ComeUndone

The second part of my Tokyo Sweets Tour is completed. Part 2: a tes souhaits!, Le Coeur Pur, Paris S'eveille, Mont St. Clair, Le Souffle, Cuoca Enjoy!

Thank you! I found that pound cake or quartre-quarts recipes generally yield nice domed cake whereas butter cake recipes are much harder to control. I personally perfer the former because the cakes end up having more structure. Butter cakes are mush lighter and fluffier but they are too delicate for my personal taste (much better suited for layer cakes IMO).

After 10 months of procrastination, I'm finally able to put into words some of my Japan travel experience. To give my travelogue a little focus, I concentrate on the french-style pastries that I indulged in Tokyo. I will add more entries to this thread as I go. Part 1: Advice on planning your own tour, Lenotre, Namco Namja Town, Pierre Herme, Theobroma

The mango buttercream is one of my favourite flavour too. I flavour italian meringue buttercream with canned alphoso mango puree. It's the some stuff Indian restaurants use to make mango lassi. Here's the link again to my cooking notes: cupcake notes The mango mousse cake was an assignment from The Art of Cake class that I took earlier this year. This is a link to the picture. Enjoy!

I second Anne's suggestion. I have a very limited number of tips at my disposal and I just use whichever that seems to be the best for the job. Actually, when I bought my school starter kit, I was a little confused about the tips as well. Turned out pastry tips are much larger in size than the "cake decorating" tips they sell in craft stores.

I used Ateco 825 (i.e. open star #5). I'm an advocate of piped on rather than spreaded on frosting.

I made a variety of cupcakes for a special occasion a few days ago. I'm happy with most of the results. You can read my review notes in my blog. top row: coffee cake + coffee buttercream, vanilla cake + pistachio buttercream, green tea cake + azuki bean buttercream, coffee cake + ganache middle row: coconut cake + cream cheese frosting, chocolate cake + ganache, lemon cake + lemon buttercream bottom row: coconut cake + mango buttercream, chocolate cake + coffee buttercream, vanilla cake + strawberry buttercream, carrot cake + cream cheese frosting

My latest favourite is to add natural peanut butter to my ganache. You would probably need to play around with the proportion. I suppose this also applies to other nut butter/paste (almond, hazelnut). For a PB&J effect, it would be interesting to add raspberry puree or Chambord to the peanut butter ganache as well.

Mel, I think the texture (delicate vs firm) of your macaron depends on the proportion of sugar/almond/egg whites in your recipe. If you find your macaron too delicate, you may want to consider trying a different recipe with a higher proportion of sugar and almond. In addition, if your recipe contains cocoa powder, it would also result in a firm end product. As for the measurement of egg whites: if your recipe states 150g of egg whites, that means you seperate the eggs and scale off 150s of whites only. However, if your recipe requires whites from 6 eggs (for example), simply take the whites from six whole eggs. Personally, I have a jar of left over egg whites that I keep in the fridge. I've never tried to leave the whites at room temperature to dry out.

Far less advance than what everybody has shared so far....but here's what I served last month: Coconut Banana Napoleon Puff pastry, pastry cream made with coconut milk and lightened with whipped cream, banana macerated in spiced Malibou caramel syrup, caramel sauce

Probably late by a few months but here's my attempt at the Nutella Tart. I made it as individual size as part of a chocolate tasting plate and it turned out very well. I personally like the individual size better because it has a high portion of pate sucree to filling. I piped the Nutella into each tart shell for more even distribution. The ganache was a little tricky to work with because it has the tendency to split quite easily. I have experimented with saving some leftover ganache in the fridge, warm it to pouring consistency, and make a second batch the next day. The result is as good as the ones I made on day one. This is a recipe that I'll probably come back again as part of a dessert buffet.

Just came back from Starbucks and had my first Chantico. Nutritional concern aside, I would rank this drink as a very decent European-style hot chocolate. I agree with the comment that it is better than the worst and inferior to the best chocolat chaud I had in Paris. The best part, of course, is the fact that it is so widely available!

