pastrygirl

Most of the books I am going to list are not particularly new, so may be hard to find, but may also be available used at a good price. Looking through my bookshelf, these are the books that have been most useful and inspiring to me in my restaurant pastry chef career of the past 15 years: Los Postres de El Bulli, Adria - in Spanish and impossible to find, but gorgeous photos and interesting ideas if you do find it. His newer one, Natura, is also beautiful and even more modernist. Grand Finales: The Art of the plated Dessert, Boyle & Moriarty The Notebooks of Michel Bras: Desserts, Bras - more for inspiration than recipes The Last Course, Fleming - this one can be very hard to find Desserts by Pierre Herme, Herme and Greenspan Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Herme, Greenspan Dessert Fourplay, Iuzzini - actually not a favorite but more recent and some interesting ideas Sweet Seasons, Leach - plated restaurant desserts organized by season Elements of Dessert, Migoya - another new one, modernist and gorgeous New Classic Desserts, MacLauchlan - I don't have this anymore, managed to lose two copies, and its 1994 so it may seem dated, but at the time it was one of my first introductions to plated desserts and I loved it. And you can get it for five bucks on Amazon! The Sweet Spot, Ong - some interesting Asian twists Book of Tarts, Rubin Charlie Trotters Desserts, Trotter - a little older - 1998 - but gorgeous and very inspiring to me when i was just getting started in restaurants. David Lebovitz and Emily Luchetti are also pretty reliable dessert authors, but tend to be more fancified homestyle than multi-component plated desserts. Bachour Simply Beautiful by Antonio Bachour might be a good one as well. I have not seen the book, but I follow him on Instagram and he does indeed make beautiful things.

Jim, whatever works! Do you always work with it that warm, or was it so over-crystallized that it needed to be warmer to be fluid?

Yes, Jim, too much stirring can lead to over-crystallization, you have to find the happy medium. When it gets too thick, just melt it out a little with a hair dryer/heat gun or add some melted and cooled but not tempered chocolate to dilute the crystallization. Today I worked intermittently (remind me to get more than one heart shaped mold before next Valentine's day ) with the same batch of 60% over the course of several hours. In between batches, I put the cover on the melter (I have a 6kg mol d'art) and turn it up a degree or two. When it sits for a while it does get a thick sludgy layer on top, but a minute with a hair dryer takes care of that. As long as the whole amount doesn't go above 95F and you still have SOME beta crystals left, you're usually OK, but I still test a dab to make sure the temper is good. I think a big part of the learning curve with chocolate is getting over all of the wishful thinking. Thinking that because its 89F, it is in temper, or because you're in a hurry to get things done the temper is good enough, or that you are in control. Silly chef, the chocolate is in control! You have to understand how it works so you can guide it back into temper when it goes awry, but sometimes it just has a mind of its own, and as different chocolate have different personalities. Valrhona Dulcey is nicer to work with at 90F and more difficult at 86 even though it is white chocolate. Warm it here, cool it there, put a fan or chill on it sometimes, stir a lot, try to multi-task while you're waiting for the seed to melt... It's the same as cooking sugar - the more you stir, the more crystallization you get. If you're making a wet caramel, don't stir at all. Fudge and fondant are crystalline and are stirred intentionally. Chocolate is crystalline too. Stir, stir, stir. But not too much.

I think you need to let it crystallize more. Stir stir stir, let it cool a bit, warm it back up if necessary. You really want enough stable beta crystals so that it does set up in 3 minutes at room temp. Anything will set up in the freezer, that is not a good indication!

These are looking great! So bumpy/pebbled = too cold? How warm is your chocolate and how much cool air do they need? Also, where did you find the coconut cubes? I love coconut and wold love to cover something like that in chocolate.

If your shells are too thin, let the filled mold sit a few minutes before dumping the excess so the chocolate starts to set a little. Or wait until the chocolate itself is more crystallized. It might be in temper, but if you let it cool a degree or two and agitate further to get more crystallization, it will be thicker when you are working with it. Of course this can go too far and result in super thick over-crystallized chocolate, but then you adjust by warming a few degrees to melt out some crystals or adding melted and cool but untempered chocolate to dilute the crystals.

Shhhh! You're right, bread is different, it's a living thing and not as reliant on exactness or technique. With pastry, for any recipe there is some amount of leeway, but you do how to know what purpose each ingredient plays and how adjusting it will affect the end result. In restaurants, you make adjustments for that particular kitchen and those particular ingredients. One restaurant may use a different AP flour or have a stronger convection fan than another, or use different brands of cream, butter, or chocolate, and old recipes might need tweaking. One reason pastry chefs often work early is to avoid the hotter and steamier time in the kitchen. My last restaurant had a tiny kitchen, so I would do all my chocolate and buttery dough work first thing, before the cooks came in and turned on the flattops.

Nice job!

