Le Cordon Bleu week 7 - a culinary journey down memory lane

After such an enjoyable and successful 6th week at Le Cordon Bleu, I was ecstatic to learn that week 7 would see us continue on our quest for cake excellence. My right arm, wrist and shoulder were a little less excited at the thought of whipping up not one, but two more genoise sponge cakes, but my taste buds were salivating at the anticipation of the forthcoming gateau au forest noir. 

Before getting too carried away in a black forest day dream I set about practising my second exam dish, perfect Parisian coffee eclairs! Having not made pate a choux since my practical class a couple of weeks ago, I was a little dubious as to how they'd turn out, especially at home with a standard oven but, give or take a few millimetres, I think this batch looked pretty uniform, and they tasted great. On top, I piped my made up musical note in thick, rich, dark chocolate - I like to call it the Niki clef, which I'll be sticking to should this dish come up in my practical examination - IN THREE WEEKS TIME! Eeeekk! The reason for my choosing this design over the more popular treble clef is firstly that I designed it and secondly, it's narrow which means it'll work on all eclairs, fat or thin. Who am I to judge! 

After baking these beauties, I took a walk down to the Tower of London. Having seen many pictures of the poppy installation titled 'The Tower of London Remembers the First World War', I had to see them for myself. It was overwhelming, chilling and humbling to see the sheer number of poppies on display, each marking a British or Common Wealth solider fallen in the conflict. On my way too and from the installation, I handed out packages of coffee eclairs to the homeless - as it gets colder and colder I'm seeing more people on the streets and it just breaks my heart. It's far too hard to ignore them so I shall continue distributing cake as and when I can. When I returned home, inspired by the installation and wanting to play around with some left of fondant icing I had in my cake crafting tool box, I made a small batch of commemorative poppy cupcakes. Lest we forget. 

Eclairs and cupcakes under my belt, it was time to focus on a cake very close to my heart. The Gateau Au Forest Noir. It must be YEARS since I've tasted a black forest gateau but I still remember the taste in my mouth as though it were yesterday! Very popular in the 70's and 80's, this cake, or gateau rather, had dipped off the radar but according to the chefs at Le Cordon Bleu, it's making a come back, and like  many other 'retro' dishes, the prawn cocktail included, they are smartening up their act. 

Growing up in Germany I've tasted this cake many, many times. My family and I were lucky enough to spend three years living in Elmpt, a small village not far from Dusseldorf whilst my father served at RAF Bruggen. I distinctly remember this cherry fill, rich, dark, moist chocolate cake being served at a Christmas party, made by the chefs at the Officers Mess. I sat quietly and ate a huge slice of this sumptuous cake just before I met Santa - given the choice now of cake or Santa, I know which I'd choose. Sorry Santa. I remember particularly enjoying the sour taste of the kirsch drenched fruit, the rich chocolate and the thick cream exterior. I'm sure, as a child, that I wasn't supposed to have eaten this very boozy dessert, but I don't recall anyone stopping me. Who could possibly deny anyone, even a child, of this indulgent delight? What I really love about this cake is that as well as being steeped in cheery liquor, it's also steeped in history, but the jury is still out as to who make the cake first - the Germans, or the French. 

Known to the Germans as schwarzalder kirschtorte, one thing we know for sure is that the cake takes its name from the Black Forest. Situated in southern Germany, the forest was named as such due to its dense woodland, full to the brim with furs and pines allowing very little light in. This element is not only represented in the name, but also by the dark chocolate genoise sponge used to construct the gateau, but that doesn't explain the addition of the cherries, nor the cream. The name is document to also take its inspiration from the speciality liquor of the Black Forest region known as Schwarzwalder Kirsch(wasser), made by distillation of the regions tart cherries. This is the ingredient, with its distinctive cherry pit flavour, that gives the cake it's unique flavour. In America, as well as other countries the cake is often prepared without alcohol but legally, in Germany the cake cannot be sold as a schwarzalder kitschtorte unless made using the alcoholic kirsch wasser. 

In terms of the inclusion of the fruit and cream, some records claim that the cake was designed to mimic the Bollenhut, a hat worn traditionally by the women of the three neighbouring villages of the Black Forest: Gutach, Kirn Back and Hornberg-Reichenbach. The hat, which looks very Vivienne Westward, was introduced during the 1700's and quickly became iconic. The hat stands out as being different due to it being covered by 14 bright red pom-poms, worn only by the unmarried women of the villages. Once married, the women wear black pom-pom hats - perhaps to symbolise mourning over their lost freedom?

