Week 26 Cheese & Bacon Buns

Oh wow! It has been more than a month since I posted anything on my blog. This is week 26 where we made some nice breads. We made cheese and bacon buns, ciabatta, wholemeal bread and lovely brioche.

The cheese and bacon bun was really quite nice to eat. Mainly because I brought in more cheese from home to add to the recipe. Ha ha... as you can see the topping is all cheese. 

It has so much cheese that you cannot really see the design of the bun. If you look close enough, you will see the big bun is actually in a shape of a twist. 

Cheese & Bacon Bun

We made 2 types of Ciabattas. One was coated with semolina and the other was coated with some olive oil. The semolina one came out quite nice. It puffed up and had big airy holes inside. The one with olive oil and herbs was rather flat. I think we might have had a little too much oil on it, it was more like frying the bread than baking it. 
I had the ciabatta the next day with some ham, cheese, lettuce and I toasted it. It  was a nice lunch. Don't ask me what I did with the oiled ciabatta.

Ciabatta with semolina 

Ciabatta with olive oil and herbs

We made a wholemeal bread. I think it was quite a success with this one. The bread had a good rise and a nice crust. It was nice to eat when toasted and with some butter. I wish they would teach us more on making healthier bread. Unfortunately, I think this is as healthy as they will go with breads. I want to learn about starters and sourdoughs but I don't think it will be here with this school. 

Wholemeal bread

Wholemeal bread

Brioche is an enriched bread with lots of butter and eggs. It originated from France and is a type of bread that has a rich and tender crumb. It is buttery and may seem to be a cross between a cake and a bread. It is light and puffy but very rich and soft. It can be shaped in a small fluted case with a small round top. It can be enjoyed with a cup of tea or coffee. 

Brioche

With the same brioche dough, we made 2 other types of brioche which had fillings. This is a plaited one where we filled with cream patisserie and chocolates. I had dark chocolate chunks in it. Then it was plaited and topped with streusel which is a crumbly butter, sugar and flour mixed together. I really enjoyed this brioche. Eating and also making it. 

Plaited brioche with chocolate and cream patisserie

Yum!

The other half of the dough, we baked it in a round tin with a bee sting topping. Bee sting topping is almond flakes in a mixture of melted honey, butter, sugar and glucose. The bee sting is poured on the top of the brioche and baked till golden brown. Then it is cooled completely and cut  in half, filled with cream patisserie. 

Brioche with bee sting topping

Brioche with bee sting topping and cream patisserie filling

Products of the day

I have to say I really enjoyed eating most of the day's products. The only one that I didn't like was the ciabatta with olive oil. I enjoyed making them as well. 

Week 25 Coffee Scroll

This was an interesting week. We had only 3 items to make for the day and they were Coffee Scrolls, Doughnuts and Finger Buns. So since it was a light day, we were given an option to make something additional to the day's menu. So my partner and I decided to make Pretzels. It was something that I have never made before, so I was happy to try.

The recipe seemed rather simple, where all ingredients were mixed together and proved till doubled in size. Then we shaped it and brushed with soda water and sprinkled some salt before they were baked. 

Pretzel shaped

I had fun shaping the pretzels. Mine were the 3 on the right of the top picture and the other side were my partner's. We should have dipped the whole pretzel into the soda water, rather than brushed it on. It would have given them a more even colour. The pretzels rose beautifully in the oven. I think we should have made them a little thinner because you can't really see the holes of the pretzels after they were baked. The taste was quite good. I might try this recipe again but rolled thinner the next time. 

Pretzels

 We made 2 types of doughnuts. Ring doughnuts were coated with sugar cinnamon and the  round one were filled with raspberry jam. I think our doughnuts were a little over fried in the fryer but luckily it was still very soft. 

Frying the doughnuts

Sugar Cinnamon Doughnuts

Raspberry Jam Doughnuts

Coffee Scroll was the interesting one to make. I brought some extra ingredients to make it yummier! Ha Ha.... so our coffee scrolls had dark chocolates and roasted almonds in it. Then we drizzled coffee fondant over it to make it prettier and even sweeter. With the same dough, we made a different scroll with chocolate and desiccated coconut as the filling. Unfortunately, this one didn't rise as much. 

