Chocolate Macarons

     Chocolate macarons! This was my second time making macarons and it was a lot easier since the instructions were really easy to follow. I found that we had to pulse the almond/sugar mixture quite a bit before it would be fine and clump-free. 

     We forgot to let the macarons rest for 10 minutes before putting them in the oven and baked them for 4 minutes. We realized and pulled them out to let them rest for a bit. I thought that because of this our macarons wouldn't work out but they still turned out really cute and pretty.

     Unfortunately, I'm allergic to nuts so I couldn't eat these cookies. Instead, I ate all of the left over chocolate ganache. The chocolate ganache had a really nice orange flavour to it which gave it something different. 

Chicken Udon

This chicken udon was really yummy and I think that the combination of sauces was delicious! I found that there were a lot of snow peas and that they over-powered the dish. In my opinion, the dish would've tasted better without all the snow peas. However, I do think that they add a really nice vibrant colour in what would be a bland dish otherwise.

It was kind of difficult to cut the mushrooms evenly since they would roll around and such. We learned a new way to cut garlic so that it'd be totally even. The overall dish was really yummy and easy to make. I would definitely make this again!

Sweet Stacks

 

Using the same food ring as the Mexican Stack, we created a sweet cake stack. I chose an apple filling for my stack. The cake was a little dry but otherwise, the flavour was wonderful. I didn't really enjoy the apple pie filling...the texture of the apple wasn't great and it tasted kind of stale.

 I was thinking about cutting the cake into thirds but after seeing how dry the cake was, I decided that it wouldn't be the best idea to attempt cutting thin slices. I think that the whip cream looks amazing when piped through the swirly icing tip. I added the cherry on top which I think adds a different colour since most of the dish is sand coloured. The chocolate sauce was delicious but it didn't stand out on the glass plate.

yummy :)

Mexican Stacks

 

There's not much to say about the process of making this Mexican stack. All I needed to do was spray the food ring with cooking spray then layer my ingredients. A little trick that my friend Maryssa shared was: if you don't have enough beef for the stack, fill the middle of the layer with tomato/lettuce and place the beef around it. I think that it would be really nice if the rings were clear. This way, we could see how even our layers look. It's kind of a guess and check process when creating this because you can't see how much of each ingredient you're placing down.

yummy :)

Black & White Cheesecake

 

 

     The creamy filling, rich crumbly chocolate crust, and fresh flavor of the strawberry coulis is what makes this black and white cheesecake absolutely delectable. Firstly, we created the chocolate crust for the base of the cake. We combined melted butter and chocolate cookie crumbs together then pressed the mixture into the bottom of a spring form pan. I couldn't resist eating the excess crumbs off the spoon...it was delicious. Next, we created the filling. I have very limited experience when it comes to making cheesecake. This lab was only my second time making it and it was a lot easier than expected. When we were baking the cake, the top of the cake cracked which had me quite worried. I wonder what could've been done to prevent the cracks from happening?

 

     Looking at this cheesecake, your eye may be drawn to the delicate chocolate leaf laying on the cake. This chocolate leaf was the most difficult piece of food art to create. First of all, we sent our talented food artist, Natalie, to pick out the best leaves. Secondly, we tempered some chocolate and, using a food safe paintbrush, painted the backs of the leaves. After that was completed, we placed the leaves in the fridge.

     The most difficult part about the production of these chocolate leaves was the peeling. At first, I attempted peeling the leaf off of the chocolate the way you'd peel a sticker off it's backing paper. However, the chocolate was a little thin and it started cracking. In the end, I handed it over to Natalie to peel the leaves off.

     The bottom of my leaf was very cracked so I simply grabbed a chefs knife and trimmed the edges off. For the plate design, I think that the tip of the squeeze bottle is too wide and that I can't do detailed designs. I tried drawing flowers with the strawberry coulis but the lines were so thick that it just looked like a messy puddle.



     The cake itself was good. I couldn't finish the whole slice but I liked how it wasn't too sweet. The strawberry coulis was the only component of the dish that was more sweet and it made the cake taste so much better. The leaf also added a subtle chocolate flavour which gave the cake more depth.

 



Apple Bird Garnish

 

     There are many creative ways to create a beautiful apple bird garnish. I thought that this particular design was the most beautiful. This apple bird was a lot more simple to make then I thought. After watching a tutorial on how to create the bird, I realized that just a few simple 'v-cuts' could create such an intricate design.

     The wings of the bird were created out of slices of a wedge of apple. I cut out one wedge from each side of the bird then made smaller wedges within that slice. I found that it was hard to start the cuts. I was really scared to slice into the apple just in case I messed up. This was true for some of the wedges where I cut right through and broke the wing. I also had some trouble with matching up the cuts which resulted in some wings not fitting in place.

I eventually figured it out and I think that the end result is quite nice!

Watermelon Basket

 

  This lab looked a little complicated at first but it turned out to be quite simple. To create the watermelon basket, we used a small watermelon and a food decorator. With the food decorator, we created these small v-cuts along the watermelon to create the shape of the basket. We found that the food decorator was actually really easy to use and cut through the tough outer layer of the watermelon very well.

  When we finished with the outline, we went back over the lines with a pairing knife just to make sure that the watermelon would split properly. The first time we tried breaking the side chunk off, it stuck to the melon so we had to redo some of the v-cuts. This is what the inside of the melon looked like when we split it up:

  I think it looks pretty great. After we removed both side chunks, we scooped out the melon with a spoon and started melon balling it. I've never used a melon baller before but I realized that the trick is to push down with the whole tool first and then scoop. This creates the perfect and delicious melon sphere.

Guitar Cake

 

For this lab, our unit decided to bake a guitar shaped cake! We used a chocolate cake mix then filled up the guitar shaped cake pan by Wilton. The cake looked really puffy and not that promising when it was first taken out of the oven. However, as it started to set, the cake started to draw from the edges and removing it from the pan was a really easy process. We then put it into the freezer so that we could ice it next class.

 

  We used the same type of icing for the entire cake. To make the dark brown, I had to use A LOT of the brown gel food colouring which was almost half of the container. I thought that the food colouring was going to throw off the taste of the icing but it actually had no effect on the taste. For the body of the guitar, we used the #27 star tip which created a kind of fluffy texture. I thought that it looked cool but wasn't fitting for a guitar. The scalloping on the sides of the cake took a little bit of time to get the hang of, but after a while, it was really easy. We used black icing for the tuning board, the sound hole and the saddle. The black colour was so much easier to achieve than the brown colour surprisingly.

Overall, I think that shaped cake pans are really fun and quite simple to work with. The cake itself was quite fluffy and the icing was delicious! I would definitely like to try working with other character pans in the future.