I baked my first French bread today. We learned how to make baguettes in a demo on Tuesday, and Chef Somchet said if we wanted to actually make it ourselves we’d have to come in early and do them before class begins. So I made it to school first thing this morning and whipped up a batch of dough. I volunteered to work in the pastry kitchen when we were divided into teams for lunch service, because I wanted to keep an eye on my dough. I baked my three baguettes off right around noon so they were piping hot for lunch service at 12:30.
About three other students came in early to bake baguettes today, so all the bread was baked together. We all tasted one anothers’ breads to compare. We were all working from the same recipe and used the same technique, but the breads looked and tasted quite different. My bread was the prettiest, with perfectly domed tops, uniform color, and attractive opened vents…but it tasted somewhat flat. I didn’t add quite enough salt, so the yeast was able to work harder (salt inhibits yeast) but the end result was just not as tasty. Zoe’s bread had a more rustic look to it and I wanted to eat a whole loaf it was so delicious. She had added more salt than I did.
This exercise showed me clearly why most mass-produced baguettes suck when they look so fetching on the shelf. They’re undersalted so they will look as pretty as my bread did. I’ll try to mess with the salt proportions when I bake baguettes over the coming weeks and see what happens.
Friday, September 27
I have mentally dubbed today “cheese day.” Le menu included a cheese souffle (our first ones in class), a mozzarella roulade, veal milanese with fresh pasta sprinkled with cheese, and for dessert tiramisu. The roulade was especially fun to make (I had to lobby Drew to get to make it, because he wanted to do it too). We used purchased cheese curd, and I followed Chef Somchet’s technique for ladling in hot salted water and carefully stirring the cheese together. I packed my roulade with proscuitto, fresh basil, cracked black pepper, salt, and garlic before rolling it up. The resulting stuffed cheese was fresh and flavorful.
I stayed after school to bake palmiers and make crème patisserie for tomorrow’s event. Several students stopped by to wish me luck with my event, which I feel sure will go quite well.
Saturday, September 28
I had the luxury of good planning on my side today; I was able to sleep in, take my time getting things together, and do some things around the house before departing for L’academie around 1:30pm. Edemuth came with me.
I whipped together a salad and some sandwiches for us while Edemuth worked on cutting holes into all the pate a chou profiterole and éclair shapes. After eating she went to work on cutting Chefette’s brownies (which cut cleanly as anticipated, and looked quite fetching with the ganache stars we added later), and then she cleaned and cut all the fruit for the fresh fruit tarts. I ran about filling disposable pastry bags, cleaning the dishes we were using, and so on. I had intended to fill the eclairs with coffee-flavored crème patisserie, but I couldn’t find the bottle of coffee paste anywhere. I tried flavoring a little bit with some cocoa, but I decided it was too difficult to eliminate lumps and that it wouldn’t hurt anybody to eat eclairs filled with plain crème patisserie. Oh well.
One of the choir members, Meredith, came by around 4:30 with her SUV and packed everything off for us. Edemuth and I finished cleaning up and then drove out to the event site in Northern Virginia. We found the place fairly easily and went in to check out the kitchen.
One of the strange things about catering is that you never know what you will find in terms of facilities when you show up for a job. Fortunately, this place (a clubhouse in an upscale apartment complex) had a stove and a refrigerator plus a microwave. There wasn’t much counter space, but there was enough for two or three people if we each stuck to one small area. By the time we cased out the kitchen and unloaded the supplies I’d left in my car, Meredith showed up and we unloaded the rest of the goodies and got set up.
Edemuth and I went to work on filling the pate a chou and filling the prebaked pate sucree shells with the various goodies. I discovered quickly that using disposable pastry bags may not have been the best move: my brand-new star tips gouged some of them badly, and if I hadn’t brought extras I could have been in serious trouble. Also, the ganache was hard to pipe, and would have fared better in a cloth pastry bag which can take a lot more pressure than the disposable plastic ones.
I also learned that it’s handy to have several sizes of brushes available, even if you’re only brushing one substance. We were using apricot glaze to protect the bottoms of tartlets, plus we were brushing some over the tops of fresh fruit tarts. The tartlet shells were different shapes, and the large brush I had couldn’t reach the corners of the smallest ones too well. It worked okay, but a small brush would have been much better. Oh well.
All the trays went out on time, assisted by my friend Eliza who came out to help me. I was quite surprised to discover that one of the choir members has a mother who is a graduate of L’academie. She had come early to offer help where needed, and once I heard that she had a culinary background I set her up on squirting ganache into tartlet shells for chocolate tartlets. She was quite handy in the kitchen, which was a pleasant surprise.
Everything was set up 20 minutes early, just enough time for Edemuth and I to change into our party clothes. The event went just as planned; I slipped into the kitchen a few times to refresh trays but was able to hang out and schmooze most of the time. Everybody loved the food, especially the lemon curd-filled tartlets which I’d decorated with candied lemon zest and some musically-themed chocolate décor that Chefette had given me. I had some people offer me leads on future catering jobs (which means I may have to decide soon whether or not I want to do this more seriously).
I had tried as best I could to help with selecting wines for the event. I compared prices at a liquor store in the District and made some suggestions, based in part on what people recommended on eGullet. They ended up going with sparkling wines available at a bulk warehouse since they offered the most competitive prices. They served Friexinet brut, Cook’s brut, and a big-label Asti.
I’m grateful that this event is over. I haven’t really had time or energy to mull it over yet, but I really enjoyed both planning this catering job and working so intensively with pastry for the past few weeks. I relied quite heavily on Chefette’s expertise as I planned, baked, and timed things. I felt prepared to handle it on my own when I volunteered to do it but I didn’t realize how much I hadn’t considered until Chefette made suggestions. Thanks, Chefette. I also relied heavily on Edemuth for moral support and for assistance. It’s always a joy to work with her, and I’m fortunate that she made time to come assist me.
