Mocha Macarons

Yes, I'm still alive. No, I haven't forgotten about my blog and now that I finally have my beautiful new kitchen, I am baking more and definitely updating more. I also started a new baking class at school "Advanced Patisserie Techniques" aka fancy plated desserts and candy making. Exciting, but also intimidating.

For my one of my final desserts in my last class (last week), we had to once again make the dreaded french macaron. One misstep or extra fold and these stubborn little cookies will crack, break, and just not achieve their coveted "feet". These are the most finicky cookies you will ever come across and you will cry as you make them over and over and not understand why they didn't turn out "just right". Until now that is, because I finally found a recipe that I absolutely love love love. I thought my recipe from school was good, but when the success rate only turns out to be 70%, it becomes frustrating.

My favorite macarons are Francois Payard's and I was beyond ecstatic when I found his recipe on food & wine's website. This recipe has the same ingredients as a typical macaron, just made with a different technique which I believe guarantees success. I filled these little cuties with the most delicious chocolate-coffee french buttercream. Pure decadence.

Éclair Madness!

My patisserie & baking 101 final practical was last thursday, and we had to make eclairs, fruit tartlets, and strassburger cookies. I'm going to miss that class, making random cookies, cakes & pastries daily. Im ecstatic about my new breads class though, because nothing beats the smell of freshly baked bread at 7 AM. Yes, 7 AM since I switched my schedule to 6-9:30 AM. I keep telling myself its only for 6 weeks.

So for the practical I made two batches of pate a choux ([eclair paste] which yields about 50 eclair shells, however I only needed to present my best four. There isn't enough pastry cream or time in class to fill all of the shells, so instead of just throwing them in the freezer, I made some fresh pastry cream at home and went to town.

Typically eclairs are dipped in semi-sweet chocolate, but I only had milk chocolate couverture [coating chocolate] so that's what I used, and I was really pleased with the results.

So 50+ mini eclairs is just way too many, so in the freezer they go just waiting to be eaten. They freeze beautifully and defrost almost instantly, so you always can have a fancy french dessert to impress your family/friends with.

Crab & Leek Quiche

I remember when I was younger my mom would always buy those frozen pre-made quiches from the grocery store. I would scoop out all of the filling and go straight for the pie crust. Makes sense, since I love pie crust and basically still do this with fruit pies.

Quiches are so simple and although they have a fancy french name, they are basically an omelet with a crust. You can put any type of filling you like in them, the possibilities are endless. I had some lump crab meat and a few leeks from school which pair together nicely.

This dish is so warm and comforting, especially during the colder months.

Macarons, yum!

 I've been so busy with culinary school lately I haven't had time to bake anything, but I thought I would post about these lovely french macarons my boyfriend Josh bought for me. These delicate little cookies have become one of my favorites. In the past, the closest I could get to the real ones from Paris were the frozen ones at Trader Joe's. I stumbled upon Payard Patisserie which makes authentic french macarons, and Josh was so sweet and ordered me a box. I have attempted to make macarons once before, and they were so fragile many of them broke before I could even sandwich them together. I think I might attempt a second batch sometime in the near future however.

The flavors included: vanilla, strawberry, coffee, chocolate, and coca-cola.

My favorite had to be the vanilla, strawberry and coffee. The coca-cola was very interesting and actually had a slight carbonation to it.

The strawberry ones were so good I ate them before I could even get pictures

rainbow!

these little hamburger cookies are so cute

YUM!