Visiting Chef Series

This week at school we had an opportunity to sit in on the first visiting chef series at JCCC. The Charming Chef Michael Smith was talking about Tapas and demoing several recipes. His life experiences and travels were inspiring! Some of his favorite foods are not any of mine like roasted rabbit brains and blood sausage just to name a couple.
He gave all the recipes that he made that night. My favorite was Chickpea Salad 'Pinotxo' Style

Makes 4 quarts
1 quart cooked chickpeas
1/3 cup white raisins-soaked in water for 20 min-then chopped
1 piece Morcilla sausage-peeled and minced
1 whole onion-fine diced and sauteed 1 min
1/4 cup toasted pistachios- rough chopped
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup Sherry Vinegar
Salt and Pepper

Method

cook chickpeas in salted water until soft 3-4 hours.Mix all remaining ingredients together.Adjust acidity and salt and pepper.

heart stopping week....

On Wednesday I created a Love statue made out of ALL Chocolate! It was really fun but messy. I love the whole love note thing and the question of Be Mine. I carved the hearts out of white chocolate and sign is made of Almond paste {the only exception to All Chocolate}.


Thursday the production for the BIG weekend started with dozens of Tuxedo Chocolate dipped strawberries and lots of love filled recipes...I was so busy that I really could get too many pictures! Our Cases was probably the most beautiful it has ever been!

We had so many item it was almost too much to fill of two cases! It would lie if I didn't say it that there was stress and a small amount of tears{from me...I was truly exhausted this week and having a hell of a time with writing chocolate! There was also some creative differences that can be frustrating!}

But all in all we came together and kicked butt and had a steady line out the door for about an hour! Thank goodness I'm off to a new production list {makes it interesting}.

Cheesecakes and Othellos

Well this week in school I had Cheesecakes, Othellos and Rosemary bread.
I chose to do a plain cheesecake this week....next week I'm thinking raspberry white chocolate?We'll see.
To play with my Chef I told him that my signature L would be the design on the Othellos...He wasn't amused!

No worries this is what they looked like. I really like these ...french macaroons sandwiched with mocha buttercream dipped in chocolate.
It was a strange week but I made it through I'm hoping to get through this winter slump and start kicking butt!LOL

Lavender Lemon Meringue Tart

A Tribute to one of my favorites... Lemon Meringue, I haven't had much luck in making a good one. This one is the closest to what I'd sell though I think there is a few more things that need tweeking.

A new and fun crust for me is to make a standard sweet pastry dough and roll it out with graham cracker crumbs. It adds a lot of texture without being too grahamy {for a lack of a better word}.
I used a 9" tart pan ...blind baking my crust on 350 for 10 mins. I don't use pie weights I just put holes with a knife before baking..seems to keep it in its shape.
I had received lots of fabulous Gourmet Lavender items like Lav Sugar, Honey and Dark Chocolate from a beautiful little store called Pelindaba lavender. I decided to incorporate Lavender to my meringue tart.
To start the curd process I heated to a simmer 2 cup of sugar, 1/2 c. of cornstarch, 1/2 tsp of fine sea salt and 3 cups of cold water and brought it to a simmer.{It turn translucent}


Then I added 12 egg yolks, 2 Tbsp of lemon zest, 2 tsp of Lavender, a cup of fresh lemon juice and 4 tablespoon of butter. One it was thick and looks like a curd take off heat and place plastic wrap over it.

Then make your Meringue-

4 egg whites,1/2 c. of sugar plus 2 Tbsp. and 1/2 tsp. of cream of tarter in your kitchen aid with your whip until full stiff peaks



Fill with warm curd and spoon on meringue. Bake for 20mins on 325.
Viola! It is very good! The flavor and smell is intoxicating... I just want it to be a bit tarter and thicker but that is a personal taste.

Bacon and Chocolate?

I got this wonderful care package from my sister... full of fabulous goodies! Along with lots of my staple favorites like red wine and sea salted dark chocolate was some fun stuff to try.
I was very intrigued when I saw Mo's Bacon Bar ...Hummm I thought. I know I like the whole bacon maple combo...so why not chocolate? Some things do not work this one being one! It was terrible! I'm blogging about it to warn you that bacon especially bit like pieces are not good with chocolate.. Fun to try but do not buy! Thanks Lorie I loved everything else :)

{ I think Abby agrees}

Pastry Shop Hop

On my trip I of course wanted to go to as many bakeries as possible. One... to eat but most importantly to see price points, quality,quantity,skill and their pastry variety. Over the next 6 months I will be getting myself geared toward my own store front. With LOTS to do and many UNknowns I have lots of investigating to do. The beautiful Lemon Tarts above was from one of my favorite bakeries Shaadzee Bakery Bistro in Pleasant Hill,CA. we actually went in there for breakfast but found a great little bakery. I really appreciated that whoever does their pastries,cakes and tarts has REAL skills and training behind them. You can tell in the way the cakes are layered and the by the types of pastries they offer that they know what they are doing. I didn't want to take too many pictures of products because people don't like that very much!FYI
Next place that was very good was Walnut Creek Baking Company They have a petite little shop downtown Walnut Creek. I enjoyed my black bottom cupcake with cream cheese frosting! but wasn't impressed with my lemon bar because the curd was not strained and the eggs got over cooked leaving a chunky texture plus I like really tart lemon. I also wasn't fond of their pecan apple tartlette..flavorless. I do think their cakes looked good.

