(Aside: In addition to their demo and prac classes, all Basic and Intermediate students must serve as demo assistants at least once during their course. A Basic Pastry student might be asked to serve as a demo assistant to the chef instructor in an Intermediate demo class, and vice versa. The demo assistant is supposed to help the chef instructor set up tools and equipment before the demo, fetch trays, preheat the oven, wash up, and so forth, when asked to do so. Basically, an extra pair of hands in the demo kitchen.
I was lucky to be asked to assist in a chocolate demo class, because I'm really interested in chocolate-making. I didn't have a great deal to do during the demo, so I was able to watch the chef instructor show the Intermediate Pastry students how to make a chocolate box. It was fascinating! I only had to help wash up at the end.)
Anyway, back to Lesson 6. In the 3-hour demo class last Friday, Chef H showed us how to use the brioche and croissant doughs to make the following (students only had to make the ones marked with asterisks):
** Brioche à tête (head brioche)
** Nanterre (loaf brioche)
** Tressée (braided brioche)
Galette (flat, disc-like brioche)
Mousseline brioche (cylinder-shaped brioche)
Fruits brioche (fruit scroll brioche, baked in a round cake pan)
Courrone (crown brioche -- it actually is shaped like a bicycle tyre)
** Butter croissant
** Pain aux raisins
** Pain au chocolat
Danishes (including 1. bear claws; 2. pin wheels; 3. cinnamon twists –-> twists, coils and s-scrolls; 4. triangles)
We really were not expecting the chef to make so many different kinds of danishes and brioches in one class. It certainly was a lot more than was listed in the course outline. Anyhow, I'm glad Chef H decided to do it. It was inspiring stuff! Just see the photos below. (I had never seen so many kinds of brioches, croissants and danishes in the one place. And the best thing was, we all got to taste the fruits of the chef's labour at the end of the demo.)
A feast for the eyes
Bear-claw Danishes in the foreground and butter croissants in the background
Mousseline brioche (cylinder-shaped brioche) in the foreground
Fruits brioche (shaped like a cake, with fruit scrolls inside it), Nanterre (loaf) and galette (disc-like) brioches; Brioche à tête (head brioche) in the top right-hand corner.
Pin-wheel danishes (left) and couronne (crown) brioche (right)
In the practical class, I was able to make the three kinds of brioches without too much difficulty, though I found the Brioche à tête (head brioche) somewhat tricky. To me, it was a lot trickier to work with the croissant dough. I think I did not roll the dough out thin enough, and my pain aux raisins were not stuck too firmly with egg wash, which meant that some of the scrolls "uncurled" slightly during baking. [Note: You don't see the uncurled pain aux raisins in the photo included in the last post, because I ate my "mistakes" as soon as I could. ;-)]
Anyway, I really enjoyed this particular lesson. And I got to enjoy my croissants and brioches for breakfast on the weekend. :-)
Next lesson, the chef will show us what we can make with puff pastry dough. I'm sure that will be enjoyable too.
