Plated Desserts

this is how it worked: we all made a bunch of components, desserts and sauces and things, then the chef plated one, then we each plated one to look like the chef's. then we ate them. it sounds fun, right? well, it is fun until you eat this many desserts in 6 days.

and this is how the pictures work: there are pictures of the chef's plating, then pictures of my plating. it doesn't always work this way, but usually if the plate is on marble, it's the chef, and if it's on stainless steel, it is mine.

Creme Brulee
with chocolate sable cookie



this is a good recipe. everyone likes creme brulee, right? but there are a few things that make it good or bad. (this is my own personal list of makers and breakers.) i hate creme brulee that is a bad color. it doesn't matter what it tastes like, grey creme brulee is gross. i don't think that creme brulee should ever be more than an inch thick; there should be crust in every bite, and if it is too thick, you are left with a crustless bottom. the crust should actually be brulee. that means burnt, so it should not be barely melted. and it should be thick enough that you can hear it when it breaks. (anyone else love that part in the opening credits of amelie? i love the whole opening credits of that movie.) this one has two layers of burnt turbinado sugar on top, one melted on top of the other.


i think we had the big scary blow torch that gets hotter the more you use it. it is supposed to be dark, but the burn spots are not so attractive.



Creme Caramel
with orange grapefruit salad, hippen, and clear caramel



this is a fine dessert, if you like flan.



mine is a different color from the chef's because a different group made it.



Orange Crepes
with orange butter sauce and blueberry sorbet


this probably would have tasted fine. but before we ate it, our chef told us that she didn't like the orange pastry cream filling. she said it tasted like baby asprin, so then it tasted like baby asprin. (i've never even had baby asprin, and it STILL tasted like baby asprin.)


i love making crepes. i want to make crepes all day long. but i want them hot and rolled up with nutella.



Chocolate Crepes
with cranberry swirl ice cream, chocolate sauce, and pear ice cream


good. i like it.
i like ice cream with sorbet swirled in. i like pear chips. i like pears. of course i like chocolate.

(a note: things that are already brown are hard to cook. i didn't make any chocolate crepes, but a lot of them were burnt on the edges. )

my first chocolate comma is kind of struggling.


Spinach and mushroom jalousie
with bechamel sauce


savory things are always exciting at pastry school.

this was puff pastry filled with a spinach, mushroom, and goat cheese filling. we all had our opinions about how we would have made the filling.






Kiwi Milk-Marmalade Tart

with lemon frozen yogurt, kiwi cookie, and kiwi coulis


milk marmalade sounds gross, and i can't figure out why you would call this marmalade anyway. it is condensed milk, evaporated milk, and coconut milk cooked until it caramelizes. and it's not really a tart. i think a better name for this dessert would be kiwi dolce de leche napoleon.


i cut all the kiwi for these cookies, and while the cookie tasted like absolutely nothing, i think it was very pretty.


i loved this. i like puff pastry (those are the disks). i could have eaten the milk filling by itself. the kiwi was green enough to give you a mouth cramp, but i can see how it would be nice with even slightly un-ripe kiwi. and the frozen yogurt was delicious. because of the lemon and yogurt, it was not too sweet either.


Pineapple Tart
with caramel swirl ice cream, ginger creme anglaise, and port wine reduction sauce



this was actually kind of boring, and i think i was getting tired of the eating.


and the wine reduction was way too thick and sticky



Marquise
with cherry swirl ice cream, cherry compote, and mint creme anglaise


that is a molded chocolate thing. it has a lot of potential, but it is hard to make perfectly because it has a lot of components that need to be in sync. even though my partner and i made a lovely smooth marquise (trust me i tested it), i got a very grainy one the day we plated.



the chef forgot that we had ice cream. this is vanilla ice cream with sour cherry sorbet swirled in. it is really really good, and the balance of sweet and vanilla is nice with the sour cherries.



