Baking at Home with the CIA (lots of pictures)

[Rachel Perlow]

eGullet was invited (by John Wiley & Sons, publisher) to send representatives to their exclusive media day at the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park to preview Baking at Home with the Culinary Institute of America, the companion to the IACP award winning Cooking at Home with the Culinary Institute of America. Fat Guy and I attended; we had a great time playing in the demo kitchen, having lunch and touring the CIA campus along with a gaggle of other food journalists.

Baking at Home with the Culinary Institute of America

Our day began with a short lecture about the CIA, their new baking book (which is due out in September, but you may pre-order on Amazon), an introduction to our instructors for the day and the students who would be assisting them and us. During the question and answer segment I inquired if the book has weight measures or volume? The answer was volume, that weight measures are used in the professional book & textbooks (i.e. Baking and Pastry : Mastering the Art and Craft ), but were not for the home cook. So I followed up with "since weight measures are so much more accurate don't you think it's the duty of the CIA to educate the public on this issue and encourage its use?" The response was pretty much the same, saying that home cooks don't want that type of measurement, that they couldn't assume everyone has a scale. One of the other attendees said "well it certainly wouldn't sell as well if they did!" I'm sure that's the reason, in a nutshell. I just figure that if Jamie Oliver can be on TVFN using weight measurements, the CIA should be able to put them in their book. Maybe someday.

To learn more about weight vs. volume measurement, read eGullet's Kitchen Scale Manifesto by Darren Vengroff.

Our Chef Instructors for the day were Michael A. Garnero, Peter Greweling, and Associate Dean Thomas S. Gumpel. At the end of the talk, we were given an apron, side towel and paper toque to wear during our kitchen time.

Chef Instructor Peter Greweling shows us how to assemble paper toques

Fat Guy aka Steven Shaw models our kitchen gear

We were then given a quick demo at each of five stations: Yeast Bread, Custard and Souffle, Chocolate and Candy, Cookies, and Flakey Pastry. We had previously signed up for two hands-on demos each, so after the overview we all moved to our stations for more detailed instruction. I took pictures during the overview demos and the hands-on ones, so that I could show you some of what we learned. I apologize for the blurriness of some of the images, but these guys move fast and I didn’t want to be too intrusive in asking them to pose.

Yeast Breads

Opening bread demo

Rolling Baguettes

Fat Guy displays a finished Foccacia

Flakey Pastry

Ice cold butter on top of all purpose flour

The butter is chopped into the flour very quickly, using a bench scraper. Then ice cold water is mixed in, using the well method, and still using the bench scraper.

At this ragged looking stage, the chef was finished and started pushing the dough into a disc.

The dough is chilled for at least an hour before rolling out. It can also be frozen at this point for future use.

THE AH HA MOMENT: Almost everyone in attendance realized how much they overmix their dough when they saw how not uniform the chef's dough was. You should clearly be able to see pieces of butter. These large pieces of butter are what allow the crust to be so flakey in the finished product.

After chilling, the disc of dough is rolled out to a thickness of approximately 1/8 of an inch and laid out in a pie pan.

Fat Guy rolling out some flakey pastry dough

Pie crust filled with apples, spices, flour, lemon juice, and dotted with butter. The next step will be to apply the top crust, crimp, pierce for ventilation, wash with egg, then dust with cinnamon sugar before baking.

The flakey pastry station also made a delicious spinach and goat cheese quiche

The crust for the apple pie was baked as a completed pie, since it would be baked at a high enough temperature to cook both the crust and the apples (the filling should come to a boil). The crust for the quiche was baked blind, because it would not become golden and flakey at the lower temperature required for the quiche custard.

Custard and Souffle

Creme Brulee

Cream and sugar, infused with vanilla bean, are slowly poured into beaten egg yolks

Here is a close-up showing that you must be constantly whisking the yolks while adding a small stream of the hot cream

The mixture was then strained through a chinois, poured into dishes and baked in a water bath. The dishes were filled almost all the way to the top and placed on a sheet pan. The pan was brought to the oven before adding water. The cooked custard is chilled before finishing the caramelized sugar topping.

