Internship CYC Week 2: July 1- 5

Wednesday 7/1

-Roberto making focaccia bread for Thursday night pasta bar

-1 tray of fruit tarts is enough for the Wednesday night buffet- 18 tarts

- 1 plate of cookies and brownies each

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-dip éclairs in ganache – as Roberto does, dipping the filled éclairs right from the freezer is easier than from the cooler- they are more solid between your fingers and don’t smush because the pastry cream is hard. They are difficult to dip either way, the ganache gets all over your fingers.
-to melt/ warm the ganache it is best to put the container in the hot water bath where the soup is kept warm, and let it slowly come to temperature. The butter and chocolate don’t separate as easily as when microwaving it. Be careful not to let the container tip over into the water though (I found this out the hard way).
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Pastry Cream

1lb 9 oz sugar

5 lb 8 oz 2% milk

2 qt cream

1 qt egg yolks – 2 lb 2 oz

10 oz cornstarch/ crème elsay

5 oz Clear Jel Powder- modified cornstarch

1 lb butter

2 T vanilla

Bring sugar, milk, and cream to boil

In kitchen aid bowl whip eggs and starches at low speed

Add a quart of warm milk to mixer to temper eggs

Add egg mixture to milk and sugar on stove and whisk constantly

Cook to boil

Pour onto small Hobart bowl and whip on speed 3 until it cools some

When the steam stops rising from the top add pieces of butter and continue whipping

Pour into short hotel pan, plastic wrap touching surface, put in cooler

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It was my first experience using Clear Jel powder, which the package label called a modified cornstarch. I suspected it might have a sort of gelatin in it because of the use of the word Jel, but I am unsure. Roberto used that in addition to the other starch to make the pastry cream very stable for its use in items for the buffet. Both the fruit tarts and éclairs are filled with the pastry cream, and too loose of a cream would not do as well on the buffet. The additional starch makes the cream thicken very quickly when combined and much vigorous whisking is necessary. We used whole eggs from a bag that day because we were out of liquid yolks. Roberto said it was not a good idea to crack two flats of eggs because we would have too much egg whites left over that would go unused.
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Caramel for Crème Caramel/ Flan

-Scoop of sugar, water, corn syrup, and some lemon juice

-use 10” cake pans and will cut finished flan like a cake

-pour caramel into base and swirl. Will leave at room temperature for tomorrow- no time to bake them today

Custard for Caramel

1 gallon milk

2 lb sugar

30 whole eggs

10 oz egg yolks

vanilla

Whisk eggs and vanilla in Hobart

Heat milk in steam kettle

Add warm milk to eggs and mix on speed 1

Strain into bucket and let cool before put in cooler

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Roberto said this is a small recipe; he usually uses 3 gallons of milk

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Sweet Dough for lemon Squares (Pate Sucree)

Yields enough dough to line 3 sheet pans

3 lb butter

1lb 8 oz sugar

2 lb 4 oz cake flour

2 lb 4 oz AP flour

10.5 eggs

vanilla

Paddle butter and sugar, add eggs, vanilla

Add flours, mix to combine

Knead on floured table into a ball. Separate into 3 balls, 1 for each pan. Roll into a log then roll out with rolling pin. Roll onto pin and roll off onto flat sheet tray. Dock and bake at 350 degrees for around 10 minutes

For tonight:

-make 3 sheet pans of sponge cake- one large recipe, like enough for 7 round cakes

-make chocolate chip cookie dough

-cut lemon tart in 12 slices for dessert menu

-wrap up cookies and brownies

-put ganache on chocolate cake, top cake with pate a glacer

-re-ganache the peanut butter parfait desserts

Chocolate Chip Cookies- double recipe

1800 g butter

1500 g sugar

1500 g brown sugar

40 g salt

900 g eggs- 16 eggs

50 g vanilla

3000 g pastry flour

40 g baking soda

2000 g chocolate chips

Sponge cake layers

-followed chiffon recipe for 7 round cakes to make the 3 layers

-used water instead of lemon juice (original recipe from book called for water)

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For the meringue added to the batter- use large Hobart bowl, it is too much for the kitchen aid!
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Bake at 325 degrees