Manjari Chocolate Tart
with toasted coconut ice cream, coconut creme anglaise, chocolate sauce, and fresh coconut shavings


this was good except for the chocolate crust. i think i just hate chocolate crust. if you know a way to make a chocolate crust that actually tastes chocolatey without tasting burnt or being dry, please let me know.


and i could eat toasted fresh coconut shavings all day.




Lemon Tart
with mixed berry sorbet, basil ceme anglaise, and berry sauce

this has powdered sugar on one half of the plate and the opposite half of the tart


(this post is full of my very strong opinions, but it is my blog so. . . ) if mixed berry sorbet has banana in it, it should be called mixed berry and banana sorbet as a warning to people that it is going to be sort of gross. banana is good. i like bananas. bananas are very distracting from mixed berries and make things that could be delicious taste weirdly acidic and like you can't afford enough mixed berries so you had to go buy some 79 cents per pound bananas to make enough sorbet. and banana does nothing for a lemon tart. (thank you.)





i made some caramelized macadamia nuts and it was really fun and looked cool. they are on skewers. (note: i recommend not placing the skewer right where the nut divides in half unless you really do want a stigma scar.) then it's dipped in caramel. the caramel drips of the table, and it makes a stick on the macadamia nut.


it also makes a big caramel mess on the floor. if you want, you can pick up the caramel mess and make a caramel nest. you know, if you need a caramel nest.






Pineapple Tart Tatin
with frozen vanilla lime yogurt, pineapple passion sauce, kaffir lime syrup, and pineapple chips


this was about the time i decided i never wanted anything sweet again ever.



but i do love pineapple chips. these were made by slicing a pineapple on a meat slicer, dipping the slices in warm simple syrup, and baking them on a silpat. if you, for some reason, have a meat slicer, you should make a lot of pineapple chips. then send me some. thanks.



Banana Macadamia Nut Financier
with brown butter sauce, milk chocolate ice cream, macadamia nut tuile, and caramelized macadamia nuts


there are those macadamia nuts.
(oh, and by the way, my computer does not think that i am spelling macadamia right. maybe i'm not, but it has no suggestion other than "macadam's" and "macadamized" which seem like much less-real words.)


this was fine. too sweet. and either brown butter sauce is disgusting (i kept tasting it because i didn't think there was any way it could really be THAT BAD) or someone made it wrong. i think it was made wrong. i HOPE it was made wrong. (i am trying to think of what it even tasted like, and i'm coming up with nothing because it didn't even taste like food. it tasted like burning plastic.)




Cold Apple Charlotte
with red currant sorbet and clear vanilla sauce



i think this one is so cute. and it tastes pretty good and happy.



Warm Apple Charlotte
with green apple sorbet, apple caramel sauce, and caramel decorations


even though i was sort of done with dessert, this was super yummy delicious. (i can't think of a better way to describe it.) you should make it at home. i will tell you how.

make some apple (or another bake-able fruit) compote. . . you know, apples, sugar, spices, raisins, whatever you like. cook it in a pot until it is soft but not falling apart.

then take some white bread. (no really, some white bread.) if you have a little sturdier plain white bread, that is good, but the regular stuff will work, too. take off the crust and cut it into little pieces (about 1 inch x 2 inches) and some circles. you are going to be putting this into cups. aluminum cups will work, but so will a muffin pan. soak the bread in clarified butter and fit it into your cups. put the circle in the bottom then put the rectangles around it. (if you want it to look really nice, make the circle a little small and make the rectangles fit from bottom to top.) fill up your cup with your compote and put it in the fridge for a little while. you could even put it in the fridge at night and bake it in the morning for breakfast. just bake it until the cup is crunchy and delicious. take it out of the cup (upside down) and eat it while it is warm.




you can make it all fancy, but in the end it's just a really delicious toast cup.




as if that was not enough, we also had to go to a restaurant and critique a dessert. i just wanted to eat salad or spaghetti or something, but i had to try this pecorino and pineapple souffle with lemon-thyme ice cream from 11 madison.