The surface of the chilled custard is blotted with paper toweling to remove any condensation. If the sugar gets too wet, it would not brown properly (i.e. quickly enough to avoid over warming the custard).

Sugar is applied in thin layer. It should be evenly coated, but you should still be able to see the yellow custard beneath. The chef says they prefer to use regular granulated sugar over finely or coarsely grained sugar. In addition, he discussed the use of brown sugar, but said it tends to burn quickly and doesn't produce the correct caramel flavor.

The chef wipes the edge of the dish to clean off any stray grains of sugar

A blowtorch is used to brown the surface

The torch is held about 4 inches from the surface of the custard and is continuously in motion. They prefer to use the torch rather than the broiler, especially with the shallow dishes we used. If the home cook does not have a blow torch, they can use a broiler, but it should be made in a larger, deeper dish, so that the custard does not curdle before the sugar browns.

I was most excited to try the blow torch as I had never done that before. It was actually quite easy, I may go buy one. But from a regular hardware store. The smaller versions made specifically for home cooks aren't as powerful and are more expensive. I found myself rather timid with it. Fearing burning the sugar, I under browned it and had to turn the torch on to brown it some more. Then we got to try them. One of the best creme brulees ever.

Raspberry Souffle

This raspberry souffle recipe is different from a traditional souffle in that it contains no egg yolk base. It is more of a baked Italian meringue and seemed much easier to produce than a traditional souffle as well. I'm not sure what other types of souffles could be made using this method. Certainly not savory souffles, as I think the hot sugar is required for it to work.

Click here for the Raspberry Souffle recipe on RecipeGullet, appearing with permission from the publisher.

Raspberry puree, lemon juice and sugar are combined in a saucepan

A thermometer is placed in the saucepan, and the mixture is brought to a rapid boil over high heat. Meanwhile, egg whites are put in the bowl of a stand mixer. When the raspberry-sugar syrup reaches 230F, the stand mixer was turned on to bring the egg whites to soft peaks. They should reach that stage just as the raspberry syrup reaches 240F.

The raspberry syrup mixture is poured directly into the beaten egg whites, with the mixer running

Be careful as the raspberry syrup is very hot, you may want to slow the speed of the mixer a little. The hot syrup cooks the egg whites but they still stay fluffy, just like Italian meringue. When all the raspberry syrup is incorporated into the egg whites, the bowl is removed from the mixer.

The raspberry meringue is poured into buttered and sugared ramekins and filled quite full

We were surprised with how he over filled the ramekins. The peaks were smoothed out with a fingertip swirling from the outside in. Wipe stray bits of the meringue from the edge and sides of the ramekins. No collars were used, they were placed directly onto a sheet pan and into the oven.

The finished Raspberry Souffle

We were all quite impressed with the volume attained on these souffles. They were quite stable; you certainly didn't have to worry about being quiet or not slamming any doors with these. The browned top was like a chewy candy and the flavor was intensely raspberry. My only problem with these souffles is that they seemed quite, even overly, sweet. A lot of sugar is needed to stabilize the egg whites, but I felt it needed more lemon juice to counteract the sweetness. However, they were easy, very doable for the home cook -- and fat free! as we were told more than twice. Which, of course, is the most important aspect of any dessert. Not.

Cookies

They're the one calling this section cookies, not me. I think of Petit Fours and Rugelach as pastry not cookies. Whatever. They were good.

The Petit Fours demonstration was mostly about pouring the fondant to get a proper coating. Click here for the Petit Fours recipe on RecipeGullet which appears here with the permission of the publisher. An almond cake with raspberry filling was already prepared, layered, cut into squares and placed on a wire rack over a sheet pan.

Associate Dean Thomas Gumpel checks the fondant for the right pouring consistancy

A properly coated petit four has a thick white layer on top and a thin semi-transparent layer on the sides

It was pointed out that if you went to all the trouble to make a beautifully layered cake, you don't want to hide it behind a thick wall of fondant -- that would also make the final product too sweet. The almond cake in this petit four was particularly moist and delicious.