Many believe the Bollenhut to be the reason behind the inclusion of cherries within the gateau au forest noir. Following researching both the hat and the cake a little further, I discovered that the hats were introduced and worn for religious reasons - some history papers elude to the pom-poms resemblance to the rose and suggest that they were sewn onto the straw hat base in a cross formation. The combination of the cross and rose, and the weight of the hat symbolising the crucifixion of Jesus.  

These hats were traditionally worn by the women of the villages every Sunday - now they are worn only on special occasions. Whether or not these hats lead to the inclusion of the cherries within the Black Forest Gateau or not is unclear but I'd like to think so. Fashion has long inspired culinary art and why not take inspiration from these crazy headpieces?! I certainly would. 

Some documents mention that the cream is inspired by the frilly white lace shirts worn along with the hats. I'd like to think the entire cake is inspired by these traditional German get ups. Regardless of its past, it was time for me to jump in the kitchen and bake my very own Gateau au Forest Noir.

Not only was I excited to bake this delicious cake, but this practical was also our first opportunity to play around with chocolate at Le Cordon Bleu and in this case we were going to be tempering and using chocolate cocoa transfer sheets in order to give this vintage cake a modern twist in its appearance. Chef presented us with a selection of transfer sheets, the designs ranging from stars to pink blobs and strips. I carefully selected the stars as I had a vision of creating furs with my tempered chocolate so as to represent every element of the Black Forest and the stars, I felt would give the cake a lovely festive feel. This vision wasn't realised as all my trees broke. Obviously. 

After tempering our chocolate directly onto the decorative cocoa transfer sheets, I was confronted once again by a giant sized silver bowl, a balloon whisk as long as my arm and eggs requiring a beating. I whipped the eggs as hard as I possibly could, haunted by my Genoise a la confiture de framboises pancake. Once light and airy, I added my flour and cocoa powder and...the mix didn't collapse! Result. This could possibly be due to the inclusion of additional egg yolk which created a slightly more stable mix, or because I whisked so hard adding so much air to my mix that it couldn't possible collapse on me. I'd like to think that it was due to the latter...although it was probably the egg yolks. 

Once poured into a cake ring, it was time to bake my chocolate genoise and it rose perfectly. The cake was then cut into 4 very thin slices, something which I still find very unnerving doing without a cake wire. I don't think I took a single breath as I pushed and pulled my exceptionally sharp bread knife through the cake. Each sponge layer was then soaked in a kirsch imbibage (sugar syrup) and then...more flippin' whippin'! This time, creme chantilly. We last made creme chantilly way back in week 1 and this was to be the creme of choice for assembling our scrumptious gateaus. Luckily, whipping up cream doesn't take nearly as long as eggs. Whipped over ice to avoid splitting, a few minutes later I was ready to pipe my cream filling, which was then sprinkled with a kirsch soaked cherry compote.

The cake was finished with a creme chantilly top, etched using the serrated edge of our bread knives, 8 beautifully piped creme rosettes, more liquor soaked cherries and tempered chocolate shards. The side of the cake was first masked using creme chantilly then covered with chocolate triangles. What do you think? Probably a little different in appearance to the gateaus you remember eating during the 80s but take it from me, it tasted just as good, if not better than I remember! 

Chef commented that my masking could have been a little more thorough but other than that he was happy with what I'd achieved. I think this is a very fair comment - my reason for my being a tad cautious and going light on the masking was that I was nervous about the cream splitting on the cake. This can happen if played around with too much and I could see little lumps beginning to form so I quit whilst I was ahead. Despite my chocolate furs breaking and not making an appearance, Chef liked my simplistic design. Simplicity always seems to be a winner - which is good as my second cake of the week had to have a simplistic finish due to what can only be described as a chocolate fan disaster. 

Chocolate fans are used a lot in the industry to create height and add drama to simple cakes. Made from scraped, room temperate, tempered chocolate - chef made creating the fans and ruffles look incredibly easy so I was excited to see what I'd be able to create with mine. Turns out - not much. The fans and ruffles were to be placed upon our second cake of the week, a Charlotte au Chocolat. Never having heard of a Charlotte cake, let alone a chocolate one, I thought it best to find out what was in store for me but my reading around the subject only led to confusion. 

The Charlotte, you see, is a dessert served either hot or cold. Some call it a brain cake, when made with using rolled sponge, but it can also be made using stale bread, lady fingers, biscuits or cookies. Reading on, I came across the Charlotte Russe. An elegant cake make from piped sponge lady fingers filled with a Bavarian cream - invented by the French chef Marie-Antonie Careme (1784-1833), who named his creation in honor of his former employer, George IV's only child, Princess Charlotte, and his current Russian employer at the time, Czar Alexander I (russe being the French word for Russian). This had to be what we'd be making - doesn't it sound fancy? 

