Summer favorites...

 

What does summer mean to you? To me, it means listening to Sebastien Tellier, plenty of bossa nova, indulging in rosé wine and long beach/boat days on the water that end with a whole fried fish and a very sandy bed. 

I'm on a summer break, if you can call it that.. after being in college and getting about 5 months off a year, this 10 days off seems a bit cheap, but I'll take it. I finished off my Bread and Viennoisserie class with an A+ and my next is Advanced Patisserie Technique. Finally, I'll be knocking out some tiramisu and maybe even an opera torte. Rumor has it we'll be making frozen desserts too. Add a day or two in cannoli making and I will be on cloud nine.

Here is the rundown in photos of my last two weeks before break.

Channeling a fancy strawberry shortcake~ Napoleon filled with Bavarian creme and strawberry preserves

Handcut pithivier filled with almond creme... I have knife skills..

Cute sugar crusted miniature palmiers

Croissants worth writing home about

Chocolate croissants

Goat cheese, sun dried tomato & basil croissants

I was told not to make bear claws look like actual bear claws, but I couldn't help myself!

This is the "correct" bear claw formation, both filled with pecans, cinnamon and sugar.

Guava filled danish pastry

The second way to do a danish- covered in apricot glaze and flat vanilla icing, filled with apples.

A little slice of heaven if you love honey as much as I do... Baklava.

I brought it home to my mom to share with her friends.

And now finally to the summer favorites list... 

If you are like me then you LOVE sangria....here are two recipes I've been dying to try out: CHOW.com's Lambic Sangria looks like everything that's good in the world. Bon Appetit ( of course) has me salivating over their Rosé sangria with pinapple and guava.

I am kind of obsessed with having a bento box for lunch. A bento box is something so nice looking you don't want to eat it. Food art. It feeds into the Japanese side of me that I claim is real. I had a bento box today. Check them here. 

I like weird photos. I pride myself in collecting them. Find your own here. 

Art things. Bellwether Gallery. 

Fashion things. Les Nouvelles. 

Where I wish I was spending my summer holiday: Capri, of course. 

And now, I'll send you off with classic Tellier's "Kilometer".........

Sebastien Tellier - Kilometer from Lucky Number Music on Vimeo.

Long awaited peacefulness.

It has only been two months here in Orlando and I can admit to a concrete list of accomplishments... and with that a longer list of undone to-do's, mostly scribbled on random pieces of paper throughout my room.

I officially passed (with an A+) my very first patisserie and baking class at Le Cordon Bleu. I do have more than a few photos to share. Hit play on this Munk banger and feel free to swing your hair around while you browse.

To start, these are the first two cakes I've made at LCB... handcrafted buttercream roses.. don't worry about those. The rest is simple and fairly standard, a yellow chiffon cake with vanilla buttercream, raspberry preserves, and hazelnut coating.

This is based off the world famous Sachertorte.  It is a sinfully decadent, highly addictive chocolate cake with chocolate ganache coating. My cake vision was to throw together some peanut butter whipped cream filling and raspberry preserves to create a peanut butter jelly monster cake. I ate 1/4 of it before swearing it off... and then cutting off another sliver "to make the cut straight" from before.

The conclusion of my intro pastry class was to team up and produce a final sweets table of everything we learned through the course. As I mentioned before, our theme was Alice in Wonderland. Production was spaced out over 4 days and we had to make a couple dozens treats from 6 different categories. It was definitely a change of pace...a couple days with no instruction and free reign for 4 hours of any ingredients. I can totally see myself in the future, putting on my huge headphones and tuning in to beautiful beats for hours on end as I decorate cakes and plan petite fours for parties.

Centerpiece of our table... Cheshire cat morphing into the Mad Hatter hat.. Perfect fondant work done by my talented roommate and baking partner Jadrianna.

Magic mushrooms, mad hatter hats, and lovely little flowers sit atop cayenne spiced chocolate cupcakes with orange cream cheese icing.

 Queen of hearts. Blondies with white chocolate ganache and brownies with chocolate ganache.

 Garden of cinnamon nutmeg spiced linzer cookie flowers kissed with confectioner's sugar.

 

Pate sucree with lime curd and blueberry caterpillars. If only we could have fit a hookah somewhere...

 Eat me! Drink me! Mini eclairs with chambord whipped cream filling and white chocolate coating.

 Trippy petite fours. Apricot jam filling between sweet spongy frangipane and almond paste.

 French macaroons made into the white rabbit.. filled with guava buttercream... sweet and scrumptious.

