The Eventful Voyage of a Lemon Cake

Last Thursday before our Christmas break we assembled a delicious coconut chiffon cake with lemon curd filling and covered it with marzipan that we made from corn syrup, almond paste, and powdered sugar.  The cake was beautiful and delicious!  It was adorned with marzipan roses and leaves and it was quilted and then decorated with royal icing.  The newest technique we learned for this cake was lace points.  We piped out small lacy like designs with the royal icing and then once they were dry we picked them up and attached them to the cake using more royal icing as an adhesive.  You can see how the lace points stand up so that they are 3D coming off of the cake.

Another try at quilting and piping dropped strings.

My monogram writing and 3D lace points border.

My Marzipan Roses

My finished cake before it's voyage.

Since I was leaving straight from class to fly home for Christmas I decided to wrap my cake in plastic wrap and attempt to bring it home.  It was a very involved voyage, but my cake made it to VA only mildly damaged.  I carried the cake on my lap in a taxi to Laguardia, I put it in a bin and sent it thru the xray machine at security, and then I carried it on the plane and held it on my lap for the entire flight.  

The best part of the trip was that I was upgraded to first class at the last minute and I only had to carry the cake to seat 1D, perfect!  Carrying a cake, which again was only wrapped in plastic wrap, and not in a box, gets you a lot of looks from people.  Luckily, I made friends with the girl in the seat next to me.  As many of you know I HATE to talk to people on planes, but this girl was very nice and we had a lovely chat (and obviously a few drinks) on the way home.

When I landed in DC Emily came to pick me up and when we got to her house we sampled the cake and both loved it.  After dinner I took the cake home and my Mom, Dad, and Grandma tasted the cake  and also loved it.  The next morning Greg took the remains of the cake to work and all of EJF Capital got to taste one of my creations as well.  Greg said the feedback was positive, but I'm working on another not-half-eaten creation for them for January 3rd.

Until next time thanks for reading and Bon Appetit!

Merry Christmas!

This week was my third week of class and we began working with fondant.  We covered 2 dummy cakes made of styrofoam and one Milk Sponge Cake filled with two layers each of pistachio buttercream and apricot buttercream.  We also made our own fondant and used it to cover one of our cakes.  We covered the other two cakes with a brand of fondant commonly used in professional bakeries called Satin Ice.  The Satin Ice was definitely easier to work with, but the fondant was fun to make and would make a great alternative if you needed extra fondant in a pinch.  The first dummy cake we made was wrapped with a fondant ribbon border and piped using a pattern called Swiss dots.

A 9-inch round cake covered with my fondant and the Swiss Dot technique.

The next cake we made was a 2-tiered Christmas present cake.  It had a little much going on for my taste, but it incorporated a lot of new techniques that I had never tried.  It was time consuming, but fun to make.  The first thing we did was cover the bottom tier with fondant and then we created a quilted pattern on all over the cake.  The quilted lines were very difficult to measure, but I think they turned out pretty well for my first attempt.

Probably my cake's "good side."

My quilted cake.

After quilting the bottom layer we filled the top of our second tier with something called Cornelli Lace.  To make Cornelli Lace you draw squiggles with your icing making sure that none of your lines ever cross one another.  The lace was time  consuming, but very beautiful.

My first attempt at Cornelli Lace.

The bird's eye view of my top tier.

After creating lace to cover the top of our cakes we painted holly leaves on the sides of the top tier using a technique called needlepoint.  We piped the outline of the holly leaves using royal icing and then used a paint brush to pull in the edges of the leaves and fill the middle making a kind of sewn looking finish.  My holly was not good at all, but at least I tried!  The holly berries were simply red fondant balls.  Our next step was to cover the bottom tier with a ribbon and create a red fondant rope border for the top tier and finally to stack the cake.

My atrocious holly leaves!

Did I mention we also made fondant ribbons and put used those as cake toppers?

My fondant ribbon.

My stacked cake.

And another view

To top the entire cake off, we made 100 yellow fondant buttons and painted them with a gold paste made from vodka and gold luster dust.  We affixed the buttons to the crosses in the quilting using yellow royal icing.  Et voila!  Here's my finished cake.

My buttons

The finished product

Thanks for reading and Bon Appetit!

Chocolicious Roses

Finally, after 10 days we made our first really rich and delicious chocolate cake!  We actually made two chocolate cakes.  They were very cute and only 6 inches in diameter.  We filled them with chocolate ganache and covered them with a chocolate glaze.  Finally we used modeling chocolate to start making chocolate roses.  We were a little rushed because we were running a bit over time, but I think the roses turned out pretty well.  I also attached a picture of my first rose in Paris, I've certainly come a long way!  The last picture is of the marzipan rose I made for my Alhambra at Cordon Bleu.  I think this rose is the prettiest, so I'm hoping to improve my modeling chocolate skills soon.

My first rose, yikes!

My beautiful marzipan rose accompanied by candied violets.

Thanks for reading and Bon Appetit!

Fruitcake Updated

One of the best lessons I've had so far was the basket weaving lesson.  While I've never had an actual urge to learn to weave those Charleston baskets I've always wanted to know how to pipe one onto a cake.  So, here's the basketweave cake we learned to make.  It's supposed to be a basket that is full of fruit.  What do you think?

Hope you enjoyed my take on a "fruit basket."  Bon Appetit!

First Exam

At the beginning of the second week of class we had a practical piping exam and a written test on the recipes we'd been learning and the techniques we'd been using to bake and decorate our cakes.  At the end of the 10th day of class we received our grades for both tests as well as a break down of our marks in the class.  I was very pleased and surprised to have earned some of the highest marks in my class.

Here is a picture of my exam cake.  It was a 3 layer genoise sponge cake filled with raspberry jam and covered with a pate a bombe buttercream.

I was pleased with my borders, but need to work on giving my rosettes more height.
Bon Appetit!

Mini Wedding Cake Anyone?

And, voila!  As you know, I made these two cakes and stacked them on Friday.  The cakes were white sheet cake that I cut into circles and layered to make a 2-tier layer cake.  The filling, frosting, and decorations were all made of Swiss Meringue Buttercream.  As a review from my other blog, there are 3 types of Meringue.  This buttercream was based on a Swiss meringue, but we will also be learning about and making a French meringue buttercream and an Italian meringue buttercream.

This cake was not necessarily the most beautiful thing I've ever made, but it was a great exercise in practicing piping.  From what I've seen from myself and the other students I'm definitely an efficient, clean, organized, and quick worker, but I'm not necessarily the best overall piper.  I'll keep you posted, but I hope you keep checking back in with me!

My Blank Canvas

My finished product!

Reverse Shell piping in purple and Ruffle edge piping in green.

 Bon Appetit!

Week 1 Completed!

At the end of Week 1 I can definitely say I am in love with this program.  I had a great time going to school this week and cannot wait to go back on Monday.  We rounded out the end of the first week by making a chocolate genoise sponge cake, a mousseline buttercream, and a chocolate buttercream.  We also stacked our white cakes and built our first tiered cake.  We will practice piping and complete and decorate our tiered cakes on Monday.  The best news of the week is that my Mom, Dad, Grandma, and the Tugwells all came up to sample both of the cakes I made this week.

An example of rosettes

A swag border

My tiered cake to be continued on Monday!

Thanks for reading and hope you'll check back Monday or Tuesday for the completion!

Bon Appetit!

ServSafe....what?

The French Culinary Institute could not be more different from Le Cordon Bleu.  The school is physically bigger, but in addition to that the kitchens are huge, the ovens are gas, a ton of the Chefs are women, all of the Chefs are super friendly, and the biggest difference is that all of the students take a food safety course and become Servsafe certified!  Apparently food safety certifications are a huge deal in the US.  Who knew?  I've learned more about hygiene, contamination, and food borne pathogens in 4 hours of class than I learned the entire year I was in France.  I'm not sure if knowledge is power, but it certainly is eye opening.

In addition to taking a food safety course the structure of the class itself is much different than at Cordon Bleu.  My class, which can enroll up to 14 students, only has 7 students.  We have one head Chef and each day we have an assistant Chef as well.  My Chef is Cynthia Peithman and she has quite a resume.  She is a full time pastry chef at FCI, but also runs a business out of her home making wedding and occasion cakes.  Her business is called Cakeline and I think she will be an amazing resource now and in my future.

For the past few days we've been working with Genoise cakes and learning about different kinds of Buttercreams.  While I did learn recipes for these items last year in school the learning process here is much more in depth.  I'm retaining a lot more information because I'm not just repeating a recipe, I'm learning how and why ingredients in that recipe interact and respond to each other.  We also have a textbook with our recipes, tips for executing each recipe, and the history and science behind each recipe.  The experience is much more hands-on and interesting.

On Monday we made a Genoise and refrigerated it until we could make Pate a Bombe based Buttercream on Tuesday and decorate it.  Today we made a Chocolate Genoise, a white sheet cake, and a batch of vanilla flavored pastry cream and refrigerated those to assemble and decorate tomorrow.  I was not very pleased with my Genoise, but we'll be making them again for a practical test on Tuesday.  Hopefully I'll perform better next time!  I do think the rosettes I piped on top of the cake were quite nice in relation to what Chef Cynthia was asking us to do.  Here are some photos.

Genoise Cakes before being decorated.

The side of this cake could have been MUCH smoother.

My rosettes.

My finished cake filled with raspberry jam.

Keep checking back and until next time Bon Appetit!

Why Henny?

Back by popular demand I'm finally blogging again, but this time about my Big Apple adventure!  Join me while I spend the next three months at the French Culinary Institute in Manhattan exploring all things cake instead of all things pastry.  I arrived in New York City on Friday, December 2nd and started my class, Cake Techniques and Design, at the French Culinary Institute in SoHo today, Monday, December 5th.  Before I get into details about my new program I thought I'd update you on my endeavors since graduating from Cordon Bleu in June.

First of all, I took a 5 week intensive cuisine course at Cordon Bleu where I was studying classical French cooking for 9-12 hours a day 6 days a week.  It was tiring to say the least and I learned one important thing: I made the right decision when I chose to study pastry.  Not only does classical French cuisine involve tons and tons and tons of butter, but it also requires butchering several different types of whole animals.  I can safely say I'd be a great ally on Survivor if it took place in an area that was highly populated with chickens, rabbits, and baby cows.  I came away with some great knife skills, but also a strong desire to become a vegetarian.

After returning to the US for the month of August I went back to Paris from September 1st to November 1st for a baking internship at Sugarplum Cake Shop.  I baked my little heart out for three fantastic women, Laurel Sanderson, Krista Juracek, and Taylor McLoughlin.  During my brief stay at their cake shop I developed friendships that I hope will last forever.  While working at Sugarplum I got my first nickname in a long time.  I became Hennifer which was shortened to Henny and Hen from time to time.  I not only like this nickname, but since I'm usually the one giving the nicknames and not the one receiving them, it makes me feel like I really left a mark on the Sugarplums.  They even made a video for me when I left entitled Ode to Henny.  I hope you enjoy it...

After returning home in November I put together a pastry party to showcase a sampling of the pastries I learned to create in Paris.  It was a huge undertaking and I couldn't have done it without my Cordon Bleu classmate, and self proclaimed Sous Chef, Nicole Rasic.  We baked our tails off for 5 days!  Here are a few pictures of the Chefs and of our finished products...

A long day of baking!

Assembly of Verrines, a photo by Lauren Penalba 

Piping with a St. Honore pastry tip.

Chef and Sous Chef, I can't tell the difference, can you?

The best part of the party was seeing Patty Rogers.  Patty was my one of my biggest fans when I was blogging about pastry school and I'm so glad she finally got to taste some of my creations.

Another great part of the party was seeing out of town visitors and being with my best girlfriends.  Dr. Kate, Lilo, Tay-Lo, and Lexi all came home to toast my success and we drank Stoli Doli out of cups printed with a fleur de lis and the name of my Parisien blog A French Confection.  Also, my Mom's friends forever Donna and Lori came to visit along with Lori's pregnant daughter Lauren.  The party went late into the night and we had a great time, but it was nice to have the pregnant lady around to remind us of our craziness the next morning.  She assured us that we are all very, very FUN!

Dr. Kate, Lilo, Henny, Tay-Lo, Jexican the Mexican

Lori, Donna, Lindy

The Moms and their Girls

So, back to the first day of school.  I arrived at the French Culinary Institute at 8am today and was introduced to my group and my Chef.  My Chef for the next 3 months is Chef Cynthia.  She is very nice and seems very knowledgeable.  My class is only the second section of Cake Techniques and Design that the school has offered, but already she seems excited about some of the kinks they've worked out.  My group is made up of only 7 students and we all share a kitchen for 6 hours a day.  Our Chef periodically lectures and does demos all in our kitchen and then we repeat whatever she's shown us.  It is very hands on and very easy to get individual attention if needed.

Today we made a genoise sponge cake made of sugar, cake flour, eggs, and butter and a pate a bombe based buttercream.  Tomorrow we are going to assemble our first cake.  I think this class will be very interesting and I can't wait to improve my cake repertoire.  I will try to write at least a few posts per week and I will be posting pictures of my cakes as well as the cakes of last session's students as soon as we see their displays so be sure to check back.

Thanks for reading on and following the newest installment of a Jennifer Saville production.

Until next time Bon Appetit!