Food... It's good for what ails ya.

I think I may have mentioned that, so far, my Spring Break has been riddled with grey skies and rain and  COLD nights.  I think I also have mentioned how much I dislike rainy days.  They just weigh me down and make me feel... blah.  So yesterday I finally mustered up enough umph to do something other than catch up on previous seasons of "The Tudors".  In the morning, Kirra and I made strawberry jam.   mmm... sweet, tasty yumminess.

Then we colored eggs in the afternoon (see previous post).

Last night was super-duper special because both Hanna and Kalynn were home.  Together.  Before bedtime.  Hip-hip-hooray! 

As your kids grow older, family dinners are a rare event.  So, for the prisoners I made pizza.  Not just any old pizza, mind you... CPK Bar-b-cue Chicken Pizza. 

 

And, because I had some momentum - and a few leftover strawberries - I made a Trifle (or a gigantic parfait).  Whatever, you get the idea, right? 

Hello, lover...

Today, I am fasting.  HAHAHAHAHA!  Yea, right.
Seriously, it's a good thing that even though I must leave the comfort of my PJ's every day I can run (or waddle) to my stretchy yoga pants.  PHEW!

Truffle, Truffle... Not so much trouble!

Ok, so... I couldn't give up on my love affair with chocolate.  I just couldn't and that's all there is to it.  I'm not ashamed.  I'm proud.  Proud to pronouce my love for chocolate.  Proud to admit my addiction.  To my complete and utter helplessness to respond to the call by making these: 

 

They were D-E-licious!  And... kind of purty.

"What ARRRRRR ya doin?"

"What are you doing?" (if you can't name that movie, you obviously don't have teenage girls) 
I thought this an appropriate opening line since I've been incognito for almost a week.   Anyway, here's what I've been up to:

We made Croissants (pronounced;  krahw - sone, or something to that effect) in Baking class.  Actually, since making croissants is a lengthy process, we made up the dough 2 weeks ago and then rolled them out and baked them last week.  They are a little on the ugly side, but they were deeeelicious!!  On the croissant menu were:  Plain Butter Croissants - for Hanna, Chocolate Croissants - for Kalynn, and Turkey and Cheese - for Barry.  mmm,mmm good.  I'll definitely be "practicing" this little baking skill in my own kitchen again, and again, and again...and then rushing right out to Curves to work each and every one off.  Also:

We made Danish (pronounced:  day - nish).  Again, a little on the ugly side, but not bad for a first attempt/group effort.  Trust me, it gets a little hectic in the kitchen when you have 24 students and 4 ovens.  Honestly, being in that kitchen is sometimes reminiscent of the classic I Love Lucy episode in the chocolate factory.  Rest assured that I am well-versed in all the parts in this little skit.  From miss-bossy-grumpy-pants..."Llllllet her roll!" to Ethel's "I kept pinching them to see what kind they were." All the way to Lucy's quick-thinking solution... "Here she comes! (stuff, stuff, munch, munch, spit in the hat..)"  You get the idea, right?

We also had a salsa cook-off in the sauce class.  I didn't win so I'm not posting any pictures...Juuuuust kiddiiiinnnng.  I didn't have my camera and I'm waiting for a classmate to send me the pics she took.  I might post on that later.  Friday, I spent with my sweet Kirra.  She's almost two.  I can't believe how fast she's growing up.  Wonder of all wonders... she only made me sit through "The Wizard of Oz" one time!  woo hoo!  I think it's a little quirky that she gets scared by Bruce in "Finding Nemo", but the Flying Monkeys or the Wicked Witch don't phase her one bit.  As a matter of fact, she gets very excited when she knows that the Witch is going to appear.  She starts screaming and hooting and shouts "Witch! Witch!" (only with a "B").  It's hard not to laugh....  So this last Friday, while I was rummaging through her dresser drawers looking for a pair of pants to replace the ones with applesauce all over them, she got busy stripping off her diaper and running around the house squealing "Nakey, Nakey!  I hiding".  I did take some very cute photos, but I'm not gonna post them.  Even if they are adorable.

That's about all I have to say, except for this...Next week I will be attempting Truffles... again.  Will she fail or will she succed and conquer the Evil Truffle Monster?  Stay tuned... 

Truffle-Truffle Toil and Trouble

It's official.  Working with chocolate is H-A-R-D.  It's messy.  It's temperamental.  It's difficult and fussy.  And... I don't like it.  This statement should not be misconstrued as to mean that I don't intend to still enjoy said difficult, temperamental, fussy, messy deliciousness at any and every opportunity.  I just know now that I don't want to make chocolates for a living.