Thank you culinery bear for such a wonderful tutorial. I couldn't wait to get home last night to make my first tarte tatin. I only have individual tart tins with removable bottoms so I baked the tarts in a muffin tin instead. One of the main reason that I stayed away from tarte tatin was the fact that I had to cook the apples stove top. With your method, I could avoid that step and the apples still turned out soft and full of caramel flavour after baking. I used Northern Spy because of its low moisture content and tart flavour. Here is a picture of the finish product served with caramel parfait and caramel sauce: If I wasn't in such a hurry, I would have coated the edges of the parfait with some caramelized walnut pieces for some interesting texture contrast. Thank you!

I totally agree about the stiff dough. My friend and I made 4 batches of the sable before the Christmas holiday as part of our holiday cookie box. Between the two of us, we bursted one very sturdy pastry bag and ended up with two very sore forearms. We added orange zest to the dough and garnished with candied orange peel. I liked the texture of the cookie and the piped cookie makes for very nice visual attraction. However, I would need some convincing before making this recipe again.

Thanks everyone for your suggestions. I'll do a few tests with chefwoody's recipe. Looks like it is just what I'm looking for!

I haven't experiment too much with ganache in terms of cream/chocolate proportion. Assuming that I use a 65% dark chocolate, would a 1-1 ratio of cream to chocolate be too stiff or too loose at room temperature?

Thinking ahead for Valentine's Day, I plan to serve a chocolate dessert at the restaurant. I would like to decorate the plates with the word "love" piped directly on the plate using something chocolate flavour. Ideally, I would temper dark chocolate and decorate all the plates ahead of time. However, it is just not feasible to have so many decorated plates around (not enough room for sure). This means I need a cream/ganache/sauce that stays at pipeable consistency at room temperature so that it is ready to pipe when I plate. If possible, I would like to stay away from ready-made piping gel or the stuff that comes in a tube in cake decorating shops. Do you have a recipe suitable for this purpose?

This book has been published for a couple of years. Both hardcover and paperbacks are available in Canada. It is one of my personal favourites because I learned about composition of plated desserts based on the serving suggestions for each recipes. For example, the recipe for green apple bavarois recommends to serve with green apple sorbet and dried apple slices. Or the panna cotta with roasted fig. This aspect is quite similar to The Last Course by Claudia Fleming. The recipes are reliable and turn out wonderful results. I particularly like the different flavour combination and the description of why Ramsay likes that combination. Some more memorable ones are dark chocolate & mango mousse, caramelized banana in syrup with Malibu and star anise (wonderfully aromatic), banana ice-cream, roasted white peaches in orange caramel, and poached white peaches in basil syrup. There's an quite an emphasis on using herbs and spices. The books is divided into chapters loosely based on the cooking method. The first few chapters begin with a description of the master cooking method (i.e. fruit, gelee, sorbet, bavarois, mousse, ice-cream) and a master recipe. Thoses are the chapters that I find most useful. The petit-fours chapter was okay but there are better recipes elsewhere. The special occasion and homey desserts chapters are okay but a bit unorganized. The basics chapter at the end is okay but again, there are better recipes elsewhere. All measurements are given in weight (metric). However, since the book is writen for a UK audience, I had to make substitution for some ingredients. For example, they distinguishes between double cream and heavy cream. I could only use 35% cream for both instances.

I finally had a chance to bake up the puff pastry and I was also very disappointed with the taste (or lack thereof). It does taste better than other store-bought puff pastry such as Tenderflake or Pepperidge Farms but it is still far from dough made from scratch. I think it is a good alternative if I need a small amount of puff pastry for garnishing purposes but I would not use it as a main component of a dish.

This sounds great. How much pistachio paste do you add to the cream? ← I used 160g cream, 50g pistachio paste, 340g milk chocolate, plus 2tsp rosewater (could have used more).

I'm also in the process of churning out truffles from my little kitchen. Each batch yields about 50. This is what I have so far.... -lemon lavender in dark chocolate (infuse warm cream with lemon zest and dried lavender, garnish with a single lavender bud) -chestnut in dark chocolate (cook cream with creme de marron, garnish with a tiny piece of marron glace) -coconut in dark chocolate (add powder coconut cream to warm cream, fold in toasted coconut, spike with Malibu) -rose pistachio in milk chocolate (add pistachio paste to warm cream, flavour with a little rosewater) I also have a bunch of coffee dark chocolate and triple sec what chocolate truffles from class. The whole place smells like chocolate.....

