The wonderful world of minis.

[bripastryguy]

I gotta say Wendy I think you started an awesome thread or threads....

Just put a name of a dessert out there and with the talent we have here, there are so many options that come about....

I am so glad this place exists!

[Wendy DeBord]

So I took some photos of my current freezer to let you peek into what I do.

So as you can see all the items are ready to be plated..........all garnishes are on, no last minute prep allowed........which also limits what garnishes you choose. Some break very easily. For those trays I use a sheet pan extender around the sides of the pan and then I either loosely lay plastic wrap over the top of the tray or I don't wrap the item at all. Instead I use them up quickly. Besides the guys always grab for the most elaborately decorated items the most.

We buy in sheet pan covers, which are basicly large baggies. You could use a garbage bag instead if you can't find these. It has protected my items from freezer burn (so far). I let the mini's freeze uncovered, so they don't get mushed by the plastic. Once they are solidly frozen I go back and wrap them.

Wrapping them verses using covered storage containers like tupperware has their advantages and dis-advantages. The plastic gets torn pretty often sliding items in and out of the type of racks I have. I can easily see what's there. And if you look at photo that shows the entire freezer open.......on the bottom of the freezer you can see that I've got items dirrectly stacked on top of each other. Those are cookies, nothing that will be harmed/smooshed. But it's great when your limited on freezer space to be able to dirrectly stack items. I have no wasted space. I've worked at bakeries that used tupperware items to store pastries in. They never all fit into the freezer well. There were always awkward spots left vacant. Or the container would be a little too small or a little too big for the amount of product you needed to store.

[chefette]

I had a thought on this - well - maybe a couple of thoughts.

First of all there are minis (petit fours) and minis - small pastries that would be trayed up but larger that petit fours, and minis (single portions).

Depending on what you are doing/where you work you may produce all these types and produce them in different ways/for different reasons.

the main point that I had on my mind was the naming. I think that Wendy's device to get people thinking is great and has produced great results. I think that her point is ultimately that most people make something - frequently based on what they have around, the amount of time available, storage, needs, etc and then look at it and give it a name (if necessary). So when someone created a mini banana tatin (for instance) they might have thrown together something crisp - wafers of caramelized filo, cookies, shortbread rounds, caramelized puff, whatever with some caramel, and banana and someone said what is that and they said "Its a mini Banana Tatin" Just like someone someplace came up with Sloppy Joes or all those hamburger and tuna pasta entrees.

This is why What Wendy is trying to convey in this thread is such a useful tool to you. She is saying - Don't get all wrapped up in what something is called and what it has been in the past - assuming it has ever existed at all. You are God here and you brought together certain elements. You tasted it and liked it. You give it a name to keep it in your file so you can create it again when your memory fails you. Now it exists! All because of you, and those extra bananas and those Nilla wafers that were sitting around and a dollop of caramel sauce from the speed bottle and your mental dexterity and imagingation.

Or it all goes back to that pesky cat - -- there are a million ways to skin it.

[Wendy DeBord]

Ah...........

Sometimes I think English is my second language. Getting a point across is painfully hard for me sometimes.

YES to Chefettes points! YES! I hope everyone follows?.....

I wish I had been able to sum this up that well!! I'm a blabber........

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I keep thinking about how we could have fun with this........like a game. Eclairs keep coming to my mind as the perfect vechical to explore how you can create your own mini pastry. I bet I can think of 500 * ways to make eclairs, seriously.

You have a plain choux puff casing, to that you can add almost any flavoring. Choux puffs/eclairs/cream puffs are a basic dough that can be flavored. Although I rarely see anyone doing that (but me). Then you can do a chocolate Choux puff and double the list of possible flavors you can make.

Then you've got your pastry cream filling you can flavor a million and one ways.........but who says pastry cream has to be the center filling of your eclair. You could fill it with a mousse, a bavarain, a ganche, a fool, a frosting, etc......... Then to each base component you can adjust that flavor. So I can make a chocolate mousse filling and flavor it with orange oil. I could make a lemon mousse and insert that from one end of my puff, then make a raspberry mousse and insert that into the other end of my puff...........giving me two distinct flavors/filling in one eclair.........and so on.