 Lemon madeleines so tasty they can make you purr like a walrus.......... what?

The final shot of the table. 

Currently I am in a bread and viennoiserie class. Just last week, I took home 7 baguettes. Help! I cannot eat all this bread. Today we made whole wheat pitas, pizza in a brick oven, and focaccia bread. If you like bread, please let me know and we can work something out. We can even trade for it... but you better have something good to bring to the table... like rollerskates.... or Pocky.

The next 6 weeks are more relaxed and I can breathe again. I have an interview next week for a better job (wish me luck) and Electric Daisy Carnival this weekend.

Living with wanderlust.

Most days I have my head in the clouds about traveling. It's getting even worse.

Spending my weekend in the ocean helped. Vilano Beach sometimes makes me feel like I'm not in the country, with the orange crunchy shell floor and aquamarine seas. I like to leave the shells in my hair so I can be a secret mermaid in Orlando. By Monday night, I cave and shower.

I should be paying attention in classes.. and I am, somewhat, well, I am making A's atleast. But all I can think about is finding a hollow island cave and enjoying foreign cuisine that's so spicy I have to slam my glass of water (or beer) which in turn only covers my sunburnt lips with hot sauce extending the pain. ...You know what I'm talking about. I have perpetual wanderlust, I'm not sorry. But it is important to live each day as it comes. Today we made fruit tarts with pate sucree crust and lemon curd filling. I would make it for a spring/summer dinner party. Which makes me want to throw a dinner party next time I'm in St. Augustine..... hmmm.... stay tuned on that one.

Moving along, here are my little fruit tarts. Pate sucree, or sugar cookie crust, lemon curd filling, fresh fruit with a simple syrup glaze... too good looking to eat! But I picked one apart when I got home. Shocker.

Here is a rough batch of my darling cream puff swans. Usually they're dusted with a kiss of confectioner's sugar. I gave all mine away, they don't travel well.

Mid-size cream puffs. Makes me think of a mid-size sedan.. ew. These are delicious. Covered in chocolate ganache and filled with vanilla bean pastry cream.

Be careful if you make pastry cream at home.... you might want to pipe it right into your mouth instead of filling the cream puff. Don't confuse these cream puffs with profiteroles, they're filled with ice cream and are equally thrilling. Now you won't confuse them. I've got your back.

Ooo Creme brulee'... so many people like creme brulee'. They think it's decadent. I like it because it allows me to play with fire. Yes, I will use the largest blowtorch you have. These tasted like vanilla custard candy crack. Don't you love it when white girls refer to crack?

More creme de la creme... up close and personal.

 

Cheesecake. This one was especially exciting. I subbed 2/3 of the cream cheese with marscapone. You Italians and foodies know what's up. I was drooling and I can't eat dairy.... but I'd get sick for this one. Orange zest, chocolate ganache swirl, and oreo cookie crust. Heavy as a pillowsack of bricks. That's New York style.

Lastly, a dessert that makes its own sauce. If you guessed flan.. Wrong. It's creme caramel. Orange creamsicle creme caramel. It really tasted like the popsicle. Getting so classy in the kitchen with white plastic plates.

Only 2 more weeks left in my basic pastry and baking class. We're working in groups of 4 to produce a sweets table full of petite fours. Alice in Wonderland is the theme for our group. Trying to sway more toward the creepy/weird Alice Through the Looking Glass, not new fun and cartoonish. I want to get some eclair caterpillars in the there and freakish acid flowers.

Alice in her Wonderland and myself consumed by wanderlust.... 

Spring cleaning and what not...

Spring in Orlando is humid enough to be summer, and thus far I haven't done too much cleaning. Cleaning doesn't have to be throwing away junk or using so much bleach on your kitchen floor that your eyes burn and drip with tears uncontrollably...It can be more of an inner cleaning, a mental renewal, and a time to focus on goals. I have never understood New Year's resolutions- do you know how hard it is to drag yourself to the gym or not have an extra generous portion of homemade coconut chocolate ice cream when everyone is covered in layers and generally miserable? Not happening.

With that said, I'm a big fan of starting good habits one at a time, and being a (future) pastry chef, I don't have any choice but to work out 5-6 times a week hard. I'm spring cleaning my attitude. I just got a job, typical food and bev in a high traffic area near the convention center. Am I psyched about telling our guests all about our enticing "starters" or "perfectly cool" cocktails? No. Do I like money? Yes. Do I want to own a bakery in the tropics soon? Yes. So Taylor, get to work. There was once a time to be lazy and daydream on the beach and surf twice a day. That time is over... for awhile.

