Week 44

TUESDAY 28/10:
Produce Pastries + Coffee
In this week's pastry class we learnt about puff pastry such as different methods and turns to getting those hundreds and thousands of dough layers. With our puff pastry we then made palmiers and pear galettes. The hardest thing about this class was that Panee and I were at the back of the kitchen where it was a lot warmer - meaning that our dough was so soft the whole time we were rolling and kept tearing on us (and also because we didn't use enough flour on the bench when we rolled LOL) but nonetheless, by our 5th and 6th turns we had pretty much gotten the hang of it and our dough turned out fine.

Palmiers - which look like those asian butterfly cookies you can get!

Pear Galettes with Frangipani underneath and an apricot glaze

Our pastry class ended at round 4.30/4.45pm-ish so we all wanted to rush to get changed and to  hurry across the road to get food before our coffee class at 5pm. BUT just as we finished getting changed the fire alarms to the school went off LOL. Cause our changerooms are pretty close to some of the kitchens, we decided to walk down the hallway and saw the reason to the alarms - one of the rooms was filled with smoke (turns out one of the students microwaved and burnt her butter - or something along that line. It was a pastry class for croissants is the only thing I'm sure about). Anyways, we were all pretty hungry so we left to get food and as we walked out the gates a firetruck pulled up and when we walked about 20m down the road another one came blaring (good to know that they're prompt!). We got food and walked back to where all the other students were waiting outside and soon got let in again for our coffee class.

Now I'm actually a barista at my workplace so coffee is something I'm very much familiar with - but I really wanted to do the class with everyone because all of my skills and practices are basically self taught and through talking with my co-workers, nothing by the books, and so I really wanted to learn things properly.

Today's class was lattes and cappucinos. The biggest problem I still have is that my pouring and latte art is still not the prettiest - something that comes with lots of practice and time though, so I'm not too fussed about that. Though, I did pick up on a really good technique today to pouring which I've put into practice and it works! Also the pressure of the steam wand is a lot stronger than I'm used too but it was fine after two or three gos.

The two front ones I poured - the one with the face is thanks to Sophie because the pour wasn't too good, so she made a face LOL instead of us just covering it up with chocolate like we did last time. Not my best, but still ok since the machines are still new.

WEDNESDAY 29/10:
Produce Cakes
So Sophie called me at 4pm asking if I could come pick her up and go to class together which was perfect cause I was packing my uniform ready to head out the door. I drove to Sophie's and saw Oreo! HE'S SO CUTE!! Anyways, we left shortly and my GPS said we'd be at WAI at 5.10pm - but I guesstimated roughly 5.30pm cause traffic, so just 30 minutes late to class and that's what we told the other girls to pass onto our teacher. WELLLL.. 5.30pm came and pass and in the end by the time we parked, got changed and got our tool boxes from our lockers, we were an hour late LOL so we missed out on the demo for the Red Velvet Cake with Chocolate Ganache on top (it was barely red LOL).

And cause we missed out on the demo our cakes turned out like this:

SO SAD! They sunk ):

When everyone elses looked like this:

But it's ok, cause Soph and I can ice (cover it up! cover it up! LOL) And they turned out fine :)

THURSDAY 30/10:
Theory + Methods of Cookery
I always dread Wednesday nights into Thursday mornings cause we finish at 9/9.30pm and by the time I get home its almost 10pm or a little over. Also because the next day we start at 8am which means a 6.30am wakeup to be there on time. PLUS Thursday mornings is theory, which means homework, which means last minute rush the night before to do homework, which means only two or three hours of sleep D:

Today was half theory and also two tests worth 50% of the unit. I don't even know why I was panicking for the test cause it turned out to be waaaaay easier than I thought and I ended up finishing first and leaving early anyway LOL ..well actually I left the classroom early but waited outside for the rest of my friends to finish so that we could go have lunch together haha

We had lunch at 68 Degrees which was great! (post will be up in a few days!) And we almost lost track of time and only left ourselves about 15 minutes to rush back to WAI, get changed, grab our toolboxes and get to level 3.. and hey, we were only 5 minutes late!

Thursday also happens to be my favourite class cause I have the best bench partner, Panee :D And we always go a little bit crazy on Thursday afternoons haha, plus we have the best teacher and she just makes everything fun, so the atmosphere of this class is always upbeat (which is great when we're all dead tired LOL)

So today we made vegetable stock, poached some eggs, cooked some pasta, blanched some broccoli and then microwaved it, steamed some chicken, and then made some pumpkin soup.

Our final product - pumpkin soup! But who garnish with broccoli.. wtf LOL

FRIDAY 31/10:
Produce Yeast Goods
Fridays are also early as well - 8.30am start or for me still a 7am wakeup cause we have to get changed BUT I crashed at round 8.30pm last night and didn't wakeup till 6.30am (10 hours of sleep oh em gee! :D!! ) so I was buzzing in the morning.

For yeast class today we made celebration bread being stollen (German Christmas bread with dried fruits and marzipan) and hot cross buns (we did fruit and chocolate). Class went really well today and we were pretty much on time or ahead of time - which meant that we finished early too!

Because we had three recipes, we split into three groups and so I shotgunned the chocolate hot cross buns - cause I really like chocolate hot cross buns kekeke

So you can divvy up the dough by hand and by weighing it out individually - or you can use this machine what does it for you.. so much easier!

Perfectly shaped fruit hot cross bun dough balls from the machine :D

And our chocolate ones! SO PRETTY!!

With the stollen, the traditional way is to just put the marzipan in the middle and then fold in either sides. THOUGH, our teacher showed us to plait the bread which made it a lot prettier. So you still put the marzipan in the middle, but then you cut strips on either side ready to plait.

Ready to plait the bread!

Plaited bread ready to be baked

During this time, our hot cross buns had been in the proofer doing its final proof and when we took them out, they had doubled in size :D I'VE NEVER SEEN BUNS SO BIG BEFORE!! They grew even more in the oven, and our teacher was afraid they weren't going to be the right consistency inside cause we may have over activated the yeast or proofed it for too long - but they turned out perfect!

Just out of the proofer and ready to be baked

Baked stollen! The one I plaited is the middle tray, first from the bottom - turned out real pretty! and tastes good too!

 We didn't have enough of our white piping thing which makes the crosses on top of the hot cross buns cause we were too genorous with the first few trays.. so we all genuisly thought that we would make faces instead - and as I was giggly piping them on with a few other next to me, our teacher was like "there's always one student in each class that makes faces" LOOOOOL, and here we thought we were being cool haha. The faces looked good before the oven, but kinda crazy and lazy eyed afterwards haha

Crazy eyed buns LOL - we even put raisins to make the eyes haha

Our giant chocolate hot cross buns!

So yeast is also great because its a Friday and that means we get to take our product home cause they can't sell them over the weekend. So we each had 4 chocolate hot cross buns, 4 fruit ones with crosses, 4 fruit without crosses and a stollen as well. The only bad thing about that is carrying it around with you all day cause I didn't go home after class but went to play with Sophie and Josh, and then dinner after that with Michael and Nelson - IT WAS HEAVY D: .. but I ain't complaining too much about free bread ^_^