Coffee Scrolls

Coconut & Chocolate Scrolls

Finger Buns are sweet buns with sweeten whipped cream as the filling. Then the topping had sugar syrup, fondant and hundreds and thousands. So, all I can think of was how sweet the bun was going to be. I can see kids will love this one, not really for me. 

Overall, a good day with a lot to learn. 

Buns

Fondant toppings on buns

Finger Buns

Week 24 Sweet Bun Dough

This week is about sweet bread dough. Making bread is something very new to me. I find that every bread has it's own personality, so to speak. Even though all of us use the same ingredients to make the bread, somehow each bread has its own characteristics. Some may prove faster some may be stubborn. They come out looking different too.

 There are a lot of areas that we have to be careful about when making bread. The temperature of the ingredients has to right to make sure the yeast can grow healthily. The proving of dough has to be checked to make sure the yeast doesn't over prove and die. The consistency of the dough during kneading is also important to make sure the gluten stretches nicely. The ratio of liquid in the dough to the flour is also important to ensure a good texture of the bread. 

So, we made Polenta bread where we had to make a ferment first. Ferment is where the yeast gets to activate in a nice cozy environment. Then the ferment is added with the rest of the ingredients and proved till it becomes double in size. Polenta is made of corn and it absorbs a lot of liquid, therefore the amount of liquid used for this recipe is slightly more than orders to compensate that. 

Making bread requires patience and a lot of love. Patience is needed for the proving because it takes about an hour or more. Love is essential for the kneading process. You knead till you get the right consistency. Hmm..... it sure is a product of love. 

Polenta bread after second prove

Our baguette shape polenta bread didn't look too nice. I am guessing it is due to too many people hovering over the oven and kept opening the oven so the bread didn't get to rise properly. Luckily the 3 buns in the loaf tin had a better rise. 

Our polenta bread

We also made Lavoche. It is a type of crispbread. It is quite easy to make. Just mixed all the ingredients together and refrigerate for a while. Then rolled thinly and cut to desired shape and baked. Apparently it is very expensive to buy. 

Lavoche

Chelsea buns

Our Chelsea buns didn't get a good rise either. It does look nice in the shape of a flower in the tin. We glazed it with sugar syrup to give it a nice shine and drizzled fondant over it to finish off. It is pretty but not something that I like to eat. 

Challah and incomplete boston bun

Boston bun

From the same dough as the Chelsea buns, we also made Boston Bun. This is the one on the right which we have glazed with sugar syrup. It is cooling down on the wire rack so that we can put on a layer of butter icing and topped with desiccated coconut. The other is Challah which is a plaited bun. It is a rather plain bun but looks pretty. I think we will be making this again in 2 weeks time.

Sweet Plait Bun

This Sweet Plait Bun would be the best one of the day. I am really happy with this one. The bun is made of sweet yeast dough. It had hazelnut paste and  I brought some dark chocolate to give it an extra boost for the filling. The dough was flatten to the shape of a rectangle and the hazelnut paste was spread on. Then topped with chocolate chunks. Then rolled up. Then cut a vertical line in the centre and twisted the two till the end and joined back at the end. It was brushed with egg wash before baking. Post bake, we had sugar syrup on it and drizzled with some fondant. It was really yummy. 

Hazelnut Chocolate Plait Bun

More breads next week. I am eating too much carbohydrates! But it is also quite satisfying to be eating your own bread. I just wish they will teach healthy version of breads rather than sweet breads. 

Breads of the day

Week 23 Croissants

 Time for Yeast goods this week. We made white bread dough, wholemeal bread dough and croissants. With the basic white bread dough, we made some baguettes and some buns in the shapes of knots , hedgehog and 
I totally forgot to take photos during the kneading and shaping process. It was fun to see how the dough proves and become double in size. Then we knocked back the dough and shaped it accordingly and proved it again. Then it went into the hot oven and baked for about 20 minutes. 

The buns were a little over proved as you can see it is rather puffed up that the cuts on the buns were all stretched. We topped one of the hedgehog with poppy seed and another with sesame seed. The rest were just left plain. 