First, one quibble: he talks about doing absolutely everything by hand, but those are clearly purchased truffle shells! The melter on ebay is clearly designed for chocolate and should work, and I often use a wet bain i.e. a bowl over a pot of simmering water. I also have a 6kg mol d'art melter. The disadvantage of the melter is it is pretty slow. I try to set it up to melt the night before, or sometimes will melt chocolate over a bain then transfer it to the melter if I need a lot of chocolate melted quickly (did this today). No matter what I'm using, I keep a thermometer taped to the side to monitor temperature. A hair dryer works when you need to heat a bowl of chocolate up just a few degrees. You should also consider what type of chocolate work you do. I like the size of the 6kg melter because the half hotel pan size gives me plenty of room to dump molds. The one you linked to looks more like a quarter or third pan size, i think I would find that a bit narrow to work with when doing a lot of molds. If you are doing more hand dipping, the size might be fine, though too deep a pan could be awkward as well if it was not fairly full of chocolate.

I generally do wet caramel because it takes less active involvement. If you've never made flan before, it may help to know that it does take some time for the custard to dissolve the hardened caramel and turn it into sauce. If you un-mold the flan after only a few hours, you may find a disc of caramelized sugar and little sauce. If you let the flan chill overnight, the sugar should be fully dissolved.

Sounds interesting. I'm sure they do degrade eventually, looks like they hope to offer about a year lifespan. It does seem like they would crack when cold, I guess it depends on how heavy the wax is.

Something with black sesame - lychee would be a lovely flavor combo for the white, if you can get it.

Not paper thin, but somewhere in the 1mm to 1/16th inch range

I took a couple classes with him in 2009, had fun, learned a lot. I was living in Asia at the time, so Australia wasn't quite as far away as it is now. Wish I could go back! Or maybe I should just check out classes in Vegas!

Was that Jean-Marie Auboine's class? I follow Paul Kennedy on Instagram, his pics from the class/shop were gorgeous! My attempts at panning so far all belong in the 'chocolates with that backroom finish' thread

In that case, since they will be built in the serving container, skip the gelatin.

I agree, gelatin is more an insurance policy than a necessity. If the desserts will be out at room temp for awhile or subject to dubious handling (as when passed off to a wedding venue), or if you want to mold and unmold them cleanly for perfect presentation, gelatin will help.

Fritos original are corn, corn oil, and salt, so I think you're good

I think the pain in the butt factor every day for years on end would preclude me from doing the conversion. How are you going to organize odd size condiments and delicate veg along with items that might spill or drip? I can see doing it if you're making a keg-erator or second fridge that wouldn't be used that much, but digging through the chest for everything every day? That would drive me nuts.

Are you wanting to make your own fritos? You'd just need some sort of cornmeal dough and oil to fry it in. Maybe get some masa and make tortillas but fry them from the raw state instead of cooking dry first then frying like for tortilla chips?

I don't know, but heated makeup air was my complete and utter nightmare when we moved the restaurant to a new space a few years ago. It took months of complaining and threatening to quit, with multiple visits from multiple HVAC guys before a switch was installed to be able to turn the heat off. The makeup air blew down in front of the hot line, but did not immediately get sucked back up the hood. Instead, we had a heated kitchen. Yes, the heat was sometimes on 24/7, in addition to ovens, flattops, and a wood grill during service. Fucking stifling, way beyond comfortable. I was the pastry chef, went in to work around 6 or 7 am so I could get things done - roll buttery doughs, temper chocolate, etc - before the cooks came in and fired things up. If the heat was on all night it would be upper 70's even at 6am on a winter morning. The day it was snowing outside and the kitchen was 77F, I truly almost walked out. A PASTRY NIGHTMARE!!! But the way the air blew directly down, if the heat was off the cooks would freeze and the hot food would get cold (unless it was summer), so I had to let them turn the heat on during prep, even though the back half of the kitchen not under the hood was plenty warm. Yeah... poor circulation/ventilation despite the shiny new hood. So I urge you to make sure you have the options to turn the hood itself off and to turn the heat off and blow outside-temp air instead. And consider where this heat is blowing and whether it actually will go right back up the hood or heat the kitchen. And if you have a pastry chef who you don't want to see suicidal, make sure you have a cool spot somewhere in the kitchen! There is no reason to heat the kitchen overnight! OK, maybe PA winters are way harsher and there is a reason, but still, make sure you have options!

I agree with your suspicion and with Deryn, the thinner layer should cook a little more quickly. i would check it at 25 minutes and go from there.

Calelbaut recommends a tempering technique which calls for adding 1% tempered cocoa butter powder (Mycryo), so you are correct about only needing a tiny percent of beta crystals. It is a chain reaction, and they do multiply... http://www.callebaut.com/usen/techniques/tempering/tempering-with-mycryo

Thanks, I don't use a lot of food color, but when I do, I want it to be worth it! Looks like Global Sugar Art carries the Americolor, I'll have to see if I can add a few colors on to my candy mold order.

Does anyone have a recommendation for a brand of food color that is best for macaron? I've tried gel color, but it doesn"t stay bright. Is powder color more stable?