Next, the filling and shaping of rugalach was demonstrated. They used cream cheese dough and filled it with raspberry, chocolate chips and cinnamon sugar.

A very thin layer of raspberry puree is spread onto the dough. Each cookie should end up with about 1/4 teaspoon of puree.

After spreading the puree, the dough was cut with a pizza wheel into 12 pieces. You want to cut it before adding chunky ingredients like chocolate or nuts, as they get in the way of the cutter. The other ingredients are added and the triangles are rolled from the thick end to the pointy end. You want the dough to only use its own weight on itself, you don't want to roll it too tightly or the fillings will ooze or fall out.

The rolled cookies are brushed with egg wash, then sprinkled with cinnamon sugar

The finished rugalach

I've made very similar rugalach before and highly recommend the cream cheese pastry, which comes out even flakier than pie dough.

Chocolate and Candy

For the candy making session, we made caramelized and chocolate coated almonds and chocolate truffles. The almonds were gone into in more depth. Click here for the Candied Almond recipe on RecipeGullet, appearing here with permission from the publisher.

First, you start melting sugar with a little water mixed in. When the water has boiled out and the sugar starts to thicken, but before it begins to color, you add raw peeled almonds. The idea is that the almonds toast as the sugar caramelizes

Right after the almonds are added to the melted sugar

Very quickly the sugar recrystalizes and coats the almonds. You must continually stur to keep the almonds separate and prevent the sugar from burning on the bottom.

The sugar recrystalizes and coats the almonds

Keep stirring. Soon the almonds begin "speaking" to you. They make popping and sizzling noises. The sugar melts and begins to brown. Remove from heat when they are uniformly brown. Spread out on a greased sheet pan, add a pat of butter, and stir then pick apart with gloved hands until cool. Unfortunately, we didn't have time to do the chocolating in my group.

Pick apart the cooling caramelized almonds

For the truffles' ganache, cream and glucose were heated on the stove then poured over high quality chocolate chips. This was allowed to sit for a couple of minutes to allow for even melting of the chocolate. Then it was gently stirred in the center, until all the cream was incorporated into the chocolate. It is important to stir in as little air as possible.

The ganache is then chilled and the centers are scooped out using small dishers. This is the point where we came in. We rolled the uneven scoops of ganache in our gloved hands to make them more uniformly rounds. Then, we were instructed to put a puddle of the melted tempered chocolate in one hand, and roll a center around in it with the other. To keep a flat bottom of pooled chocolate from forming on each truffle, we were shown how to step/roll the truffle across the fingers of one hand onto the parchment lined sheet pan.

These were pretty intense truffles, I swear I got a little high off one of them!

Chocolate Truffles and Candied Almonds

After the hands-on demonstration periods, we sat down to a lovely buffet lunch prepared by the CIA students. The buffet included baguettes and foccaia baked for the yeast bread demo and the dessert table included all of the goodies we made.

Dessert Table

Campus Tour

After lunch we were given a brief tour of the campus. The demo kitchen and lunch were in the Colavita building, on the floor below the Ristorante Caterina de' Medici (all of the decor within this restaurant was imported from Italy, including $20,000 Murano glass chandeliers). Unfortunately, we didn't have the opportunity to tour that restaurant. Just out back of this building is a beautiful herb garden, used by the students in their cooking.

Durkee Herb Garden

Just across from the Colavita Building is the Conrad N. Hitlon Library. This is where the Danny Kaye theatre is located, where the TV series Great Chefs and Cooking Secrets of the CIA were filmed.

Hilton Library

Our tour continued inside the Roth Building. Just past the bookstore and information center is a long hallway leading to the student dining hall. There are many picture windows along this hall, and the classrooms beyond have door windows:

Main hall in the Roth Building

Farquharson Hall used to be a chapel, but now it serves as the student dining hall

One of the beautiful stained glass windows lining Farquharson Hall

Peeking through the doors of the Knife Skills Class

A window onto Production Baking

Sign above the bar in the Escoffier Room restaurant

View through the window of the Escoffier Room into its kitchen classroom

Additional pictures and information are available on the CIA website: http://www.ciachef.edu

Also, you can take virtual tours of the CIA by clicking here.