Plain white bread

The next was the wholemeal dough which we used the all in method, where we placed the yeast, flour, salt and water in the bowl and mixed it together. Then we bulk prove the dough until it doubled in size and  knocked it back. Then we divided the dough into 3. One was just baked free form and 2 were baked in the loaf tins. The ones in the loaf tins rose beautifully and had better shape. 

Rustic wholemeal bread

The 2 on the left were ours

The wholemeal bread was quite nice to eat. The texture of the bread was soft and had a nice crust on top. I like the hazelnut that we put in the bread, it gives it a bit more texture. 

Wholemeal Bread

Croissants will be the more challenging one among the 3 that we made. We did the dough the day before and had it resting in the fridge overnight. We didn't want the yeast to activate when making the dough so we kept everything cold. We made 3 single turns and 1 extra double turn. The double turn was not common in croissant recipes. It actually made the croissant a little more like bread texture. It was a little too fluffy and less flaky. I prefer the flaky croissant where there were only 3 single turns. The extra double turn also helps prevent the dough from leaking butter and according to my trainer, people actually prefer the bread like texture more these days. I guess I am more old school so I prefer the classic croissants. 

Croissants

I really enjoyed shaping the croissant, unfortunately I forgot to take any picture of how to roll the croissants. Then we also made Pate Croissant Pain Au Chocolat. We had the our tray further in the oven and the heat was a little hotter on the inside and the Chocolate Pains went a little too dark. We ate it all anyway.

When I tried the white bread at home, I thought.... hmm.... this is quite tasteless and I wondered why. Then I read the recipe again and realised that I forgot to type in "Put in salt" in the recipe! Silly me. Well, I will learn from my silly mistake. 

Week 22 Petit Fours

Another week of Petit Fours. This time we made Petit Four Frais which means fresh items that can't really be stored for too long. Normally have to be eaten on the same day it is made. We have pecan marzipan in caramel and chocolate. Personally am not a fan of marzipan so I didn't really enjoy eating it but I did enjoy making it. It's a small little cone shape marzipan covered with pecans on the sides and dipped in caramel and chocolate. It looks quite pretty.

Marzipan with pecan

Pecan Marzipan in caramel and chocolate

The next was choux pastry. We have made choux pastry before in our earlier terms but each trainer has his or her own little tricks and we learn a bit more again this time. Because the topic is petit four, we actually made the choux items smaller. We made some Profiteroles which we dipped with caramel and filled with creme chantilly.

Then we made chocolate eclairs which was dipped in chocolate and filled with creme patisserie. Then the last one was the Paris Brest which looks like a donut. This one we had to top with coffee fondant and fill with whipped cream. But our Paris Brest was a little too crisp and it cracked when i tried to cut it open. I was using the serrated knife and was concentrating on not cracking it that I didn't realise that I was sawing my palm. Ha Ha.... yea... I got a cut. So in the end we used some profiterole choux pastry for the coffee fondant topping instead. 

Choux pastry

Caramel Profiteroles

The next item is a lemon meringue tartlet. The base was a sweetcrust pastry which we blind baked and left to cool. Then we filled it with lemon curd and piped italian meringue on top of it. The final touch was to blowtorch it to give it that slight burnt colour. 

The sweetcrust pastry was moulded into the tart cases and chilled in the freezer for about 10minutes before going straight into the oven for a snap bake. This is when the pastry cooks really fast in the hot oven and sets the tart before the butter melts and shrinks the case. It is interesting how we didnt even have to weigh down the tarts and it didn't shrink. 

But our tart cases had a few blisters when it was in the oven. So half way during baking, I took it out and pressed out the air pockets and placed it back into the oven to bake. The air pocket was probably due to not pressing the pastry into the tart cases snugly and some air was caught inside causing it to rise when baked. Luckily it can still be saved. 

Lemon Meringue Tartlets

We made some friands as well. It was a little dry and sweet. It looks good but I didn't really like the taste. Friands are little cakes made with almond meal and egg white and melted butter. I normally make them with some fruits at home and it will be moister and yummier.

All the items are ready with some final touches on the decorations and were presented on a platter. I am happy with today's work. I am starting to enjoy the class a bit more too. There was a bit more cooperation in terms of cleaning up the kitchen this week, which I thought was good.  