Thursday 7/2

-dip 600 strawberries in chocolate- 4 sheet pans

-cut 3 trays lemon squares

-dip more éclairs

-make 1 full sheet tray of fruit tarts- 54 ea

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Add white choc ganache to cream and whip to make white chocolate mousse, filling for sponge cake
3 sheet pans made 2 half sheet cakes
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Friday 7/3

-cut pies, decorate chocolate mousse cakes, cheesecakes

For 3^rd of July buffet we had:

18 fruit pies, 12 oreo pies, 12 key lime pies, 8 banana whipped cream pies, 8 pecan pies

7 coconut cakes, 8 black forest cakes, 9 chocolate mousse cakes, 8 cherry cheesecakes

150 fruit tarts, 3 sheet pans of brownies, 600 chocolate dipped strawberries, 500 lemon squares, 500 cookies, 400 éclairs, 2.5 hotel pans of bread pudding, and 8 flans

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This was the biggest event of the summer serving close to 1000 guests. During the peak of service I, along with Chef and various servers, could literally not run fast enough to keep the dessert buffet full. Each trip from the kitchen came back with two empty plates. People were grabbing things from my hands before I had a chance to set them down. It was exciting and fun, at the same time stressful as toward the end we were running out of certain items. By 9 pm we brought out the last desserts of the evening, the fireworks began early at around 9:10 and most people were outside and done eating. Some guests were asking for more items, but by that point it was not worth making more fruit tarts or éclairs, for example. They went through both of the sheet cakes; Roberto made an American flag with frosting on one and I used berries to simulate exploding fireworks on the other.

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Sunday 7/5

-defrost 3 trays each of raspberry bear claw, croissant, cheese Danish, cinnamon roll, and some carrot muffins

-defrost on floured tray, transfer to parchment line pan to proof

-proof around 40 minutes at 85 degrees

-bake 350 degrees for around 12 minutes, turning trays half way through baking

-croissants defrost, give egg wash before proof and before bake

-prep cakes for brunch

-2 cakes on stands

-pies ready for buffet tonight

-2 key lime, 3 pecan, and 1 banana whipped cream pies left over

-2 chocolate mousse cakes, 1 black forest, and 1 carrot cake left

-plates of lemon squares, cookies, brownies

-bagels, sliced and plated

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For Sunday brunch we really only need to bake 1-2 sheet trays of each breakfast pastry. Each tray is about 1 plate, and the brunch does not seem to go through more than that. It is a waste of money to bake multiple trays, as they just dry out in the cooler, even if wrapped up. It defeats the purpose of frozen pre-made products- you can bake what you need and leave the rest frozen. They are paying a lot for a high quality, all butter products but letting it go to waste in this manner.

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Tartlet shells for proposed tarts on new dessert menu

Pate Sablee- from Gislen pg 319

150 g butter

75 g powdered sugar

½ t lemon zest

2 drops vanilla

25 g eggs

225 g pastry flour

Chocolate Pate Sablee

150 g butter

75 g powdered sugar

50 g eggs

175 g pastry flour

30 g cocoa powder

M.O.P. Creaming

Yield: 55 vanilla shells, 54 chocolate shells

Mealy Pie Dough

1500 g pastry flour

975 g butter

375 g cold water

30 g salt

Flaky Pie Dough

1500g pastry flour

1050 g butter

450 g water

30g salt

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I found both of these doughs to be too dry and ended up adding more water, just enough to combine to form a ball. They were difficult to roll out because of the dryness. Not the best dough recipe.

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Cherry Pie filling- from epicurious.com

1 cp + 1T sugar

3 T cornstarch

¼ t salt

5 cp cherries

½ t vanilla

2 T butter

I made the recipe x2.5 to fill the 3 pie shells I had prepared

Whisk 1 cp sugar, starch, and salt in bowl.

Stir in cherries, lemon juice, and vanilla

Fill pie crust and dot with butter

Put crust on top, brush with milk and sprinkle with sugar

Bake 15 minutes at 425 degrees, reduce to 375 degrees until juices are bubbling and crust is golden brown, about 1 hr. Cover edges with foil if crust gets too brown.