[jhlurie]

Did you bring me back a cupcake?

[TrishCT]

What a marvelous experience! Thank you for sharing!

[bleudauvergne]

Rachel, thank you so much for sharing that amazing experience!

Your photos are excellent.

[docsconz]

Great job! I have enjoyed some of the hands-on cooking classes that CIA puts on. They are a lot of fun, educational and best of all - you get to eat the final products!

[Jason Perlow]

Did you bring me back a cupcake?

Dude, -I- was -lucky- to get a foccacia, a cookie, some quiche and a small bag of rugelach. Do you REALLY think you are -that- high on the totem pole that I'd let you have a CUPCAKE? Get real.

[Tepee]

Sniff...I feel so privileged to be privy to such a tour! Thank you so much, Rachel! Happy Belated Birthday!

[Fat Guy]

I though the end results of all the recipes were terrific, and all the instructors and CIA students who participated in the demos and hands-on sessions were all very professional and patient. Like Rachel, though, I was disappointed to learn that the CIA is going with volume-only measures in its home baking book. To me, it seems almost a moral obligation for an institution like the CIA to be pushing home cooks towards weight measures for baking and pastry. While I understand the marketing downside of not including volume measures, what possible objection could there be to including both? Any competent typesetter can put the metric weights in small type in the margins so they don't bother anybody.

The most interesting part of the day, though, was the transportation situation. In most any assemblage of food writers, editors, etc., the ratio of women to men is pretty steep. But this event was off the charts: I was the only guy among something like 15 attendees. This was particularly evocative of pornography on the transportation front, because Wiley's marketing department arranged for limo service from Midtown to the CIA and I got to ride in a stretch with 4 babes.

[Wendy DeBord]

Thanks for sharing your experiences and so conviently posting right here where none of us would miss it. Your photos worked really well, it makes such a difference. That's the first time I've seen inside the magical CIA.

[foodie52]

I hope you were suitably entertaining during the drive.

[Moopheus]

While I understand the marketing downside of not including volume measures, what possible objection could there be to including both? Any competent typesetter can put the metric weights in small type in the margins so they don't bother anybody.

It's not much of a problem for the typesetter. It's a little extra work for the author and editor before it gets to the typesetter, but the main obstacle is just a conceptual problem for the publisher--the conviction that the home cook is not going to bother with weighing stuff. The publisher isn't seeing people refusing to buy cookbooks that don't have the weights included, or seeing extra sales for books that do (not that they could really tell, anyway). So the publisher doesn't see any incentive to change the way the books are done, and just goes with the conventional wisdom. When Isaac Newton wrote the Principia he used the publishing industry as his model for the concept of inertia.

[SethG]

To me, it seems almost a moral obligation for an institution like the CIA to be pushing home cooks towards weight measures for baking and pastry.

Not only is it a moral obligation, it is also a pretty common thing to see these days! I would say it's at the very least the norm now for any book containing flour measurements to at least state how many ounces equal a cup. The CIA would hardly be going out on a limb to provide weights as well as volumes. Their policy is simply inexcusable. Very disappointing.

Also, and this is not a complaint, it's funny to see an event to publicize a book for home cooks in which the demonstrations all appear to be done in restaurant quantities!

Thanks for the excellent report.

[slowday]

To me, it seems almost a moral obligation for an institution like the CIA to be pushing home cooks towards weight measures for baking and pastry. While I understand the marketing downside of not including volume measures, what possible objection could there be to including both?

To me the moral obligation is to present recipes consistent with the CIA method. If the CIA insists on weighing ingredients at the school they have a moral obligation to do the same for its publications. That is unless they look on these as a high gloss Classics Illustrated money making version of its teaching method.

I was convinced of the need for a scale with a few paragraphs from the Bread Bakers Apprentice. It has recipes in both weight and volume measurement. So does my King Arthur Flour book. The CIA should have done the same thing; a few paragraphs in the beginning explaining why they use weight measurements and why home bakers should use them, then move onto the recipes with both measurements.

slowday

edited to add that the photographs are really great. Especially the one of the production baking room. It had to be challenging to get the light right with the large windows in the background.