Essentially this is a cake made using three main elements - a sponge, a Bavarian cream and some chocolate fans or ruffles. This sounds so simple but there were many opportunities for failure along the way...such as the genoise sponge collapsing, the gelatine used within the Bavarian cream not activating correctly leading to a unset moose and the tempered chocolate not playing nice leading to a lack of fans. I fell victim to one of the three. My sponge cooked well, although it was a little loose in its consistency, resulting in a lack of definition between the fingers. My moose held well, although the cocoa powder did cause it to become a little on the lumpy side. My issues were with the cooling of the moose, which I over did in the blast chiller, making the cake very hard to turn out of the cake ring, which then caused it to dent and mark. 

I'm not entirely sure why I struggled with the fans. Chef said it was something to do with the temperature of the chocolate not settling but I did the best I could with that I had. Below are a couple of pictures of my Charlotte au Chocolate and a picture showing a selection of my class mates. You'll notice their fans and ruffles are big and full and mine isn't but again, Chef made a point of letting me know that he liked the simplicity of my cake. He said I'd considered all angels, height, texture and depth and these are the type of comments that, as an aspiring food stylist, mean a lot to me. Sure, my fans didn't work out as anticipated but what I created didn't look so bad! 

Next week on my path to patissiere, the Gateau St. Honore! Eeeek. That piping nozzle is coming back to haunt me! And petit fours. How quaint :o) 

*Please note that the views I express are mine alone and do not reflect the views of my place of study*

Le Cordon Bleu week 6 - CAKE!

Finally, after just about making it through custard week 1 and 2, the making and baking of puff pastry, short crust pasty, sweet pastry, fruit salad, tarte au citron, tarte aux pommes, meringues made three ways, lemon meringue pie, coffee eclairs, creme caramel and a burnt creme brulee it was time to move onto CAKES!

Naturally, having come from a very cakey background this filled me with much joy, excitement and anticipation. Surely, this had to be my best week yet! But, not wanting to be over confident I decided to take things in my stride. After all, the past 5 weeks have taught me that everything I thought I knew was wrong and every little trick of the cake baking trade I'd learnt over the years I needed to quickly forget, because at Le Cordon Bleu I'm being classically trained which means whisking...with a whisk. No short cuts. 

Rather than beginning my week as I've done before, by researching the bakes ahead of me immediately due to my excitement, I postponed my research in favour of taking a trip back to the city I like to call home, Bristol. With the key to my old house still in my pocket, I snuck in and whilst my friends were still at work, I cooked up a huge spaghetti bolognese and a chocolate tart for pudding. As you do. After all, home is where the tart is ;o) I like to call this 'baking and entering', however it was a little tricky explaining the concept to the neighbours when I popped over seeking a rolling pin and sieve, without it sounding like I was up to no good. The following day I made a plum and creme patisserie tart with the left over pate sucree. Both were very well received and proved to be great practise for me. Edible homework is the best! 

Upon my return to London it was back to business and excited by the task ahead of me I began flicking through my cookery books to learn more about my bakes. This week, beautiful burnt butter madeleines, gateau au citron and a genioise a le confiture de framboises. Even the names of the dishes sound delicious. 

Having always loved the simple but charming appearance of the palm sizes snack that is the madeleine I was excited to learn more about it. Surrounded by romantic fables, the origins are sadly not set in stone, however it was thought that, given their scallop like shape, that they were first baked in the town of Commercy, in Alsace-Lorraine. Some suggest that a servant of the disposed king of Poland, Stanislaw Leszcynski, began baking these delightful cakes in real scallop shells taken from the coast line, and handing them out to pilgrims travelling through the town on their way to Santiago de Compostela in Spain during the eighteenth century. Over the years the baking tins have changed, resulting in a narrower snack which lends itself very well to dunking. 

In France, dunking is exactly what these cakes are baked for (no rich tea or chocolate digestive will be found in the hands of our frog eating friends) and for many, the dunking of a madeleine is habitual. Enjoyed with tea, coffee, hot chocolate or milk, these cakes are a hit with the old and young alike. Baked with brown butter, or beurre noisette, they are sweet with a hint of nuttiness. Due to the way the tins are lined, they have a slightly crisp, caramelised outer and of course, look like a sea shell on their underside and have a nipple on top. 

