didn't know before about doughs and the importance of temperatures. Did you know that the temperature of the room and also the temperature of the flour itself affects the temperature your water needs to be for the yeast to thrive? ME EITHER!
I did really well in this class and could rave about it for ages, but I'll just give you the highlights.
First of all, I was paired with a good friend of mine, Chris. He is super nice, does his work, and is almost as sarcastic as I am. We make a good team. We always finished things ahead of everyone else, mostly just because we stay focused. It's that simple.
In addition, our Chef, Chef Rosenbaum aka Chef Rosie, has been one of my favorite Chefs. He has a very dry sense of humor, so we get along quite well. He is great at explaining things and lets us learn by our own mistakes. Baking and Pastry as a whole has just been awesome.
Anywho. One of the objectives of the class is to make a Kaiser roll and I can do them pretty easily after doing so many of them, but I knot them a little differently than we are taught. Chef Rosenbaum noticed that I did them in the opposite hand and had me show the ENTIRE class how to do it my way. No pressure, right? But I ended up getting a 5 out of 5 on my rolls today for our exam though, so all of that practice paid off for sure.
KAISER ROLLS --->
BEST MOMENT OF THE CLASS:
On day 7 (there are 9 days per class) we made pizza, cake, and pie all in one day. My cake turned out nearly perfect (even Chef Rosenbaum came over and said, "There hasn't been a day that you haven't impressed me." Like..... what!?) So, that was awesome. The trick is to heat up your frosting a little and keep your spatula warm so it creates a smooth, glossy layer of frosting. That way, you can get really clean edges.
Shout out to Ms. Litz for making me ice all of those cakes back home!
This whole time, Chris is making snide remarks saying how much he "hates me" because his cake looked like a 6 year old did it and how I need to stop "showing off". (Baking is not his forte. And everything he says is sarcastic, so don't think we ACTUALLY have issues with each other, because in reality he's just the other brother I never asked for. Gotta love him.)
So, when it came time to do pies and I asked for help on how to do a lattice top, of course he has to say, "Oh look, Trish. Something you're not proficient at," and Chef defended me! Chef says, "BUT she makes up for it with her rolls, which is an objective of the course, AND she decorates cakes like a BOSS. So, leave her alone." Day 7 was a good day to say the least.
Fun fact: Every time I make pie all I can think of is this scene from Snow White:
I ended up getting a 97.6 on my practical, in which we had to present cookies, muffins, biscuits, round rolls, and Kaiser rolls. My muffins turned out bad the first time, so I had to re-do them. I had 1 hour left to re-bake my muffins AND make cookies. SUPER stressful. I actually teared up in the fridge until I realized that I was surrounded by éclairs, cakes, and pies so I ate an éclair and went back to work. YES, I EAT MY PROBLEMS AWAY.
Once I got my head back in the game, I was fine and finished with zero seconds left. My cookies were white chocolate cranberry and the muffins I presented were chocolate chip.
Here's a few additional pictures:
Once I got my head back in the game, I was fine and finished with zero seconds left. My cookies were white chocolate cranberry and the muffins I presented were chocolate chip.
Here's a few additional pictures:
So, with my classes having come to a glorious end, I will be devoting myself to work in the office to rake up as much money as possible for Germany. 19 more days!!! I still have my math class to go to, but that's no problem.
My Valentine's Day halftime show is this Saturday. Wish me luck! It's a bummer that Josh (my valentine, my boyfriend, and the target of my dad's potential bounty hunter crew) can't make it, but I'm sure that we'll sort out a Skype date. My goodness, I love that guy.
That's all I've got for now. I hope that you all have a WONDERFUL weekend. I'll be posting a video of my hooping sometime next week!
You guys are the best.
Stay thirsty, my friends.
My Valentine's Day halftime show is this Saturday. Wish me luck! It's a bummer that Josh (my valentine, my boyfriend, and the target of my dad's potential bounty hunter crew) can't make it, but I'm sure that we'll sort out a Skype date. My goodness, I love that guy.
That's all I've got for now. I hope that you all have a WONDERFUL weekend. I'll be posting a video of my hooping sometime next week!
You guys are the best.
Stay thirsty, my friends.