let it rain, let it rain, let it rain....

It was a really rough summer in central Texas. It was over 100 degrees for practically 3 months straight and there was very little rain. The city imposed mandatory water restrictions. We were allowed to water our lawns one day a week and the fine for homeowners that misbehaved was pretty steep.

There have been frequent showers the past couple of weeks and the temperature this weekend is dipping down into the 50's. I have a couple of rain chains rather than drain spouts on my rain gutters. They don't get much of a workout but they are nice to watch when it does rain.

I would normally complain about rain on a weekend but today I plan on making a crock pot of chili and enjoying this nice fall weather. Please pass the tabasco....

i'll take option 2.....

There is a policy at school that we aren't allowed to bring our product home. They cite some legal issues but my lawyer buddies scoff at the notion. We put our cakes from yesterday on display overnight. At the end of class today, our instructor asked us to take them to the dumpster or take them home. He's a free spirit. Emily insisted on a slice before her calculus class tonight. I see many slices this weekend served with the darkest, strongest coffee that I can make.

By the way - dark modeling chocolate tastes like tootsie rolls. giggle

yabba dabba doo.....

We had to come up with a theme for our Devil's Food Cake and I went with the Flintstones.

Here are the details...

It's a 9" Devil's Food cake sliced into 3 layers with a crumb (thin) coating of ganache between each layer, on the top and sides. The whole cake is then covered in rolled "brown" fondant which was made by kneading vanilla and chocolate fondant together and rolling it very thin. The rope on the bottom and the frill on the side is chocolate fondant. The boulders and the Flintstone car is made out of modeling chocolate. The stand and the circular disk is pastillage which is formed from powdered sugar, glucose and gelatin and allowed to dry firm. (If you add cinnamon during mixing, you create Altoids). Fred's portrait is done by mixing cocoa powder and melted cocoa butter. Fun and completely edible.

drop and roll....

I don't know if I haven't noticed before but it seems like the oak trees around my house are producing a lot more acorns than normal. I think acorns is the right term for nuts from an oak tree. All day, including the night, I hear a "ping" as the acorn is dropped onto the metal roof and then the roll roll roll as it tumbles down the roof and then a short pause and then the gentle "thud" when it hits the deck. It's kind of fun to listen to it.

The deck was swept last week so this amount in the picture is one weeks worth - minus what the squirrels take and hide.

hapy anivversry.....

The project for today was an anniversary cake. It's a white cake that was sliced into 3 layers of 1" thickness each. A thin layer of apricot jam is spread on each layer and the sides. A very thin (1/16") sheet of marzipan is rolled out and molded onto the cake. The whole thing is topped off with a fondant glaze.

The structure of the cake is good, the marzipan roses look similar to roses and Happy Anniversary is spelled correctly. We actually had someone in class write Hapy on their cake. There is no edit key or scraping it off. I got confused in the middle of piping the double border. I forgot what was supposed to loop where so it turned out a little goofy. It's better than cake #1 but I still have a long way to go.

chocolate dream...

This has nothing to do with me but I thought it was cool so I'm posting it. One of the head pastry chefs from Le Cordon Bleu spent last week in Austin and he did a chocolate sculpture demonstration on Friday, which I attended. At the risk of stereotyping, he was exactly what I picture when I think of a pastry chef - French accent, full of energy, always talking, strong opinions, very demonstrative, very passionate and has a story for every situation. He came to our classes every day and it was a blast having him around. He peppered his sentences with "alors (a-lore)" which has many meanings but if I remember right ,"so" or "then" is the closest translation. After being around him for 5 hours every day, it was easy to walk out of the room speaking in a French accent... "You put this here and that over there...alors, I think it is perfect, yes?"

He did the majority of the sculpture on Thursday and did all the finer details during the demonstration. He shaped all the leaves and constructed the flowers during the demo and started adding them to the main body. Just when you think it was done, he'd add a flower or another leaf. It was like he was winging it as he went. "I think I will add a flower here and angle it this way and add this accent piece. Alors, I think it is OK, yes?"

chicken scratch....

My first cake in the cake block. It's a vanilla chiffon, 3 layer cake with Italian butter cream masking and filling.

Summary - the cake has nice square edges, the basket weave on the side is good (for the most part), the shells along the top and bottom are fairly uniform, and the butter cream roses and flowers are promising. What's up with that writing? I felt like I was in first grade in a one room schoolhouse and I was writing on a piece of slate with chalk. I'll be making some butter cream this weekend and practicing. I think I'll invest in a cake stand and start whipping out some cakes as well.

This adventure took about 90 minutes to do. There is a speed drill in 2 weeks where it has to be done in 30 minutes. It should look interesting