Last I've got to top my eclair. Well who doesn't love it topped with ganche. But again the possiblities for topping your eclair also becomes a long list. Sometimes I top my eclairs with fondant (you can see an example in my photo above) and pipe on another flavor (chocolate ganche in my photo above). Sometimes I flavor my fondant or ganche.

I could make a lemon flavored eclair shell, fill it with a coconut mousse and put a pineapple flavored fondant on top. See the possiblities? They're endless.

We can/could go on talking about all the posiblities forever. AND if you have a couple base component recipes you wouldn't even need to look at a book for another mini pastrie idea.

Chefette mentioned to me that she thinks of the opera torte similarly as the perfect vechical to make zillions of versions. And so forth.........you could examine tart shells and again dream up hundreds of ways to fill them.

No book I've purchased on mini pastries has taught me how to think on my own about making mini's. Every book I own on mini's keeps me dependent on a book. Not that I think theres some sort of conspiracy in the baking book publishing circles. But the whole thought process of baking and on baking we/I try to address here honestly and openly with you all. Too many web sites and book authors seem to think people can't catch on to any greater understandings. That's just silly and insulting.

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Going back for a moment to something Chefette mentioned, naming your items. I do feel frustrated at times that we talk names of items too much. To really share the thought (in my mind) you have to say how you made that item with the' cool sounding name'.

[CanadianBakin']

This has been an excellent discussion and I'm glad I got to read it before I got too far into mini's. I did buy Flo Braker's book but because of this discussion I feel more confident in using her ideas and some components but developing them to fit my menu and what I have available as well as coming up with my own things. This gives a lot of freedom and room for creativity. If I have any doubt about flavour combinations, presentation, etc. I can always go back to a book for ideas. I've been working on a menu for 55 and I picked 6 items to make but didn't end up with enough variation so what was supposed to be almond cake rounds covered in white chocolate glaze with chocolate dots will become butter cake rounds cut in half with raspberry jam in the middle, covered with white chocolate glaze and decorated with raspberry jelly piped on.

Now, Chefette was mentioning about size. I've been trying to keep my mini's around 1-1/2 - 1-3/4". Would that be considered a petit four?

Wendy, what size are those mini cakes in your cooler and what size pastry shells do you use? It looks like you purchase pastry shells, I imagine with the amount you go through, making them would be insane. What brand do you use or what brand do you think is best?

[Wendy DeBord]

Yes we purchase the mini tart shells. I 'think' there 1.25".....but I'll double check for you tomarrow. A few years back the quality of the purchased tart shells really differed between brands. It was hard to buy a decent tasting tart shell.

I like Hafner brand shells alot. But we've gotten other brands that are pretty good too. The thing I'd tell you to watch when purchasing them is the thickness. Some shells are too thick and dominate the fillings. On a side note: I haven't had any issues with mini tart shell breaking. But I have with purchased larger size tarts (around 3.5 to 4").

Mini cakes, I cut to size. The size sometimes is influenced by how difficult the item is to cut, or if it wants to fall over, etc... Sometimes the size is dictated by the size pan I own. I wish I could demand pans in all different sizes, but that's not the reality.

On my mini pastry trays I do have "larger" and "smaller" pieces............ not perfect, but not horrible either. If you wind up with something too large, you can cut it in half then dip the cut in melted chocolate to reseal it........and pretend that thats how it was meant to look........like a circle cut into a half moon.....why not.

I think of a mini pastry when we're talking in general about mini pastrys it should be 2" or less. Over 2", not a mini.

[CanadianBakin']

I think I'm getting it. I was ready to throw out a batch of small chocolate macaroons that didn't get feet and suddenly thought... these might work in a tart shell with, I don't know, some mousse or buttercream above and below. I imagine they'd soften up a bit and give it a nice texture. Would this work? I can just stick them in the freezer for now.

[Wendy DeBord]

Your totally on the right track....use up what you've got, convert recipes that didn't work into something else, etc...

