Heather Bakes

That’s What She Said…

Final Stretch July 23, 2008

Filed under: July 2008 — heatherwlu @ 12:56 pm
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So as promised, last night we assembled our cakes. We were scheduled to make a Jelly Roll as well, but that was scrapped in exchange for a much better option: Grandma’s Chocolate Cake. I don’t remember my Grandmother baking a lot, but she definitely made this when we would visit. It’s a rich chocolate cake with kind of a fudgy-pecan icing. I think we called it Texas Sheet Cake.

In addition to the Grandma Cake, we also made German Chocolate Icing and frosted Monday night’s Devil’s Food Cakes with this (on top) and Ganache (on the sides). Here are all of the chocolate cakes. Props to Bryan for the lovely food styling that we have going here:

I want a cake turntable.

We also halved Monday’s Yellow Butter Cakes, spread raspberry jam and Italian Buttercream between the layers, and iced the top and sides with the buttercream. This cake was essentially a lesson in icing and decorating. And guess what? I suck. Maybe it’s because I’m left handed (or because I’m a total spaz), but icing the top and especially the sides was a disaster. I enjoy the whole icing process- it’s kind of therapeutic- but obviously need to practice.

(This reminds me of a Demetri Martin joke: “I want to live next door to Carnegie Hall so it’ll always be easy to give people directions: ‘Practice, practice, practice… then make a left.’)

The best part, though, was cake decorating! Although no Duff Goldman, I am faaaaaar better at this than at icing.  And it’s really what I want to actually DO at some point, and hopefully get paid for it. Yeah, that would be nice.

So here’s my little Yellow Butter Cake with Italian Buttercream and Raspberry Filling.  We only had three colors to work with, so it kind of ended up as an homage to my (pink and green) wedding:

Too bad the top slid off in the car on the way home. Damn it.

And here’s my group member Kerri’s cake, just because it was so stinking cute. And I basically ripped off her swirl theme:

We’re kind of in the final stretch with class right now; just two more sessions left! Monday is our baking practical. I drew Blueberry Turnovers and Chocolate Cream Pie. Actually, no- I drew Coconut Cream Pie and Dutch Letters but Bryan was gracious enough to switch with me. Because Coconut Cream Pie is disgusting. Tuesday is our written exam and then we’re done! I’m actually really sad. The class was fun, the other students were awesome, we had a great instructor… oh, and I learned a lot. Unfortunately (for me AND you guys), next semester’s classes don’t sound very exciting: Sanitation and Basic Food Prep. Although who knows? Maybe handwashing and foodborne disease will translate into some good blog reading.

I doubt it.

 

Let Them Eat Cake… Tomorrow. July 22, 2008

Filed under: July 2008 — heatherwlu @ 4:29 am
Tags: , , ,

Okay, so I have a dinner dilemma on Mondays and Tuesdays. I leave at 4:15 to catch the train, but then don’t get out of class until 10. I’m never hungry at 4:15 but by 10 I’m starving and usually whine and demand politely ask Brian to stop somewhere on the way home so I can grab food. Well, SCORE- we finally found a Subway that stays open until 11! So tonight I ran in to grab a turkey sub in my usual chef gear (checked pants and white jacket- it’s hot… don’t be jealous) and the kid ringing me up gave my outfit the once-over and asked, “Uh, you’re in chef school, right? So why aren’t you making your own food?”

Damn teenagers.

But it is actually kind of funny. This is just class a couple of nights a week- I can’t imaging actually working at a restaurant all evening, every evening, and still having the energy to make a meal when you get home. I recently read an interview with Casey Thompson from Top Chef, and the interviewer asked her what her typical at-home meal consisted of. Know what her answer was? Peanut butter and rice cakes.

As far as what I did cook tonight: Cakes, Cakes, Cakes! We mostly did prep work for tomorrow night, when we’ll actually assemble and decorate. For example, I made these three Devil’s Food Cakes which will become German Chocolate Cake tomorrow evening:

Bryan made Angel Food Cakes, which are delicious! We did get to take these with us tonight… here’s my half:

Kerri made these Yellow Butter Cakes. We made an Italian Buttercream icing to go on top (assembling tomorrow). Let me tell you, that icing was a giant pain in the butt to make. You have to whip the eggs into a meringue, boil the sugar, let the sugar cool then add it into the meringue. Whip more. Add butter and a little shortening. Keep whipping. And how does it taste? Like BUTTER. I actually liked it less than the super easy-to-make standard buttercream. Blech. But the cakes are pretty:

And finally, Lemon Buttermilk Cake with Flat Icing. These are SO insanely good. Our group just sat around dipping our fingers into the glaze. Unsanitary? Perhaps. Delicious? Indeed.

So that’s it for tonight! Full day of babysitting tomorrow AND a quiz tomorrow night. Oh, for any of you with kiddos, I found this cool site today: Easy Kids Recipes. We made the Baked Craft Clay recipe today and it turned out great! Too bad I forgot to take a picture of my creation- the only thing I can actually make with clay… a snake, of course.