Edited May 19, 2004 by slowday (log)

[bloviatrix]

I think it's naive of the editors of the book to think that the public doesn't was want weights. I would think the audience that this book will appeal to are somewhat advanced home bakers who own scales (or are willing to invest in one). The fact that they are unwilling to embrace weights is a setback for use serious home bakers.

[Fat Guy]

The recipes in the home baking book are, as far as I know, all from the professional baking book that the CIA has already published. All the volume measures in this particular book were probably derived from the metric weights in the first place.

Publishing companies as enterprises fundamentally care about selling books, but the industry is also a highbrow one -- especially a publisher like Wiley that handles authors like Paula Wolfert, various Nobel Prize winners, etc. Most editors will err on the side of doing something that makes the company overall more respectable, more of a leader in the field, more prestigious and highbrow -- even if that action doesn't directly sell more books. Likewise, educational institutions like the CIA should be thinking in terms of enhancing their stature in the community. I can't imagine including metric weights would hurt sales, and I can imagine it making the book extra respectable.

Inertia doesn't tell the whole story. What I see and hear in my interaction with cookbook publishers is more of a patronizing, almost contemptuous attitude towards the fat, lazy, stupid audience of mommies who couldn't possibly handle using a kitchen scale or advancing their knowledge in any way beyond simply learning more recipes and tips-and-tricks. And that's just not the case.

Here on eGullet where we cater to a decent sized audience of advanced amateur cooks, we see very few cookbooks that meet the needs of our members. Many of us find the average home cookbook to be overly simplified, yet we don't have the skills, equipment, or understanding to cook from professional texts -- not to mention it's a pain to scale down the banquet quantities and scaling doesn't always work right when you're dealing with baking powder and such. Any book that expands itself to include our audience is likely to sell a few extra copies.

[Pan]

What a great way to spend a birthday!

Thanks for sharing it with us, Rachel, and what a wonderful post that was!

[Rachel Perlow]

Thank you for all the compliments, it was a very fun day. We had a fab time in our pimp mobile although 3 of the 4 "babes" accompanying Steve discussed knitting most of the way up. Actually, the best part of the drive was the continental breakfast supplied by the CIA's Apple Pie Bakery. My favorite as a savory scone with Green Onion, Ham, and Cheddar, mmm.

FYI, the book does have extensive conversion tables in the back of the book. It shows volume to weight comparisons, ingredient equivalents (they show 1 cup AP flour = 4.4 oz or 125 g), advice on pan substitutions, how to scale a recipe, etc. The recipes in the book are not at restaurant scale. As you can see from the Raspberry Souffles recipe, for example, it is scaled for 4 portions -- if you were making these for a dinner party, you might have to scale up.

Here's something one of the instructors said that I hadn't heard before: Recipes with weight measurements are called "formulas" rather than recipes, which use volume measurements. Anyway, there is a section in the introduction on measuring, including proper volume measuring techniques, and they do comment on "measuring by weight: Recipes for professionals tend to rely on weight measurements, for greater precision and more consistent baked goods. Although weight is the most accurate method for measuring ingredients, most American home cooks and bakers are not accustomed to workign this way. Instead, they use wet and dry volume measurements. (for conversions, see ...)" (page 11)

PS - there were no cupcakes to be had, sorry.

[McDuff]

I was disappointed to learn that the CIA is going with volume-only measures in its home baking book. To me, it seems almost a moral obligation for an institution like the CIA to be pushing home cooks towards weight measures for baking and pastry. While I understand the marketing downside of not including volume measures, what possible objection could there be to including both? Any competent typesetter can put the metric weights in small type in the margins so they don't bother anybody.

I brought this up with an instructor at J&W and she said it was too much work for the author and publisher, but this omission would keep me from buying this book. I find it really annoying when bread books in particular don't have weights.

Nice bunch of pix though. that must have been fun.

[JustKay]

Happy Birthday Rachel. And thanks for sharing those wonderful pictures and experience with us.

