Lemon Tart

Today's class was the very first complete dessert that we'll be making and I was so excited. But everything seemed to work against us that day.  As we were walking up the stairs towards class, the group ahead of us were coming down with tarts in various stages of incompletion. Some with the almond cream and some with the lemon cream. As luck would have it, we were also working in the kitchens on the 3rd floor for the first time, with gas-powered stoves that no one had used before. I was sous chef and a few tart bottoms had gone missing after the first class, so I had a frenzied dash down to the other kitchen to beg Chef H for more. Now there was an intimidating conversation. He wanted me to scold Chef J for losing the molds... in my 2nd week of class no less! When I returned from that little adventure I had to waste even more time having the Chef explain the kitchen to me again. Definitely not off to a good start.

 Not one of us finished our tarts, except for the girl who will be known as The Wiz. She flies through everything without batting an eye. It's positively frustrating, and awe-inspiring.

All of us were way too slow making the pate sucree and then the double baking with the almond cream took FOREVER. Half of us were dancing in front of the ovens just begging for it to be done. And that italian meringue we'd all made in the previous class proved to be my undoing. I added the syrup too quickly and created a runny mess and had to do it a second time. My arm just about fell off. Should I mention that it was also a double recipe? Try whipping meringue by hand some day. Go on. I dare you! The consistency becomes more and more like glue, but you have to keep on pouring and whisking until it's cool. One poor soul in our class actually had to make it four times.

By the time Chef called stopping time (a full 10-20 minutes late), I had just managed to pipe the meringue on top of the tart. But there was no time to pop it in the oven for it's final browning and then requisite cool-down period. And genius that I am, I hadn't yet realized the importance of documenting my work. Because you're all so eager to see these things, right?

All disasters aside, this was an amazing dish to start the program off with. I took it home and Phil and I just dug into it with our forks. No dainty little slices for us! It was amazing! A sophisticated version of lemon meringue pie. I remade it a few weeks later, just to prove that I could do it. It's composed of a sweet dough with a layer of almond cream, topped with a layer of lemon cream and then italian meringue.

Chef J also made a couple other tarts during his demonstration, which thankfully we didn't have to tackle during practical.

A strawberry tart with mousseline cream:

And a French apple tart with caramelized apples:

Basic Pastry: The Beginning (Lessons 1-3)

I'll spare you the pain of going through each of these first three classes in detail. Suffice it to say they were pretty painful. With all of my home baking experience, I felt like this program would be a piece of cake (that idiom finds no better use than here), but I was so wrong. My blood pressure rose before every practical class to the point where I started to question my reasons for being here. I got so nervous about making a mistake, that I worked painstakingly slowly, to the point where someone watching me would want to scream in frustration. To tell you the truth, I am writing these posts about Basic Pastry months after the fact; from the viewing seat of Superior Pastry. And I can say without a doubt that I was a serious mess when I started.

Lesson 1 was all about different types of dough; we had to make 2 sweet (Pate Sablee and Pate Sucree) and one dry (Pate Brisee) within 2.5 hours. Sounds like a breeze? It wasn't. We didn't even have to roll them out and we barely finished on time. I messed up the first one I tried by not mixing the egg in enough. The sugar started to burn the yolks, so I had to painstakingly work it back together. I don't even want to talk about the pate brisee with it sanding technique. Pah! Chef J said that we could make the sable nantais cookies with the sablee dough, but it didn't even cross my mind.

Lesson 2 was an introduction to sponge: genoise and ladyfinger; dacquoise was only touched upon in demo. It was also an introduction to our balloon whisk, the single most heinous torture device known to basic pastry students. My arm still aches in memory of the whisking I used to do. For everything we do in basic pastry needs to be done by hand. Literally. Just wait until lesson 3 for that to sink in... Anyway, this class I actually had time to make 2 genoise cakes and the requisite ladyfingers. I had made ladyfingers at home and expected it to be just as easy. So wrong. My piping was such a mess!

Lesson 3 was all about different types of creams. We had to make italian meringue, pastry cream, ganache, almond cream, creme anglaise and italian meringue again, if time enough. There wasn't. The thing I mentioned about doing everything by hand? Well, that meant testing the sugar for the italian meringue with our bare hands. No thermometers allowed. And that sugar has to reach a soaring temperature of 121 degrees Celcius. Ouch. We all saw Chef J doing this in demo class and winced in sympathy. It actually wasn't that bad, if you cooled your fingers enough in ice water before submerging them in the hot syrup. And if you're quick enough about grabbing a sample. This class is also a fair example of how slow I was: two girls beside me starting making their creme anglaise at exactly the same time. They scrambled theirs and had to start again and were both finished by the time I finished my first batch. I was so nervous of overcooking it that I kept the temperature ridiculously low.