It's been a month????

Where has the time gone? A lot has gone on since my last post. I have learned to table temper chocolate, how to use templates to cut chocolate for sculpture, how to make chocolate truffles, the use of power tools, started a new project in sculpture, made rolls successfully at home for Thanksgiving and started a new job.

Let me start by saying....I might like eating chocolate but chocolate and I don't get a long when it comes to working together. :-) Tempering by marble slab is difficult. Now, I got pretty good at that part but the first day was a nightmare. The first time I tempered, I did awesome. Then we had to do it again, and again, and again, because of the chocolate sculpture we were doing. Let's just say I eventually gave up and there is only one picture of a horrible chocolate sculpture flower of mine in existence and very few people have seen the disaster. haha The second day of chocolate went much better as we didn't have to temper it as many times and it was all about cutting out pieces before they hardened and then gluing them together with chocolate. Much better:



Then the last day was truffles. Oh yummy truffles. Now, I was doing great and way ahead of everyone and then....my filling set up too fast before I could get it in the truffle shell. Air holes. UGH! Now, they still turned out pretty and tasted amazing but I had to keep them in the fridge just to make sure they didn't go bad! But for the first time, not bad.



No pictures of stuff in my sculpture class quite yet, but it involves wood and power tools! I have learned to use multiple types of machine sanders and saws. It is fun but I finally had to start wearing a mask because of my allergies. haha

Thanksgiving was interesting. Made an amazing cherry pie filling but instead of making my own pie dough, I decided to use frozen pie dough. Well, I tried to use the Trader Joe's brand and it did NOT work out well. In retrospect, I should have either bought the frozen dough in a metal pie tin or made the dough myself! lol So, it ended up going into a dish with a crisp crumble on top. As a pastry student that is 6 months from graduating, I could not bring myself to put out a pie that looked like that, even to my family. So, crisp it was and it tasted awesome!

My rolls were beautiful. I was nervous about using the granule yeast and trying to proof in my Mom's temperamental oven, but it worked out great and they looked awesome. I only regret not taking a picture!

It was nice to have a Saturday and Sunday off and used my Sunday morning that I am usually up at 4am to get up at 7:30 and drive over the hill towards the ocean to take yoga in Laguna Beach at 8:30. It was a great Sunday!!

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! Two more weeks of school left and two weeks of making my final cake in class!! Wish me luck!