Desserts are actually really popular in the Cantonese culture. You can find many restaurants specializing in desserts in Hong Kong and chinatowns in North America where there's a significant Cantonese population. The good ones are often very crowded late in the evening when people have finish their dinner. Desserts that you can typically find in these restaurants are either the traditional or modern varieties. Traditional Cantonese desserts are strong in the desert soup variety. Within the dessert soup category, they are roughly divided into the cooked-in-a-pot type and the steamed-in-a-covered-container type. Typical cooked-in-a-pot type dessert soups include red bean porridge, mung bean porridge, black sesame porridge, walnut porridge, cashew porridge, peanut porridge, glutinous rice ball (mochi) filled with black sesame/lotus paste/red bean paste served with a ginger sweet broth, tapioca soup in coconut milk. Most of these can be served cold or hot. Steamed-in-a-covered-container dessert soup are often made with ingredients prized for their medicinal qualities. For example, you will often find red dates (紅 棗), swallow bird nest, snow fungus (雪 耳), lotus seed, almond (南 北 杏 ), papaya, jiggly stuff from female toad's reproductive system (雪 蛤 膏), and pears in some combination or another. Modern Cantonese dessert takes advantage of the abundant supply of tropical fruit available. These desserts are often served chilled. Some typical offerings include mango/durian crepe, mango pudding, tapioca mixed with fruit, fruit smoothies, and whatever else the chef's creativity comes up with. Other than dessert soups, there are also some Cantonese desserts that are quite popular. My personal favourites are steamed egg custard, steamed milk set with egg whites, and milk curdled with ginger juice. There are also glutinous rice balls (mochi) filled and/or coated with coconut & nuts, coconut pudding with yellow split peas, red bean pudding, coconut pudding, and black sesame rolls. Most of these pudding are set with agar agar or corn starch. These pudding used to be popular in dim sum restaurants too until recently when less profitable items are taken off the menu. In a typical Chinese banquet menu, the meal usually ends with a dessert soup and Chinese petit-fours. These petit-fours are usually some sort of flaky lard pastry filled with lotus seed paste or red bean paste. In Northern Chinese cuisine, dessert is quite different. As mentioned in previous postings, fruit coated in caramel and dipped in ice-bath at the table is popular. Some other items that you will find on the menu include crepe filled with red bean paste, fried meringue filled with red bean paste, and moulded sweet glutinous rice with glace fruit. There are many other sweet items in Chinese cuisine meant to be eaten at any time of the day. But that's for another day.

I went to Ecole Lenotre in late October 2004 for two half day classes: l'Opera and Pain Epice. Both classes were practical with a maximum of 8 people per class. The whole class would participate in completing the recipe together as a group. The class room resembles a well-equiped home kitchen with a big island in the centre. The focus of the class is definitely towards teaching the students how to prepare the recipe at home. Chef Francois Schmitt was the instructor for both of my classes. He's knowledgeable and communicates in a concise manner. He's also very patient with the students. You don't need to bring anything to class, even the aprons are provided. I would recommend picking up a copy of the Lenotre catalogue before registering for your classes. In the fall/winter issue, there's a coupon for buy one get the second at 50% off.

I have yet to bake them up.... I've never seen puff pastry made with lard. I think it is more commonly used for pie dough. The reason that lard makes flakier pastry than butter is because butter contains water whereas lard is 100% fat. Each has its own advantage. Commercial puff pastry is often made with roll-in fat which is a type of vegetable shortening. The advantage of roll-in fat is that they are much easier to work with. If properly made, puff pastry is flaky regardless of which type of fat being used. I like to judge the quality of puff pastry based on how high it rises, whether it rises evenly, and of course, flavour. Each package contains 2 sheets of 10" squares. I think it cost between $2.49 to $2.99.

Gifted Gourmet, which store do you buy the Pepperidge Farms puff pastry sheet? I can only find them in blocks at Brunos in Toronto but not already rolled out. I agree that they rise well but I had a side by side taste test with an all-butter puff pastry dough from scratch....woah, the flavour difference was very pronounced. That's why I'm really hoping to find a consistant source for frozen puff pastry dough made with butter.