This past week was all about quick breads. I was especially thrilled to bake biscotti, which was a regular treat my beautiful grandmother used to make for the family. We dabbled in muffins, banana bread, pie, danish butter cookies, and biscuits.

Day 1: Danish butter cookies with fruit filling. I didn't actually take this picture until I got home, and they might have been tossed around in the car a bit. Orlando traffic. Fail. However, quite scrumptious.

Day 2: Biscotti means to bake twice. First you bake the dough in a log, then slice it and bake it again. Vanilla almond with orange essence, drizzled in chocolate.

 

Day 3: Biscuits.... I will never buy biscuits again. This was not only extremely easy, but the technique created biscuits that were tender and flaky and HUGE. These are roasted garlic and cheddar biscuits. Next time I'd probably do sage and cracked pepper biscuits, maybe with a sharper cheese.

 

Day 4:  Apple pie. This was another common treat my grandmother made for every holiday. She taught me the lattice crust back in the day, what kind of apples to use, and always used fresh fruit. They gave us canned apples (Gag.) I was rusty on my lattice skills but it still came out nice. 

Right out of the oven in class

 

Day 5: Blueberry mountains, or muffins, and banana bread. I've made better blueberry muffins, and I wasn't crazy about this recipe. I like to use a lot of fruit in my muffins and less sugar. The banana bread was so-so. Banana bread is kind of my thing. Banana mango, banana chocolate chip, sometimes with coconut, sometimes blueberries... Anyhow... this one I topped with streusel and sanding sugar. It was filled with miniature chocolate chips. 

Next week is all about pate a choux, pronounced pot-ah-shoo..... which means eclairs and cream puffs! Maybe even a cream puff swan. When I was in grade school, I used to walk to a little French pastry shop called Denoel on Charlotte Street in St. Augustine and buy one cream puff swan. With cream on my nose and confectioner's sugar on my plaid uniform skirt, I'd wait on the corner for my mom to pick me up. Denoel is still in the same place, and I happen to be going home for Easter weekend, maybe this time with a swan that I crafted. Let's be honest, if said swan is made, I'll be walking to my car with cream on my nose and sugar on my chef's coat. Nothing has changed.

Bake wild is about to go crazy.

For those of you who don't know, I picked up about 2 weeks ago and moved from St. Augustine Beach to Orlando, FL. And for those of you who do know, I am starting to like it here, thanks for asking. To get a girl like myself to leave the beach and all that is dear to her, there must be a motive. Now that I got that whole Bachelor's degree thing out of the way, I am free to pursue my official diplome of patisserie and baking at Le Cordon Bleu. I have been there a week now, everyday dressed in my crisp white chef's coat, awkward checkerprint drawstring pants, and black steel toe shoes... Not my best look, but I think I can manage for the rest of the year. 

Bake Wild is about to take a detour until I graduate.. with occasional recipes but mostly a weekly photojournal of the things I have made and my progress in becoming a pastry chef. The most fulfilling reinvention of oneself is changing paths to truly live your dreams. Mine is to travel the world and make pastries of glitter and diamonds..... anyway. 

Last week was all about the petit fours... or "small oven" in French which means small cookies. I have bags and bags of treats.... if you want some, email me your address and I'll gladly send them your way. This week is all about quick breads, biscuits, and pies. Stay tuned..........

Day 1: Miniature semisweet chocolate chip cookies- honestly the most perfect chocolate chip cookies I've ever made. Soft and chewy on the inside with a bit of crispness on the edges.

Day 2: Double chocolate brownies with ganache frosting (no picture), The best peanut butter cookies I have ever made.

 

Day 3&4: Vanilla and chocolate checkerboard sugar cookies. Time intensive but visually pleasing.

 

Day 5: French macaroons with raspberry jam filling. Looks like it took a lot of work, but the easiest of the week. A bit sweet for my taste. When we have some breathing room with flavors, I'm thinking a cocoa macaroon with creamed peanut frosting... 

Check back this Sunday for biscotti, pies, biscuits, and more. 

One thing I forgot to mention as an obvious upside of moving to Orlando.... MUSIC. In the next two months, I'm looking at CSS, Rusko & Doorly, Avicii, Felix Cartel, and The Electric Daisy Carnival. My roommate happens to love the beats as much as I do. Nothing but heavy bass and baking for the next 9 months.. and I like that.