Friday, May 20, 2011

My Palomo Torte

For this week I made a Palomo Torte; a European cake that is made with fruit and nut joconde, pistacio dacquoise and layered with Mascarpone cream mousse. Below is the recipe for this torte. I know it seemed like a lot but the finished torte was just delish! Promise! :)

Torte Components:
29 oz strawberry- raspberry gelée
1 Fruit and Nut Joconde, fully baked (1 half sheet)
34 2/3 oz Pistachio dacquoise
5 lb Mascarpone cream mousse
1  Almond biscuit (1 half sheet)
7 .5 fl oz Simple syrup
2.5 fl oz Strawberry liqueur
2 oz Strawberry purée
Tart glaze, as needed (flavored with strawberry purée)
 
Procedure:
1. Prepare the strawberry gelée and pour it into 4 silicone molds or pie tins, slightly smaller than the 7-inch torte rings being used. Freeze until needed.
2. Lightly oil and sugar four 7-inch torte rings. Place on a paper-lined sheet pan.

3. Cut the joconde into 2-inch wide strips the length of the sheet pan. Fit the strips tightly into the rings. Place the dacquoise in the bottom of each ring.

4. Spread a small amount of the Mascarpone cream mousse into a thin layer on the dacquoise.

5. Cut the Almond Biscuit into four 7-inch rounds and place on the cream.

6. Combine the simple syrup, strawberry liqueur and purée. Moisten the cake with the strawberry syrup. Cover with a small amount of cream.

7. Unmold the frozen Strawberry gelée by simply pressing it out of the silicone molds, or by briefly placing the pie tins on a heat source, until the disks comes free. Place the coulis in each ring.

8. Cover with the remaining Mascarpone cream mousse and level to the rim of the ring.

9. Freeze until well chilled, approximately 2 hours.

10. Coat the surface of the tortes with strawberry glaze. Chill until firm then remove the rings. Place the tortes on cake boards. Garnish with chocolate decorations, fresh strawberries and pistachios.


i just took this one out from the freezer.

a slice of my palomo torte.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Cooking for my best friend Nat

My best friend Nat had been supporting me alllll the way since I went to culinary school. He had been my critic for the products that I made even though he hadn't tasted nor eaten them yet.

So my ultimate wish is to cook and bake for him! And then, teach him as well so when I am craving for something too, he makes it for me! He said he's more than willing though and I am just so excited when that happens!

Hi Nat! :)

Thursday, April 14, 2011

Chilling with Chocolates!

Off from school and from work. I had been up 3 hours ago and since the weather had been really fine, I was on my laptop browsing about the news and updates about the upcoming iPhone 5. Ha! Yea, the past few days I have been reading blogs and reviews since I wanted to get a new phone - either the iPhone or the Thunderbolt. The other day Nat also told me to check out Techcrunch.com so I decided to look through their site today. As soon as I started reading the first few posts from the site, I suddenly thought of the chocolates that I brought home from class last Tuesday. So I took it from the fridge, ate some of it and went on web surfing. Each piece of bon bon and the filling inside was as good as every post I've read from Techcrunch. Lol


Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Chocolates!!

The advanced classes for the baking and pastry program focused more on the advanced courses for European cakes, chocolates, bread production and pâtisserie. For this quarter I took the chocolates and European cakes course.  It was really exciting to be in my chocolates class that I forgot to take a lot of pictures. I mean come on now, if eating chocolates is almost everyone's favorite, then making them especially bon bons are the most fun! We watched videos of demos of chefs from the CIA then after that we had a lecture about how to properly temper chocolates. The next day was for us to work on our own. Groups were given recipes and each member basically had to do one or more recipes. 
So yeah, here were some of the snapshots that I took. One thing I have always remembered since that day, "Make it, don't wear it!". I had to admit, if I didn't wear my full apron on, my chef coat would be covered with dark, milk and white chocolates all over! Well, it was my first week anyway!

demo. first day.

making dark bon bons. i filled it with layers of tangerine- white chocolate and dark chocolate.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

My Charlotte Cake

March 26, 2010 For my first post, I would like to share with you this cake that I made in school for my final practical exam in my baking and pastry course. It was filled and layered with bavarian cream, strawberries and blueberries. I topped it with strawberry gelee and garnished it with blackberries, strawberries and blueberries. I was so proud it came out this beautiful. I got an A. :)

charlotte cake

Australian Open week

January 30, 2011 My siblings and I had been watching  the Australian Open 2011 since it started. Most of the games would not start until late at night often at midnight and since I did not have much stuffs to do with school, I spent most of my time watching the Men's and Women's Singles. The games lasted almost 3 to 4 hours long so I usually made food for us to snack on. I made meat lasagna and garlic bread sticks during Novak Djokovic's and Andy Murray's game as they fought for their grand slam. That was a really fun night!

Click to watch Djokovic's win against Murray http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=6073658

meat lasagna and garlic breadsticks