Chef couldn't bring himself to say the word 'nipple' in demo - and I don't blame him. Stood in front of a class of 60 odd girls, it's not really something you want to get into! However interestingly, the nipple is formed in the oven due to the pressure of the mix. As the butter within the batter begins to melt and the chemical reaction between the baking powder and other ingredients takes place, the mixture is forced upwards to create these perfect little domes. I was incredibly excited to bake madeleines. As mentioned in my previous post, I've been on the look out for a vintage tin for many years and haven't yet found one so I've never gotten around to making them. Dad has been put on look out duty and is currently scouring every charity shops baking section in the county of Worcestershire. He does love a challenge so I doubt it'll be long before he hunt proves to be fruitful.

Following demo I finally had the chance to bake madelines! 18 to be exact. This was a slightly more complex mix than I'd imagined, and one that needed to be handled with the upmost care. First I prepared my beurre noisette, a simple task which involved essentially burning my butter. It didn't look partially pleasant but it smelt fantastic. Almost like the smell of chestnuts being roasted by the street vendors in London at Christmas time. Once cool, into the flour, baking powder, egg and sugar the burnt better went, along with honey and lemon zest. The mixture was then chilled whilst the tins were buttered, chilled, buttered a second time and then coated with soft flour. 

When sufficiently chilled, preventing the chemical reaction taking place outside of the oven, the mixture was piped into the madeleine tins and immediately baked. The instant they were ready they were turned out of their trays and not one of us in the room could stop ourselves drooling at the sight before us. The smell that filled the room was just to much and when chef wasn't looking, into our mouths they went. Heaven. 

The next task during this practical session was to bake a lemon cake, or a gateau au citron. Often referred to in the UK as a pound cake due to it's equal quantities and overall weight, this cake wasn't a challenge for me. Into a lined tin went the mix, this was then baked for 35 minutes, during which time we prepared candied lemon julienne which was to be used as decoration, as well as a lemon juice glacage which was used to soak the cake making it super moist and truly scrumptious. 

Upon marking, chef gave my lemon cake a good squeeze, "oooh" he said "this is a very well soaked cake! This is going to taste delicious, well done!" He also complimented me on my madeleines and my overall presentation of both dishes before signing my grading sheet and moving onto the next student. I was happy with that, and even more happy at the thought of tucking into a madeleine or three on my walk home. 

As promised, I halved my bakes and the homeless men of Old Street tube station enjoyed hot madeleines and gateau au citron just before bed time. The remaining half I took with me on the train to Lemington Spa to be enjoyed with friends over tea this afternoon! Cakes on a train, not to be mistaken for snakes on a plane. 

The last challenge of the week was the Genoise a la confiture de framboises – a very fancy title, translating to a Genoise sponge layered with raspberry jam. It made me giggle when I told a friend what I was due to make and she responded with “so basically a Vic sponge cake yeah? Easy!” Oh how I wish it were but being our third and final exam dish, I knew that ‘easy’ wasn’t a word to be associated with this cake.

Knowing very little about the Genoise sponge I set about investigating it thoroughly. Sadly I couldn’t find a patisserie in Bristol that sold any Genoise in order for me to sample this light and fluffy sponge prior to my class, but I was able to hunt down some macarons which instantly made everything better. Looking into the origins of the cake, I discovered that its creator was an Italian pastry chef, rumoured to come from the Italian city of the same name. As with many of our patisserie favourites the sponge was created in France, during the French revolution. Other than this vague top line, not much was said about this cake. 

Luckily I did find an article titled ‘how to make whisked sponges’ in a Le Cordon Bleu cookery course magazine dated 1969 which was given to me by a friend. This certainly helped to shed a little more light, although the food photography left much to be desired! The tips and methods covered in the article were of course well over 45 years old, but I came to the conclusion that the classical techniques couldn’t have changed much in this time and might in fact help me if correctly integrated.

“Whisked sponges are the lightest of all cakes”, the article read. “They contain only a small proportion of flour and their texture depends almost entirely on the amount of air beaten in with the egg”.

Great. So the success of my cake essentially depended entirely on my upper arm strength. I felt a sudden wave of nerves wash over me as I dropped to the floor and into the plank position which I held for 3 minutes and followed by several rounds of press ups in the hope that the additional exercise would put me in good stead for my forth coming whiskathon. It didn’t.

