Tuesday, October 13th

Happy Tuesday evening from the fantastically rainy City of Angels! It hasn't rained here in what feels like months... probably because it has been.

So... Cardamom smells and looks A LOT like Nutmeg... Sigh. And did you know that heavy cream is called Manufactures Cream? Well... now you do... I wish I did before the test today. But I am pleased that I got all my white powders correct. After the quiz we made Devil's Food Cake with Chocolate Ganache (Y.U.M.) and Creme Anglise. We also presented our Genoise and Swiss Rolls. While Chef said that my Genoise was over-whipped (eat me), she said that my Swiss Roll looked great as did my Creme Anglise...

After class I walked with Pharyn, Vicki and Kimberly to Bucco for a bite to eat and some study time. After eating, while we were going over our notes, we were approached by a guy asking us to join his table of friends for "some female company and we will buy you dinner, or dessert, or a drink...... with no strings attached."

.......

Well that just made me giggle.

We didn't accept the offer, mainly because we felt crusty, sweating in the hot restaurant in our poly-blend butch uniforms, hat hair and stale make-up.

Our final exams begin tomorrow and will last two days. We begin with a written portion comprised of fill in the blank, multiple choice and short answer ranging from French to English translation "Bain Marie" = Mary's Bath, "Creme Patisserie" = Pastry Cream, etc., what are the three things needed to form gluten, list some acids that are necessary when making something with baking soda (lemon juice, buttermilk, honey), what are the steps to making Genoise (meise, then whisk eggs with sugar over a simmering double boiler, move mixture to mixer with whisk attachment, beat for seven minutes until indefinite ribboning, etc). Then we begin the practical portion and must make the dreaded fruit tart (pate sucree) with pastry cream and fruit as well as the Swiss Roll we recently made with lemon curd filling. And lastly, dreaded conversions which I am off to study now... three teaspoons in a tablespoon... one tablespoon in half an ounce...