You should be able to do something with that macaroon batter. The thing is.........unless it's the type made with coconut or almond paste..........I don't think you can hold it in your fridge for later use...........

I need to double check on my tarts at work and I'll post on the new thread about them. But I think I'm all wrong when I'm talking sizes.........SORRY! 2" is huge for a mini.........I'm sorry to be confusing (I just really looked at a ruler yesterday and realized my mistake). I have to edit my joconde demo thread too. I'm not using anything over 1.5", less then that is better.

[CanadianBakin']

Your totally on the right track....use up what you've got, convert recipes that didn't work into something else, etc...

You should be able to do something with that macaroon batter. The thing is.........unless it's the type made with coconut or almond paste..........I don't think you can hold it in your fridge for later use...........

Wendy, the almond dough was fine and they are all cooked, they just didn't get "feet" so they don't look proper. I'll freeze the baked cookies until I have a use.

[MelissaH]

Wendy, the almond dough was fine and they are all cooked, they just didn't get "feet" so they don't look proper. I'll freeze the baked cookies until I have a use.

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I've discovered that cookie or cake crumbs make a nice addition to galettes, to help sop up juice from nice ripe fruit. Don't know if it's practical to make mini-galettes, but I'd think that if you wanted to do a creamless fruit tart, you could make use of them in that. Almond goes nicely with many fruit flavors.

MelissaH

[CanadianBakin']

I've got a question...

I've got an order for "tea things" coming up end of next week but I just started a part-time, not baking related, job so I've got to do as much ahead of time as I can.

One of the items I wanted to do is a layered cake in small triangles, about 1-1/2". I'm wondering what will hold best. I was thinking of a genoise with a thin layer of seedless raspberry jam and almond IMBC in the middle, topped with almond IMBC or, almond cake with vanilla bean IMBC. Which of these two types of cakes holds best in the freezer, and it will have to sit already cut but airtight overnight, with or without refrigeration. I'm a bit worried about the edges drying but don't have this type of experience with either cake. Any ideas or suggestions?

[Wendy DeBord]

Depending upon your recipe and how you bake it, neither cake really is superior to the other, both will do fine.

I wrap plastic wrap around the exterior of my cut cakes to prevent the edges from drying. I doesn't touch the top of the cake to ruin you frosting. Take long stripe of plastic wrap and fold them down to the height you want.

[CanadianBakin']

Depending upon your recipe and how you bake it, neither cake really is superior to the other, both will do fine.

I wrap plastic wrap around the exterior of my cut cakes to prevent the edges from drying. I doesn't touch the top of the cake to ruin you frosting. Take long stripe of plastic wrap and fold them down to the height you want.

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Thanks Wendy!

[digigirl]

First, a disclaimer. Not only am I sooo not a pro, I, in fact, have only gotten into cooking and baking within the last year. So I'm a complete noob!! But, inspired but all y'all's posts, I got ambitious. After reading a recipe in the Pastry's Best Magazine for a fancy, gourmet "Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup" I made some minis to take to work, day before yesterday.

The original called for using a premade Dobla marbled ballerina chocolate cup, fill 1/3 with chocolate ganache, then fill to top with peanut butter mousse, garnish with thin peanut brittle and a white chocolate rose.

I was looking for more of a casual peanut butter cup cookie kind of result, so here's what I did:

I used the chocolate tartlet pastry recipe from Flo Braker's Sweet Miniatures and made 4 dozen chocolate tarlets. I painted the interiors of these with melted bittersweet chocolate because they had to sit in the fridge over night with the very soft peanut butter mousse in them and I didn't want them to get soggy.

I made the chocolate ganache per the Pastry's Best recipe, but it came out waaayyy too runny for what I was envisioning, so I just left that out. Besides, the tartlets were a little thicker than I had thought they would be, so there wasn't tons and tons of room in there.

I made the peanut butter mousse per the recipe and piped them into the tartlet shells to the top. I skipped the suggested garnishes and just grated some more bittersweet chocolate over the tops.

