Class 20: Cakes and Puff Pastry

Like I said last post, I am not a huge fan of the pastry sessions we've had in this cooking class. And sadly, this lesson did nothing to change that. I just feel like in the pastry lessons we have more downtime then necessary. This night, we made a genoise cake, which is a light, airy sponge cake. I've made a lot of cakes in my life, but this was by far one of the strangest starts to any I've ever made. The entire point is to incorporate a lot of air into the cake because no chemical leaveners like baking powder are added. We started by boiling water in a pot, turning down the heat(so that we didn't make scrambled eggs), and whisking three eggs and sugar in a bowl over this water with a large balloon whisk. The motion we used was a large arc motion against the side of the bowl closest to us. We continued whisking until we could lift the whisk out of the mixture and drizzle an 8 with the whisk into the bowl without it disappearing (or until the temperature was 110-120). This was a lot of arm work, and after tasting the cake, I'll stick with my tried and true moist cake recipe that uses baking powder, thank you very much. After we reached the desired temperature, we sifted a small amount of cake flour into this and gently folded it in until it was mostly incorporated. We poured this into a well greased and floured round cake pan lined on the bottom with parchment paper and gently placed it in the oven without tapping it (otherwise, it would deflate and all our arm work would go to waste).

Unfortunately, instead of letting us make our own batches of buttercream frosting, they made one giant batch in the industrial sized kitchen aids. Since we had the time, I would have really preferred to make my own but c'est la vie.

In the meantime, we made our own puff pastry dough for the tarts we'd be making in the next class. This was a pretty intense process compared to opening up the freezer, pulling out a box of puff pastry, and letting it defrost. We started the puff pastry dough by sifting flour into a bowl and mixing in softened butter and cold water with our hands. We turned this out onto a floured surface and brought it together and made an X on the top with our knives. Puff pastry dough is very fickle so its extremely important to make sure it stays cold and that it has adequate rest between the various stages. So, after we incorporated the butter and water, we wrapped it in plastic and chilled it in the fridge for about 30 minutes. In the meantime, we took butter and pounded it between two sheets of plastic wrap to make a brick of butter about a half an inch thick and 3-4 inches square.

The next stages of puff pastry are what are referred to as "the turns". Each turn is a series of rolling the dough out and folding it to create more layers of dough incorporated with butter so that it puffs when it cooks. Puff pastry making typically involves three turns. This process is very similar to croissant making, which I'm far more interested in. After going through this for the puff pastry, I'm considering giving croissants a "turn".

After our dough had a good nap in the fridge(and we had a good nap in the kitchen while we twiddled our thumbs), we took a rolling pin and with the X facing us we rolled the top up, bottom down, and sides left and right. We placed the butter on the X in the center and then folded the dough up around it and pinched the sides. With the last fold on the left, we rolled the dough to the length of the rolling pin (all the while flouring the board so it didn't stick). We then made a "book fold" by bringing the bottom up and the top down so they just met in the middle. Then we took the top flap and folded it over the bottom. Turn number 1 done. We did another quick turn, because our dough was still cool enough. Had it not been cold, we would have put it back in the fridge before the next turn. You never want the butter to get so warm that it starts melting. The next turn we rolled the dough to the length of the pin again, and then folded the bottom up a third of the length and then folded the top all the way to the bottom of this (the book fold only happens in the first turn). This we dotted twice in the corner with our finger to signify the two turns, wrapped it in plastic, and froze until next class when we did the final turn.

Once our cakes cooled, we made a simple syrup by boiling equal parts water and sugar. My partner and I decided to flavor our syrup with a little shot of booze, because a little dash of rum makes everything more fun. We then used a serrated knife to cut the cake in half. We brushed the entire cake with the simple syrup and then let that set up. My partner and I decided to flavor or ration of buttercream with ground hazelnut butter. We frosted the middle top and sides with a base coat and then let this set. After that set, we finished frosting the cake, making it as smooth as possible. I opted for simplicity on my cake decorating, piping rosettes around the edge with the star tip. Decide for yourselves whether you think my simple yet elegant cake merits any awards...

Didn't love the texture of the cake because it was a bit dry. I liked the frosting but that was about it.

Next up is Pot au Feu and Fruit tarts...
Until then,