Following the demo, the whiskathon began. Into the kitchen we went and into a large bowl we placed the eggs and caster sugar. The bowl was then positioned over a bain marie and the contents, beaten. 2 minutes in and I’d reached the foam stage but my mix hadn’t really grown much in size. My arm began to ache. 4 minutes in, the sugar had successfully dissolved into the egg mix, which had grown significantly, but my wrist was telling me it was time to stop for a break. I ignored the nagging feeling and continued as best I could. 5 minutes in and I agreed with my wrist and stopped, only to be told by Chef not to stop even for a second for fear of loosing time and air.

6 minutes in and my mix had grown further but it was far from the desired ribbon stage. I thought back to the article I’d read only the night before “the cake batter is ready when a little lifted on the whisk falls in a thick ribbon on the mixture in the bowl and holds its shape”. It wasn’t holding so I continued to whisk with as much vigour as I could muster.  

8 minutes in and I’d started to loose all sensation in my hand but sadly I still hadn't achieved the ribbon needed to move onto the inclusion of the flour. 9 minutes… all feeling had now gone from my hand, my wrist was starting to cramp and my shoulder was begging for the torture to end. I powered on. Ten minutes in and I was contemplating crying in the hope that Chef might take pity on me and help, but then I tested my mix and to my delight the magic had happened and my ribbon held its shape!! I almost cried anyway just because I was so happy to see the elusive ribbon and also because I still couldn’t feel my hand.

Trying to ignore the lack of sensation in my fingers, I grabbed my pre sieved flour and begin sieving it for a third time directly into the mix in small inclusion. Chef suggested the flour should be sieved twice during demo to ensure it was sufficiently aerated; the article recommended this be done three times. I saw no harm in giving the flour a third airing so carried on as such. After each flour inclusion I gently and delicately incorporated my flour into the sugared eggs, trying my absolute best not to loose any of the air I’d worked so hard to include but with each turn my mixture became flatter and flatter. “Not to worry”, I thought “the mixture is bound to puff up nicely once in the oven”, so I kept turning my batter, as instructed, making sure that every ounce of flour was mixed in well. I then poured my flat looking cake mix into an 8 inch pan, popped it in the oven, crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.

Whilst in the oven, I prepped the meringue butter cream which was to be used to mask the cake, made my raspberry jam and prepped the sugar syrup used to soak the delicate sponge. Within a flash the oven timer sounded and it was the moment of truth…bugger, mine hadn’t risen nearly as much as I’d expected or hoped! I looked around the class and luckily I wasn’t alone. I cut my cake in two, soaked the delicate sponges with sugar syrup and tried desperately to think of a plan to salvage my cake. The funny thing is, I knew it wasn't going to rise. I knew I'd over stirred and in my mind there was only one way to rectify my pancake like sponge – a thick buttercream filling. 

On to the base of the cake I piped not one, but two layers of buttercream which the top of my cake floated perfectly above. I then masked the entire sponge with buttercream, as instructed and set about decorating my slightly taller cake as best I could. Around the base I patted on a thin line of toasted almonds, and on top, I piped a design I’d conjured up over my lunch break. This was done using a combination of buttercream and melted piping chocolate.

Luckily for me, on this occasion, the inside of my cake wasn’t being marked. The same cannot be said if this recipe comes up during my practical exam in a few weeks time! Thankfully, Chef complimented my efforts and joked that in future perhaps I needed a stepladder to make the whisking of my eggs a little easier. I suggested an electric whisk would be more useful and perhaps a few of the other tools I have in my baking box at home such as a cake wire and mini pallet knife, all of which we’re forbidden from use.

Thankfully my decorating saved the day. Chef loved my design and recommended that I practise it a few times prior to the exam, just to perfect it, in case this dish should come up. He said it was simple, elegant, made good use of the space available but didn’t overcrowd or dominate. He did however mention that my lines were a little on the thick side. Never again shall I try to shade using chocolate. I breathed a huge sigh of relief – my dish would have passed the exam he said! Hurray!

During our practical de briefing Chef advised us to invest in can or two of Tesco value shaving foam. I strange suggestion I thought to myself, but it had been a long week. Jokes aside, he said that the consistency exactly mimics that of piping meringue and the meringue butter cream we’d just used to cover our cakes! A great insider tip to make practise a little less expensive and wasteful.

Happy with my week’s progress I went home laden with cake. A cake that looked a little like this...

Next week on my path to patisserie we continue with cake, covering a few more of the basic sponges used in classical French baking and we shall also be looking at les cremes bavaroises et mousses...which I'll be honest, I've never heard of but after a quick google, I think it looks very, very pretty so I can't wait to get back in the kitchen! Week 7 - I'm ready for you. 

*Please note that the views I express are mine alone and do not reflect the views of my place of study*