Petit Fours Frais

Chocolate Eclairs

Week 21 Petit Fours

After a long Christmas break, it was a little difficult to bring myself back to my enthusiastic baking mood. Luckily the things we made in the first week were rather interesting. It is called Petit fours which means "little baked items" in French. It is usually enjoyed with a cup of coffee at the end of a meal. 

Traditionally there are 3 main categories of petit fours. Petit Four Sec which means it is dry. It is normally easier to make and has a longer shelf life. We made 3 item that are in this category.

Langues de chat which is also known as Cat's tongue. It is a crispy texture biscuit. It was quite easy to make, the batter is piped into little lines and then designed with zig zags using the same batter but with cocoa powder added into it. The batter spreads and comes out flat. Apparently it looks like a cat's tongue. Hmm..... does it?

Piping Langue De Chat

Next was macarons which is also a Petit Four Sec item but it has a filling between 2 macaron shells. We made the macarons with the French method. I tried the French method before and mine didn't turn out very smooth. So I was quite interested in trying the French method again. The icing sugar and almond meal are sifted together and the egg white is whipped into stiff peaks before the dry ingredients are folded in. The consistency of the batter should look like thick lava. Not too thick and not too runny. The trick is to keep mixing it until when you bang the bowl gently on the table, the batter deflates slightly rather than keeping its shape. 

Macaron shells

As for the filling, we made white chocolate ganache which was infused with orange. The orange flavour was quite nice. Our macarons was slightly browner than what we wanted but it was hardly noticeable. (hehe)

Orange flavoured macarons

Sablé biscuits is another petit four sec that we made. The pastry was very much like a sweetcrust pastry. According to our trainer, the key to a good pastry is to make sure the pastry is well rested in the fridge. Dont overwork the pastry and always keep it cold. I brought a small cookie cutter to make little flowers. Then some we used the fluted tart moulds. The little flowers were sandwiched with some chocolate buttercream and some were sandwiched with white chocolate ganache again and topped with hazelnut.

Sablé cookies

Sablé cookie with hazelnut and buttercream

Then there is another category of petit four which is called the Petit Four Glacé which means it is "iced" with some coating like fondant. We made sponge cake which we then layered with some strawberry jam to about 2cm thick. We made 4 layers and then cut them into cubes about the size of 2.5cm x 2.5cm. Then we wrapped the sponge with some marzipan and then glazed it with fondant coating. 

Layering the sponge cake 

We made some vanilla hazelnut crescents which was a little like shortbread texture. I didn't really like the appearance of the cookie because of the shape and the colour. It looks a little like something that you will find on the ground of some parks. It's the one at the far left of the plate below. 

Plate up petit fours

Overall, I enjoyed making the petit fours. Just didn't like that the class was huge again due to combined class. It was also annoying that some students were irresponsible and left their dishes for other people to clean. This term we have another new trainer, this time it is a guy. He has his way of doing things and I am learning to adapt to his style in the kitchen. I guess it is a good thing that we can have a new trainer, then we can learn different techniques by different professionals. I hope this term goes well. 

I wasn't too happy with how we decorated and presented the petit fours that day because the glacé cake was too plain. It needed some decorations on it. I took my share of the petit fours home and the next morning, I woke up at 5am because I couldn't sleep. As I was tossing and turning in bed, all I can think about was how the petit fours were not complete and needed a slight finishing touch to it. So I got up and melted some chocolate and decorated the cakes and took some photos. 

Chocolate decoration

Ah.... at least now I feel better that the job is done and they look a little prettier. 

Banana Bread & Foccacia

With my long Christmas break, I have been having some fun in the kitchen. Some of the baking came out good and some were a little disappointing. 


Banana bread, I made this before but it was a little dense according to my dessert critic. So this time, I am trying Peter Reinhart's recipe, except I can't help but reduce the sugar. 

I think it tasted much better than the earlier one that I did. The recipe says to let it rest for an hour before cutting it but there was someone who couldn't wait and had to have a piece. So the first piece looked a little dense. 

The banana bread was nice for a few days. It didn't dry up and it was nice when lightly toasted in the oven and enjoyed with a cup of coffee for breakfast. 

Then one evening I also made garlic and herbs foccacia and we had it hot from the oven with minestrone soup. A nice hot bowl of soup with homemade foccacia.