They came out looking very nice. The shells stayed crunchy and the peanut butter mousse was light and fluffy. Overall, a pretty good success. If I was serving them immediately, I would definitely skip the painting the interior part because that was time-consuming, but it did keep the shells crisp.

The things I'd like to improve are:

My shells came out very uneven. Thick in some spots and thinner in others with very craggy interiors. Is there some trick to pressing them evently into the pan (I used mini muffin pans) or is this just an experience thing?

I think I needed to use milk chocolate instead of bittersweet in there somewhere, as the peanut butter mousse was a little overpowered by the strong chocolate taste. Something a little sweeter would coordinate better, I'm thinking.

Anyway, that was my first "mini" experience! Loved it and will definitely be doing more. I've always loved little things and my main culinary love is baking, so this is right up my alley.

Thanks for the inspiration guys!

[CanadianBakin']

Thanks for sharing your experience, digigirl! I've been thinking along that line as well although I haven't had a chance to try it yet. I was going to use the same crust as you used. Then I know I've got a recipe in one of my Fine Cooking magazines for a peanut butter tart that has a ganache topping. I think the peanut butter was thicker than mousse, more like the consistency of ganache. So I was going to do a layer of the peanut butter filling, a layer of gananche and then somehow garnish it so it was obvious it was peanut. The mousse is a great idea too. It would look nice piped in a rosette but you're right about the chocolate overpowering it. When I've made pb mousse in the past I've found the flavour isn't very strong. Delicious, but not strong. I'll have to keep that in mind.

I can't help with your crust yet. Up until now I've been using RLB's crust with ground almonds in it. It's perfect for lemon tarts. But I have a job (I'm not a pro) that needs to be more economical so I'm trying Flo's. I have it all pressed in the mini muffin pans in the freezer. I haven't baked it yet, so I don't know how it will turn out. When I do, I'll let you know. How much pastry did you use for each cup? She says 1 tsp but that's for those tiny tarts. I used 1-1/2 tsp for the mini muffin pan and that seems to be about right.

[digigirl]

I used my teaspoon sized disher, so it was just about a teaspoon. I think it was the right amount, but they just came out really lumpy, if you know what I mean. Not smoothly distributed throughout the muffin cup, so they were thicker in some parts than other. Just my inexperience, I think.

It was good pastry, though. I would recommend it. Came out nice and crisp.

[CanadianBakin']

I used my teaspoon sized disher, so it was just about a teaspoon.  I think it was the right amount, but they just came out really lumpy, if you know what I mean.  Not smoothly distributed throughout the muffin cup, so they were thicker in some parts than other.  Just my inexperience, I think. 

It was good pastry, though.  I would recommend it.  Came out nice and crisp.

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I've now tried her plain and chocolate tart shells. The texture is great and it holds well. I guess they are a bit lumpy but I think as you say, that will get better with practice. My biggest complaint is the big dip in the bottom. You know when you get a bottle of juice or something and it looks like a lot but if you turn the bottle upside-down there is a huge dip in it to make it look like more product than it is?! That's the sort of effect I'm getting. If my customer noticed they might think I was trying to rip them off. I make sure that I fill them with as much filling as possible to make up for this. If anyone has ideas on how to prevent this I would be grateful. Is it as simple as freezing them first? She doesn't suggest this in her instructions.

Peanut butter filling for the chocolate tarts...I've now tried 2. The first was cooked filling from Fine Cooking. It's very creamy but not quite the taste or texture I was looking for. The second one I tried is not cooked and is from a recipe book put out by one of our province's universities. It has whipped cream, cream cheese, butter, brown sugar, vanilla and a good amount of peanut butter. It whipped up nice and I was able to pipe it into the shells for a nice look. After chilling them I drizzled a mixture of 2 oz semisweet chocolate and 2 tbsp butter. They look really nice and went over well at my husband's staff meeting. I'm not sure if I'm totally satisfied with the recipe but it does taste good, texture is good, it pipes well, etc. The flavour might just need tweaking a bit.

Edited September 22, 2005 by CanadianBakin' (log)

[CanadianBakin']

I just found this awesome pan for mini's. http://www.nordicware.com/store/products/d...82-0002B3267AD7

Now I just have to find it on sale somewhere so I can justify yet another pan that I won't actually use too much but would love to own.

