I Love You

Since transitioning into my cake class, I've been real nervous. I also noticed that cake decorating is a lot harder than I expected, but then again, it is only week one. With practice comes perfection. Anywho, here is my first cake guys! It's a  6 inch high-ratio (which means a LOT of sugar compared to flour) chocolate cake, with a raspberry buttercream. It's not the best in the world, but it is my first cake.

Take a look at those buttercream roses, not bad for my first attempt!

My cake was made for my favorite people, Emma and Flo, however, all they got was a picture. Were not allowed to bring product home. Boo.



My whole, finished cake

Buttercream Roses...and pretty damn good ones!



My cut cake, 3 layers.

Interviewer vs Interviewee

My school is amazing at what they do, including drilling realism into their students heads. One of the main aspects of culinary that AI teaches is the art of networking. They never cease to stress how important it is to get to know other people in your industry because networking is how you advance, so to speak.

For a final of mine, I had to interview a chef outside of school, and basically start weaving that networking web. The goal was to interview someone who works in the general type of culinary you wish to enter; for me, it was either a pastry chef at a winery, or a cake artist. I landed an interview at a super cute small bakery in Temecula, called Truly Madly Sweetly. They specialize in cupcakes, but lately have ventured out into the cake and cheesecake world as well.

Truly Madly Sweetly's main cupcake display

I was very nervous about the interview, and I was the one conducting it! I walked in in my full uniform (which was now soaking wet because of the untimely torrential downpour) and almost right away began the interview. I sat down and began to ask Cindy my interview questions and the nervousness was gone.

Cute two person table and chairs

I'm so grateful that she was able to open up and give me sincere and honest advice, rather than making me pry her for answers. I learned a lot, which was the whole point of the project, and I also have started my network. after about a half hour, she answered my last question and let me try one of their cupcakes (which was delicious. I got the gluten-free chocolate cupcake with vanilla frosting). I thanked her and took some pictures, paid for my cupcake and left.

I was very pleased with how the interview went, and with how much I learned. I learned about her journey of advancing to where she is now, even without going to culinary school, about the culinary industry in general, and even about their shop. I'm pretty sure writing my report on my interview with Cindy will be a breeze, and my project will get a good grade.

Moral of the story: NETWORK. Make your face known. Get to know as many people in your industry as you can, and get on their good list. Life is all about connections, and connections are what allow you move forward in life and your career. I'm glad I've begun.

If you're in the area, be sure to stop by Truly Madly Sweetly for a nice little baked good. Their entire menu contains 0 preservatives, 0 artificials, and 0 stabilizers, so you'll be able to enjoy that cupcake just that much more knowing there's nothing fake in it and everything you're eating is 100% real and fresh.

Here are some pictures from my interview:

Cupcake display

Classic French-style menu and ambiance

Little gift shop located in the bake shop

Here ye, Here ye!

Hello everyone!

 I am so excited to finally get a blog up and going. I've always wanted to, but never really felt 'worthy' after looking at all the other food blogs out there! 

To sort of break the ice, it's almost THANKSGIVING! I am so excited that this year I have a little more schooling under my belt and will really be able to impress the guests! Speaking of impressive, today in school, my team and I successfully assembled (and hand-painted) our first pastillage showpiece. 

For those of you who don't know, pastillage is a sugar paste, kind of like fondant, that when rolled quickly and thinly, can be formed to make any shape. While drying, it hardens to the point where it resembles porcelain. This dough is tricky, because it begins to 'dry' while rolling it out, and cracks to the point of uselessness, but it isn't fully dry for anywhere from 3 days to a week. Our team had a lot of problems with our showpiece, which we insisted take of the life of a cornucopia in the spirit of Thanksgiving. Our first attempt was to cut strips of the dough and basket weave them and then cover our cornucopia mold with it and let it dry. That was a complete let down. By cutting the dough into strips, we gave it more surface area, making it dry and crack ten times faster. We had to start over...there was no saving those strips.

Our next attempt was to roll out a large sheet and press a real basket into the dough to imprint the weaves onto the actual dough, which when dry, isn't edible, so rolling a real basket on it wasn't too far fetched. This worked to an extent. The surface started to dry that the basket didn't fully imprint, so we wrapped the dough around our mold, shaped it, and decided to take a risk and cross our fingers.

Our cornucopia took a week to dry (along with pastillage leaves we also made) and when coming into school today, we were determined to assemble it and make it look as realistic as possible.

We originally planned on airbrushing the leaves to give them a soft color, but with one airbrush, and a class of 30 people, we had to come up with a plan B - hand painting them with gel colors and water. This was actually fun, and a lot less stressful than working with the actual dough. We sat there and painted these leaves for 2 hours, ensuring they looked real. We also brushed the cornucopia with a gold and highlighted the basket weave lines with a darker brown. We 'glued' the leaves to the mouth of the cornucopia, transferred it to our cake board, and were finally given the opportunity to stand back and see it in it's entirety. Low and behold, it was amazingly beautiful. Not only were we quick to take pictures, but the rest of the class and our Chef were already forming a line to snap a pic. You know it's good when the teacher wants to document it.

Our beautiful hand-painted Cornucopia

The Cornucopia, and our sister-team's Thanksgiving-esq showpiece

Our cornucopia, along with another team's Thanksgiving-esq piece just seemed to get ya ready for this Thursday, and thus, was placed in the schools main display case! This was so exciting to the team and I, as we had never created a featured piece before, and we rushed to the case after class to take cheesy pictures of us pointing at our showpiece. I think I got the taste of having featured work, and I like it...I like it a lot. :]

The display case. Front and center baby!

Beautiful featured art