Day Fifteen

Ice cream week is complete! I’m a little sad, though. I don’t think four ice cream cakes in my freezer is enough. WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I RUN OUT?!

This week wasn’t terribly difficult, except for the melting issues. We had to hurry, hurry everything because the ice cream would melt, so that was tricky. I could have done better on the piping on the ice cream cake in that picture above, but I was in a major hurry. We were having student evaluations, and getting ready to clean up the kitchen for the day.

That’s the chocolate wood grain cake. Bad name, huh? Yeah, I agree with you. Such a pretty cake should have a pretty name. It’s hazelnut dacquoise, chocolate ice cream, pistachio ice cream, whipped cream, caramelized hazelnuts. The top of the cake is sprayed with chocolate, and the sides of the cake are covered in chocolate, too.

You place a strip of acetate down, paint chocolate over the top, then run a wood grain tool over the chocolate. Paint white chocolate on top, and you’re ready to go! The chocolate strip is then wrapped around your ice cream cake…

…to create a wood grain effect. Don’t forget to take the acetate off the cake before serving at your dinner party! That would be awkward.

The finished cake.

We also made spun sugar by cooking isomalt and water to create a syrup.

We chose to dye ours blue. This is a little spun sugar nest you could use for desserts.
Or, as a hat.

Myspace-esque bathroom picture at French Pastry School! I like our uniform; if I had to wear this uniform to work every day, I’d be okay with that. It’s comfy, and my clogs are comfy too. I’m not a big fan of my hat because my hair will fit inside the hat, but then it starts falling off the back of my head like I’m some sort of beanie-wearing hipster.