[beacheschef]

I frequently make minis for customer parties and found this thread so useful for putting into words what I just pull together and create!

A few of my staples are:

almond petit four sponge - baked in sheets

citrus chiffon cake - baked in sheets

IMBC - flavored with coffee, chocolate (dark,milk,white), fruit curd, fruit puree

fresh berries and other fruits for tarts

almond frangipan (in fall and winter)

filo dough and/or puff pastry

fruit curd - lemon, lime, orange kept in the freezer

ganache

cream cheese frosting for a tangy change from IMBC

pate-a-choux

simple syrups - flavored with herbs, spices, liquours, ...

plain tart dough - I like to be careful not to add nuts unless the customer is expecting them (I work with lots of customers with food allergies)

toasted nuts - walnuts, almonds, pecans, pine nuts, hazelnuts, kept in freezer

Darbo seedless raspberry jam

Other flavors of jam, Nutella

caramel sauce - kept in freezer

lemon scented cookie dough

basic cheesecake recipe that I can add flavor to

The longer I sit here the more I think of! Most of the items are either in my pantry or freezer, with the more perishible items made fresh (such as cakes).

I have 4 different sizes of tart shells and I roll the same dough into all of them and fill them with different fillings.

Puff pastry can be cut into 1 1/2 inch squares, topped with frangipan and slices of fresh apple, pear, plum, cooked cranberries, ..... and baked. Sprinkle w/ cinnamon-sugar before baking. These are the bomb!!

Filo dough can be made into cups with mini muffin tins, baked, filled with creme brulee, (or anything!)

Most of the items I make begin as thin slices of cake, brushed with flavored simple syrup, layered with different fillings, topped with something else. I have a metal yardstick and a couple of really long knives and I carefully measure and cut my pieces. With this method I can cut squares, triangles, (squares cut in half), diamonds, rectangles. Good round cutters help me form round shapes.

Even though I have lots of PVC tubes, funky molds, fluted edge tartlet shells, straight edge tartlet shells, ...... Most of the shapes I make are with my knives.

Lots of pieces cut quickly.

Mix in pate-a-choux shapes (round, oblong) and you've added height and different shapes to your dessert selection.

I try to vary the textures, shapes, colors and flavors of items on dessert platters.

It used to be a thought process, now it comes naturally as the ideas flow.

Take notes of the minis that you make and like, so you remember all of the components used. I also note what I made that didn't work, so I can rework it (or avoid it) next time. Then, when you're asked to make more, you can just pull items from your freezer, fridge and pantry and create!

Have fun creating! Mary

[CanadianBakin']

Thanks for the great post, Mary! You've given some great ideas. Having stuff handy in the freezer is great even for the home baker. Just the other night I was to bring dessert somewhere and it didn't quite work out so an hour before we had to leave I made up a couple dozen mini tart shells. I had lemon cream and a burnt sugar chocolate cream in the freezer ready to fill them so dessert ended up being wonderful in a very short time.

[CaliPoutine]

I just found this awesome pan for mini's. http://www.nordicware.com/store/products/d...82-0002B3267AD7

Now I just have to find it on sale somewhere so I can justify yet another pan that I won't actually use too much but would love to own.

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LOL, I bought that pan last year( dec?) and havent used it yet. I really need to try it.

[beacheschef]

Thanks for the great post, Mary! You've given some great ideas. Having stuff handy in the freezer is great even for the home baker. Just the other night I was to bring dessert somewhere and it didn't quite work out so an hour before we had to leave I made up a couple dozen mini tart shells. I had lemon cream and a burnt sugar chocolate cream in the freezer ready to fill them so dessert ended up being wonderful in a very short time.

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That's the way to do it!

Many of my ideas have come from using what I currently have in stock.

When you make a batch of buttercream, curd, (whatever), store the leftovers in the freezer for just such an instance.

You'll be amazed at how creative you will become. Don't forget to document what you did - great ideas can get lost if not written down!

Mary