Our Chocolate class made truffles on Thursday - the ganache filling was made from the chocolate we made from the nib (see previous post about that).  The chocolate, btw, was absolutely mahvelous!  And the ganache filling was superb.  We made the fillings last week and used it to make our, ahem, "lovely hand-made truffles" this week.  They are so lovely, in fact, that I can't even bring myself to post a picture of them.  Actually, I can't bring myself to even take a picture of them.  You're better off not seeing them, really.  Instead let's embark on a visualizing meditative exercise:

Imagine this:  delicious melt-in-your-mouth, chocolate-orange, chocolate-peanut-butter, and chocolate-green-tea truffles.  The smells. The silky smooth creamy chocolatey goodness as you bite into it.... now imagine them being as ugly as sin because that's what they are.  Seriously.

Yawn, Stretch... breath!

*sigh*  As fun as the Wedding Cake class was, I am so happy for it to be over.  That was a couple of really busy, stressful weeks.  The best part was when I got to bring my...masterpiece... home last Sunday and spent the next 4 hours receiving praise and accolades from all of my New Beginnings buddies.  You can't get much better than that!  (Thanks everyone for the kind words and support, but next time maybe you could take some of the cake with you.)  I've been home alone with it all week.  It beckons to me when I wake up in the morning... "Wouldn't some delicious white-cake-with-white-chocolate-ganache-filling be the perfect accompaniment to your morning cup of joe?"  It calls to me when I'm completely engrossed in studying rolled-in doughs..."Who needs all the work of making a Danish when you've got me sitting right here?"  It shouts at me every morning when I get back from sweating my brains out at Curves..."Yay!  Good for you!  Now you can eat me today and not feel guilty!!"  It's torture, I tell you.  But, I've been holding off the cravings (ok, I had one piece yesterday, but Kalynn made me do it!)   But there is still a lot left.

In addition to the cake I also have about half-pound of mixed fudge sitting on the kitchen counter from Monday's Confections class.  Hanna isn't home enough to have time to eat, well, anything.  Barry isn't eating it either, but I think he's a little worried about his annual physical which is scheduled for tomorrow morning.  I certainly can't take it to Curves with me.  They'd probably trample me to get to the very last crumb and then banish me for life.  I'd love to bring it out to San Jose to all my long-lost friends and ex-coworkers, but I haven't the time to go out there.  Someone suggested I take it to the local Fire Department, but I'm too self-conscious to do that.  Poor, lonely sweets.

Not to worry... tonight I'll bring home a pound of truffles to keep you company.

Cake 'O The Day

So, I've been taking a Wedding Cake class at Cabrillo.  It's basically 4 full days that are, literally, packed with great demos, and mixing, and baking, and crumb-coating, and making-of-beautiful-things-to-put-on-the-cakes.  Last week I posted a pic of the cake my team made.  This weekend, we made another team-cake on Saturday.  Here it is:

 I highlight the hand made chococate flowers because that was my contribution (that you can see anyway) and since this is my blog and, at least in this little cyberworld, Yes, it's all about me!  There were a lot of things about the final result that I was not happy with, but I'll chalk it up to a good learning experience.  The cake itself was the most delicious chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganache and fresh banana filling.  Yum-O! (name that FN celebrity).  So yesterday (Sunday) was the class final. Each person had to create her own cake from start to finish. Sketch up a drawing and all (note to self:  take an art class.  You cannot draw)  I was very excited to be working on a cake that I could call my own. Ok, so I have issues with working in groups....I'm a work in progress, I guess.  Anyway... here is my final cake:

The end result was quite nice, I think, for my first wedding cake.  There are lots of things I would do differently (and hopefully better), but I did learn a lot through the process.  Mostly I learned that I'm going to have to be a better planner and work faster if I ever want to make any money in the cake business!  Between weekends we had to create a mock-up brochure for pretending we had a cake business.  That was an... interesting exercise.  I discovered that I've had my nose in Excel for too-too many years and desperately need to brush up on my PowerPoint skills.  The most difficult part was coming up with a name for the business.  I went with "Take the Cake", but I'm not completely sold on it.  I mostly used it because I had already spent way too much time working on a name and was quickly running out of time.  Maybe I'll host a contest and make a cake for anyone that comes up with a name I want to use...  future post pending on that...

Busy, Busy Bread and Cake!

The Bread
Last Friday I performed a "test run" of what I had chosen to do for my bread project (which is due in class on Wednesday - that's 2 days from now).  The project has to be a lean yeast bread (basically, a yeast bread containing little to no fat) and we are supposed to make and bake the recipe and bring it to class with us for Anne to evaluate and everyone to sample.  I had originally decided to make Pesto Garland Bread.  Sounds yummy, right?  That's why I chose it.  I have only a few things to say about this bread:

1. It's a LOT of steps (translate:  a lot of dirty dishes)
2. It takes a LONG time to complete
3. It's not so great

Don't get me wrong... the bread recipe itself came out fine (looks, smell, texture, etc).  I just didn't really like it.  And I kind of thought it wasn't so beautiful for the amount of work that went into it.  Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of the finished product before the weekend got away from me.  I'll get better at this blogging thing, I promise!  So, I've changed my recipe choice for my bread project.  Today I'm going to test run making Amish Pretzels.  I hope I like these better.  I don't really know why I am so worried about it being a delicious recipe.  Probably because my whole class will be sampling it.  Wish me luck!

The Cake

The rest of the weekend was packed full with a Wedding Cake class that was Saturday and Sunday 9-6.  Let me just say... I am oh-so-tired.  And, I get to do it again next weekend!  However, the class was a lot of fun and I learned a lot of new things as well as got a chance to sharpen some of my basic decorating skills.  I was pleasantly surprised to find that I am getting better at making even basic decorator flowers.   We worked in groups of three to make a 2 tiered, stacked cake.  For those of you who know me and/or have attempted to work with me in the kitchen, then you know that I AM A TOTAL CONTROL FREAK.  Add that lovely personality trait to an ever-present lack of confidence and a need to excel at whatever I am doing, and you can surely imagine my strife.  Now, before you go making up ugly scenarios of "Little Miss Bossy-Bossy", let me put your mind at ease by letting you know that I handled the situation with -I think- a lot of grace.  Emily and Reyna were sweet and fun.  Not everything went super smoothly, but that's pretty much real life, isn't it?  Overall I think we did pretty well and I am reasonably happy with the end result. 

The highs and lows of the first week of school

That's right. I'm a student of Culinary Arts. I know... I'm 41 and I should be all grown up by now, but I'm just not willing to look back on my life and see it all spent behind a desk pushing paper. Just because you are good at something doesn't mean you want to do it forever.
So, this year I gave up my career in Project Management and enrolled in Culinary School. I'm not really sure yet if I want to focus on cooking vs. baking, but I have some time to decide. I'll just try it all! I took Beginning Culinary Arts (which focuses on cooking in a Professional kitchen) in the Fall and enjoyed it quite a bit. This semester I am enrolled in a lot of baking and pastry classes. Now, all of that being said, I'd just like to point out that being 41 makes me the minority in the Culinary Arts Program at Cabrillo College. This fact alone will no doubt provide some fodder for this blog.

Here's a summary of the first week of the semester:

Monday - Artisan Confections:
Some familiar faces, but no other students that I know personally.  Anne Baldzikowski is the instructor.  I've heard really good things about her and she seems very passionate about what she does.  When I originally enrolled in this class I had thought it was going to be about sugar work as it relates to cake decorating and such.  I have no idea why I thought that.  I think I had just watched an episode of "The Great Cake Off" on Food Network or something...Anyway, it's not about that at all.  This class focuses on exactly what it says... "Artisan Confections".  Unique, hand-crafted confections (candy, etc) that is made with high-quality ingredients and showcases the artists' talents (of which I have exactly none).  She showed us pictures of final projects turned in by previous students and let me just say that it was intimidating.  I instantly started doubting my creative prowess and abilities.
Anne did a demonstration of Pate de Fruit, which looks fairly simple but with nice looking results.  I think I may attempt Pate de Fruit (jelly candies) this weekend as a Valentine's gift to my family.  Raspberry, I think.

Tuesday - History of Sauces and Sauce Making:
This is a 1/2 semester class taught by Eric Carter.  Eric was my instructor last semester in the Beginning Culinary Arts Lab.  I took this class mostly because Eric was teaching it and I respect his knowledge and passion for cooking.  He's got a fun and inspiring teaching style.  There are 24 students and 12 burners so we will be paired up.  We made a Brown  and Blonde Roux and also a Bechamel Sauce.  It was crowded and hectic around the stovetops.  I was less than pleased with the results of my teams' bechamel.  It was not as thick as I would have liked.  At the end, we all got to taste each teams' results.  It's amazing to me how we started out with the exact same ingredients yet every sauce had a different look, flavor, texture.  Pretty cool.  I'm going to enjoy this class.

Wednesday - Basic Baking and Pastry:
This class is going to be AWE-SUM.  Anne is the instructor again.  It's going to be a lot of work and, as she talked about the milestone projects and showed us examples from past students, I got that sick niggling feeling in the pit of my stomach again.  I am very concerned that I won't measure up.  I keep hoping that I'll wake up one morning to find that the right side of my brain has taken over and I've been transformed into a veritable "Kitchen Picasso".  Pray for me.

Thursday - Purchasing and Food Costing:
= Math.  Blegh.  The only redeeming quality about this class is that my "boys" from last semester are in this class with me.  The two Alex's, the two Sam's, Bobby.  That alone will make it bearable.

Thursday - Chocolate:
Need I say anything more?  I don't think so.  Well, ok just this:  We made chocolate from the bean.  Very interesting.  It's been conching since 7:30 last night and I'll go by there to help Anne turn it out and sheet it this afternoon.  I cannot wait to taste the results!  Here's a great blog about making chocolate from scratch:  http://www.chocolatealchemy.com/conchingrefining.php.  I'll let you know how the chocolate turns out!

All in all, it was an exciting week.  I'm anxious to get in there next week and get my hands (and apron) dirty!