Off to Napa Valley where they have The Culinary Institute of America. What a beautiful area to learn. They do have a {AOS} baking program that is temping to want to be apart of but after this semester of my current Pastry Program in KC ... I'm done with school...

We stopped by Bouchon's bakery which is one of the many high end establishments of Legendary Thomas Keller. The bakery was petite and OH sooo expensive...I like their pastries, bread and even cookies {which is amazing for me} but they offer No cakes.... which is a shame.

{Me enjoying Yountville}

Now for my must have Cardamom roll from Village Bakery in Calistoga,CA I also picked up a chocolate souffle cake {YUM!}

and a Chocolate Framboise which was just okay...

The picture above is of Dean and Deluca's Bakery... cute flower pot cakes but everything else seemed just okay and the worst part is that they do even less production then we do at the Leawood,KS store.Moving on the Sonoma County Bakeries...My favorite is Michelle Marie's It is do to the variety and quality of skill that they bring...I would work here!
Viola is not too far from Michelle Marie's but lacks much! I felt that their selection was boring the only thing I wanted was their Salted Carmel Ganache Tart {which we make at Dean and Deluca so I didn't waste my money} I thought their cookies were dreadful!
YES that is red velvet cake! My friend Rosie got it for us to try from Nothing Bundt Cakes. it was very good! Their staple Cream cheese Icing is something I would love to recreate! In conclusion...
I feel at seeing what's out there and knowing what I want to do and what I don't want to do is going to help me be successful in my future..

Restaurant/ Market Trend

I notice something on my trip... a trend of these organic Local Markets combine with a sit down restaurant.The first one I went to was in Lafayette, CA called Chow .It was a very pleasant experience.
I was so excited to see all the fresh meats, cheese and of course desserts! One of the people who worked there was so awesome he showed me some of their pies { all made there!}. I really wanted to take one with me but I was headed to Sonoma County which was a bit of a drive....

We stayed for breakfast and I was impressed! I really do love this place!

The following day I went to St Helena in Napa Valley. One stop of course Dean & Deluca! I work part time at the one in Kansas City so I had to visit the sister store. I guess you could say that they essentially started the Local Market/ Gourmet food movement. I find the one in Kansas City to be closer to a restaurant then the one in Napa Valley.
Though they have sandwiches and prepared foods, they don't have the seating, Sushi or Gourmet Burger bar like ours. But they do sell lots of wine :)

Next stop Fresh In Santa Rosa, CA. Very cute and they had a beautiful bakery! I had fun seeing all the wine country local goods!

Unfortunately I was unimpressed with our dinner! It was like they had a rookie wait staff and frankly it seemed chaotic! My poor daughter's food came out cold and my $18 cake cake was good too bad it was sitting on soggy greens. I will not dine there again. It is a great idea it just needs a kitchen manager...

Feeling Crabby....

Well I have neglected my blog to visit my home
The San Francisco Bay area!

It's Dungeness Crab Season here and I absolutely Love Crab! What better place to get Crab then Fisherman's Wharf?!

I love the ocean ....especially the salty air of the Bay.

Pier 39 is fun to go do all the tourist things but we wanted to go off a bit from the crowds and headed to Pier 47 with my beautiful Sister her two boys and my Dad. We decided to have lunch at Scomas!

Beyond Fabulous! The amount of fresh Crab you get and the quality is amazing!

and it wouldn't be San Francisco without Sourdough and Clam chowder!
This was just one of my many stops to enjoy crab...

I actually have a great recipe for Crab cakes that since I'm feeling so crabby I'll share it!

L's fabulous cakes
Start off with Quality Crab!!! So Important!

Mix all in one bowl
1 lb Crab meat
2 tsp of Dijon mustard
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp Old Bay seasoning
dash of Hot sauce {Cholula}
dice 1 red bell pepper
1/2 c. of diced green onion
juice of one half of a lemon
1 beaten egg {for a binder}
1 c. of panko crumbs

make into patties fry them{ in shallow vegetable oil} brown on each side 5 min.
transfer to a baking sheet and BAKE on 400 for 15 min