[slowday]

I brought this up with an instructor at J&W and she said it was too much work for the author and publisher, but this omission would keep me from buying this book. I find it really annoying when bread books in particular don't have weights.

[McDuff]

Yeah, but at the same Johnson and Wales teaches one Peter Reinhart who published his last two books with weight and volume measurements. I'm now like you and would probably avoid a book without weight measurements. I even took a pass on the Baking with Julia Child book because of this and I know that its a very fine book, especially since following the thread started by SethG that is intent on making items from the book. But that's the way I buy my baking books now.

slowday

If you notice the sub title of Crust and Crumb--master formulas for serious bakers. Formulas is the tipoff that the book will have weights. His books are published by Ten Speed Press, I think, and his latest, on pizza, does not have all the weights and percentages. And his earlier ones don't either.

Once you get conversant with weights and baker's percentages, there's a subtle but detectable snobbism creeping in. If you ever saw my bread notebook, all in pounds, it looks like gibberish, compared to what most home bakers are used to seeing, two cups of this, one cup of that, add flour till it feels right.

It really is so much easier to look at a formula expressed in weights and percentages-- you can make an evaluation of it fairly quickly. 70% water-wet rustic style dought. 55% water, no fat, probably a bagel type of thing. It's also easier to scale formulas up and down in yield.

[Fat Guy]

I agree with that but don't see it as snobbism. It's just a better way of doing things.

[SethG]

FYI, the book does have extensive conversion tables in the back of the book. It shows volume to weight comparisons, ingredient equivalents (they show 1 cup AP flour = 4.4 oz or 125 g), advice on pan substitutions, how to scale a recipe, etc.

Now that I know this I don't feel quite as strongly. As long as the home user is given the info to convert the volume measurements in the book to weights, I'm okay with it. It'd be more convenient if it were right there in the recipe, but whatever.

The fact that they use 4.4 ounces to a cup just shows how fickle these measurements are. Most books (including Baking With Julia, which every home baker should own!) use 5 ounces to a cup, and my hero Peter Reinhart uses 4.5. Seems like the professionals can't even agree how many ounces a cup will be when scooped correctly!

Folks in the UK, whose baking books have always used weights, must think we Yanks are totally daft on this issue. It is little known in the U.S. that most American cookbooks in existence here in America also used weights until the late nineteenth century. There was a slow deterioration in the quality of recipes, and then Fannie Farmer, who is credited with standardizing the use of reliable measurements in cooking, actually solidified the asinine use of volume measurements in baking with her very popular cookbooks a century ago. This according to The Taste of America, by John and Karen Hess.

[Anna N]

I am just GREEN with envy that you could spend a birthday like this! Thanks so much for sharing.

[kitwilliams]

FYI, the book does have extensive conversion tables in the back of the book. It shows volume to weight comparisons, ingredient equivalents (they show 1 cup AP flour = 4.4 oz or 125 g), advice on pan substitutions, how to scale a recipe, etc.

Now that I know this I don't feel quite as strongly. As long as the home user is given the info to convert the volume measurements in the book to weights, I'm okay with it. It'd be more convenient if it were right there in the recipe, but whatever.

The fact that they use 4.4 ounces to a cup just shows how fickle these measurements are. Most books (including Baking With Julia, which every home baker should own!) use 5 ounces to a cup, and my hero Peter Reinhart uses 4.5. Seems like the professionals can't even agree how many ounces a cup will be when scooped correctly!

As seems to be the case with many of you, this volume-only measurement in baking books drives me absolutely bananas. In particular (and correct me if I'm wrong, Rachel), if the CIA lists one cup of flour as 4.4 ounces (or 125 grams, which is even more accurate), do they specify weights for sifted AP flour, lightly spooned AP flour and dip-and-sweep AP flour? Sure hope so. Or perhaps they avoid this by stating in the beginning of the book that they use only the dip/sweep method in ALL their recipes? All this should be clearly stated in order to obtain as close to perfect as possible results.

I'm with those of you who will refuse to buy any more books that do not include weight measurements. grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr