Tastes Like More

Weddings and Cookies

2010-08-22T12:46:00.000-07:00

It seems these days I am all good intentions, but terrible follow through! I have so many photos to write blogs about but yet I always find the idea of sitting down and getting it done so daunting. Well, this Sunday afternoon I am feeling productive, so here I am, red velvet cupcake in tow as support!

I delved into the world of wedding cakes starting in June. The first cake I did was to decorate it only, which was far more challenging than it sounds. The second cake was a cupcake affair to remember, but went far smoother than I had anticipated. The cookies were for an extremely loyal customer, but gosh was I glad to see the back end of them at the end!

Below is the cake that I covered in almond paste/marzipan, fondant, and then ribbon.

In the end the cake turned out fine, but let me outline why sweat, blood, and tears went into this cake. First off, I didn't bother to ask what kind of cake (the mother of the bride made it) it was, and it turned out to be fruit cake, but a fruit with whole nuts. This becomes problematic because if the cake is not completely flat, and I have to tier it, then I usually like to shave down parts, but the whole nuts prevent me from doing this. If I tried to shave the whole nuts they'd probably just pop out and the cake would look like the moon, all covered in craters.

Second of all, the client wanted there to be a layer of almond paste underneath the fondant, which is traditional. What I failed to realize here is that for masking cakes marzipan is used, not almond paste. As soon as any kind of mauling happens to the almond paste the oils start coming out and go everywhere. The sound is like that of a wet sponge making 'squishy' noises. It wasn't very pliable either, so I basically had to patch it on. Also, 2.2lbs was not enough to cover an 8", 6", and 4" tier - it barely covered the 8". Thank god I had a reserve of marzipan hiding in the back of my cupboard.

Then the fondant. That went alright, but I made the mistake of not putting in the dowels immediately. I waited a day so that when I went to put them in, the fondant cracked. I tried caulking it with royal icing but that looked awful. I was panicking but then my mum suggested that I do an extra layer of fondant - problem solved! Stacking them was also a treat. Since they weren't completely flat there were small gaps and it didn't make a perfect 90 degree angle (oh, I should have mentioned, the client wanted it stacked off-centre). I did my best to use the ribbon to close the gaps.

I was very happy to have this (very heavy) cake delivered! I haven't received any e-mail complaints so I'm assuming all went well!

The cupcake wedding went much better!

Red Velvet with Vanilla Bean Buttercream

Marble with White Chocolate Ganache

Spice with Maple Buttercream

Red Velvet with Pistachio Buttercream and Fondant bees/flowers

The baking was pretty much completed in a day and seeing all of the cupcakes out on my dining room table made them seem less daunting! The only challenge was finding a good enough white chocolate ganache recipe that would allow me to pipe it on. The small cake was such a joy to work on and the bride and groom were very happy with it!

On to cookies!

Thomas the Tank Engine is one complex little guy. I had to make him in two parts - body and head. Then I had to do the blue portions, let that dry, then onto the red and black parts. The sides of the head had to be covered in black (which was a feat and was sometimes managed and other times not). Then I had to fill the face with grey, let that dry, and then the eyes and nose. He took many many hours and I got a little annoyed at his sweet little face looking at me all innocently!

Things I've learned with the cakes, cookies, and pies:

1) If someone wants you to only decorate their cake, make sure you find out what kind of cake it is first.

2) Almond paste is for baking and nom'ing on only, not covering cakes.

3) If you have old cupcake liners you WILL burn the bottom of your cupcakes, which is gross.

4) Maple is an extremely hard flavour to put into buttercream.

5) Cupcake holders in cake boxes are your best friend.

6) If you don't have matching cupcake pans, check the height - not all are created equal.

7) Although cookies are small and are devoured in mere seconds, the labour that can go into decorating them makes them very expensive, so I should never sell myself short (which I did).

8) If you have a good and easy tart shell recipe, stick with it. You don't need to get fancy and change it up each time, it's time consuming and not so economical sometimes. Buying a thing of cream to only use a teaspoon? Silly!

9) I still don't like make cupcakes. I can't explain it!

10) My new camera makes this camera look like crap.

And here are some other cakes that I did for sale:

Raspberry Mousse Tart with White Chocolate Ganache

Almond Dacquoise with Dark Chocolate Ganache and Raspberries

I hope to post every couple of days now, so you'll soon see a very belated review of a tasting menu/concert that I went to in July, the latest wedding cake I did (for 120 people!), and the results from the food photography course that I did last weekend, which was mind blowing. I also hope to do a review of L'Oven, an Ottawa-based home run bakery that I discovered at a Cherry Pie event. These women are making a phenomenal product and really, when they're making amazing cupcakes, why should I bother competing? I love their stuff more than mine.

Raw Food Adventures!

2010-07-27T11:38:00.001-07:00

It's been quite a while since my last post, but that's because I have been very busy! The end of June brought my first wedding delivery of 90 cupcakes and a small tiered cake that was 6" and 4". It went very well and the bride and groom were most pleased!

I've recently had about 3 weeks off because my boss was in Spain. Having the time off was really great for relaxing, reflecting, and general taking care of myself. I've been incorporating more raw food into my diet. For the last few weeks I've made pretty much all of my breakfasts raw. I used to like alternating between an egg breakfast and a cereal breakfast, but I've since found much better alternatives!

For my "cereal" I puree steamed or soaked buckwheat (I know purists will say that steaming is not "raw" but I'm sure it's not all bad) with a frozen and ripe banana (I have SO many in my fridge) with some peanut butter. Right now I'm still using grocery store Kraft chunky but I'm hoping to get some natural peanut butter soon. It's so hot here in Ottawa these days that a nice cold breakfast really hits the spot! No picture as it's not the prettiest dish.

Now, for my "egg" dish I found this wonderful video by Ani Phyo - Spanish Scramble, or a variation on I Love the Chicks pate. The first time I made it I added tomatoes and basil, but this morning I made it with ground coriander and mushrooms. So delicious and filling - I felt great for almost 5 hours!

Months ago I made raw tacos - still working on the presentation as the Boston lettuce leaves weren't really doing it for me. They also bring back bad memories as when I was making the guacamole I was trying to take out the pit with a small knife and it slipped and went into my hand instead D:. I have a bruised nerve, which is not really fun, but for the most part I don't notice it - the side of my left index finger feels like it's "asleep" but that's the extent of the damage.

The walnut "meat" was really delicious! They're not very filling though, especially when presented in those small leaves, so I'm going to try and find a bigger leaf so that this can be more of a meal than an appetizer.

Around that same time I also made a walnut chocolate cake from Ani Phyo's dessert book. It was so filling! I put strawberries in the middle which ended up cutting its shelf life in half as they went bad pretty quickly. Still delicious though. I sometimes find that all that cacao powder leaves a very powdery taste, but if you wait a couple of days it disappears. Anyone else notice this?

In the middle of June there was Ottawa's annual Raw Fest. There were a lot of neat stalls and I bought some delicious fruit, raw chocolate bars by Olivia Chocolat, and seed bars and snow balls from Rawsome Food. I also had my first taste of coconut water and I'm also a big fan of that. I unfortunately let it sit for too long in the fridge so when I went to crack it open to get the meat it was all soggy.

Because the weather is extremely warm right now I thought I'd make nature my own personal dehydrator. I attempted to make raw burgers - the bun was made out of soaked buckwheat (I tried to sprout, but failed), ground flax, sesame seeds, garlic, salt, pepper, water, and dates. The burgers were made out of walnuts (soaked and dried), wheat germ as "bread crumbs" to help it dry out faster, spices, onion, and chilis from our balcony garden. Here are a few thing that I've learned from DIY dehydrating:

1) NEVER put paper towel on top of the food in attempts to keep bugs off. You end up ripping the entire top layer of the bun off to get rid of the bits of towel. Yum? Bleh.

2) It takes forever. I had them out for about 5 hours and the insides were still goopy. You can't just whip up a raw meal sometimes, you have to plan ahead.

3) I really REALLY need a proper dehydrator!

I eventually got impatient and baked them at a high temperature so that they were edible before the next day :P. Not so pure according to raw standards, but still healthy nonetheless! I topped it with spring mix, sprouts, mushrooms, and chipotle mayo (kind of raw?). Ryan wasn't as into the buns but he really liked the burger portion, as did I! I had a few buns left over so I use them in my lunches. The garlic has really mellowed over the days making it for a much subtler tasting bun.

I also want to share with you my favourite new snack - raw popcorn. I found this video courtesy of Renegade Health. Here are the ingredients:

Here are the instructions:

1) Chop up and crumble a head of cauliflower so that it resembles "kernels". Place in plastic bag.

2) Liberally add nutritional yeast, then a pinch of cayenne (or two if you're like me and like it spicy!), and a pinch of sea salt (I like Maldon)

3) Close bag and "massage" all the ingredients together!

4) Inhale the deliciousness

Hmmm, so why do I like it? It's crunchy, it's a little salty, a little spicy, and it tastes cheesy! You can dehydrate this but I don't like waiting and I love how crunchy and fresh raw cauliflower is. I find that, because of the water content, it soaks everything up very fast and gets a little soggy, but if you add more nutritional yeast you can bring some life back to it. I wouldn't let it sit for more than 4 days though. But really, how can you not devour the whole bag in one sitting? I actually like this more than real popcorn!

The last raw thing I made was chocolate bark, which I made yesterday. I occasionally get huge chocolate cravings around that time of the month, and after devouring huge amounts of non-raw chocolate last week and feeling gross afterwards, I figured I should try and make a better alternative. I again consulted Ani Phyo's dessert book and made her liquid chocolate recipe and mixed in pumpkin seeds, almonds, and goji berries. I spread it out over a silpat and froze it for about 10 minutes. It had a strong flavour! Sometimes my body has trouble digesting pure fats so eating all that coconut oil was a bit of an adjustment. However, today seems to be better. The cocoa (I didn't have enough pure cacao so I used my Cocoa Barry powder instead) was intense so a little went a long way and it definitely satiated the chocolate craving! I even had some in my yoghurt this morning, haha.

I haven't felt this good in a long time! I know the time off has really helped, but my insides have just been so much happier since I've been incorporating more raw food into my diet. My energy levels have also been great, something I seem to always struggle with. My skin has been fantastic and all around I'm really benefiting from eating this way. I've also staring doing yoga and I went for a run for the first time in 3 years and although I have a ways to go the endorphins made me feel great.

More and more I'm moving away from my traditional way of cooking and baking in favour of raw. If it weren't for my family and Ryan wanting to still eat cooked food (and a lot of meat!) I would be raw I'd say about 80%-90%. I will admit that when I go out if I see a delicious sounding meat dish I will get it, but for the last few months I've really been treating meat as a special occasion treat and I try to eat only well fed and well cared for meat. For example, there is a butcher near my parent's cottage that sells Belgium Blue meat. They graze through a huge field and all of them are tagged, meaning that you can trace your steak all the way back to that cow! Also it means that only one cow (and only the best parts) are used in sausages. I know a lot of restaurants are moving towards using local and well cared for meat so I don't feel as bad eating out.

Today I became the proud owner of a Nikon D5000, and I am also going to be taking a 2 day food photography course which I am SO excited for. Hopefully this means my blog will take on a new and more professional look!

Crazy Mad Hatter tea party bridal shower cake!

2010-06-22T14:27:00.000-07:00

Wow, what a mouthful of a title! This cake was done about a month ago, and is my first proper tiered fondant cake. I spent a long time planning it out and made sure that I was organized enough to execute all my ideas properly (something I had struggled with in the past). It's funny though, sometimes you will be faced with a challenge and a totally different solution will present itself and you'll realize that it is much better! What I mean by this is originally I wanted to create a few large fondant roses to go on top of the cake, but I was having trouble creating them as my mind saw them. Instead I made a stack of small roses and leaves to give the illusion of a full potted plant, if that makes sense! I hoped to make it taller, but I have ideas as to how I can do that for next time. Every cake is a learning curve!

I'm quite surprised that I'm so pleased with this cake. As a "tortured artist" I'm never quite satisfied with my work, whether it be a cake, drawing, or a musical piece I'm composing. It's a really great feeling knowing that you accomplished what you set out to do and executed it well.

Playing catch-up!

2010-06-14T19:37:00.000-07:00

Warning: this is a very photo-heavy post! Those with dial-up beware!

I'm going to be playing food catch-up with this post. The last couple of months have been very hectic and despite the best of intentions I still haven't achieved my goal of posting more regularly. I feel as though once I get over this one big food blogging hump then we're smooth sailing!

But first, something totally unrelated to food - I cut off all of my hair.

Before:

After:

I really wanted a change, and my hair was completely fried having dyed it blonde for 9 months straight. I got great feelings of instant gratification but now I desperately miss my ponytail! I can now pull it back into the tiniest of stubs but it will be a few months before I can fully pull it back. I will never cut my hair again! Which is a lie, as I'll probably want to do the exact same thing two years from now. Vicious cycle.

Back now to food! Ryan and I have been attempting to eat more healthy. In addition to adding raw food to our diet, we also are obsessed with rice paper wraps! So easy and so versatile.

I discovered a recipe from Happy Little Bento, and while my own version didn't turn out nearly as cute as the photo, nor did I have all of the proper ingredients amounts, it was still one of the most surprisingly delightful dishes I've ever eaten! Despite it's slop-like appearance, of course.

As some of you may have read, awhile ago I e-mailed a food stylist/specialist in Ottawa and we met and hit it off right away. I did some part-time work with her before being offered a more full-time position, and one of my projects was to pick some recipes from her website and to make them and take photos of each step. Later these will be on her blog (when I get around to doing that... oh dear...). For now though the final product pictures are here!

Egg-free and Gluten-free chicken fingers. Dipped in a honey-dijon mixture and rolled in spelt crumbs.

Tuna and asparagus salad with avocado.

Peanut butter energy balls.

I also had one week where I made a lot of cakes!

Double chocolate cheesecake

Chocolate brownie cake with caramel buttercream and pecans

Chocolate cake with chocolate ganache

Vanilla cake with chocolate icing (this felt like such a grocery store cake!)

Chocolate almond dacquoise with strawberry cream and caramel

Lastly, Ryan and I had a dinner party a few weeks back for some friends from cooking school. We felt slightly rushed to get everything prepared but it turned out to be a roaring success.

Dinner party attire!

Stuffed sea trout. Recipe found at The Delicious Miss Dahl.

Vegan chocolate cake with not-so-vegan chocolate caramel ganache

More photos and stories to come! Here a teaser list for you - raw tacos, tales from the ER, homemade pizza, raw cakes, and more!

Raw Chocolate Orange Cheezecake

2010-06-04T13:01:00.000-07:00

Oh, right, back to food! I was on Cloud Nine for a bit meeting one of my food idols, Chef Michael Smith. After that a lot of work drama occurred, and I've since resigned and will be starting my new job in about two weeks. I'm going to be doing a lot things such as recipe developing, food styling, food blogging, tweeting... the list goes on! I'm really excited about these upcoming projects. I'm also going to be able to have a semi-relaxed Summer which is much needed to help me feel grounded and generally normal again!

I made this cake about a month ago, and I got the recipe from RawMazing, which is a fantastic site that you all should check out! I don't have a dehydrator (yet... if I can find a suitable place to store it my boyfriend will give me the OK) so I've been making recipes that don't require one, such as this cheesecake.

One of the things that I noticed about it is how many cashews it required! Wow, it was a lot of nuts. And for some silly reason I felt cheated because the ingredients only yielded enough for a 6" round. Well, I should have guessed how rich it was just from the cashew content alone! Wow, one tiny sliver made me full and kept my sweet tooth satisfied. I sometimes found it too coconut-ey, because of the coconut butter, and I really just wanted to taste the cacao and orange sometimes. Perhaps next time I'll try cashew butter instead, or maybe just slightly refined coconut oil (is that still considered raw? Maybe someone could chime in with more information!) in order to reduce the coconut taste.

Being silly with my raw creation!

This may be a slightly strange observation and fascination, but I really was glad when, after having it in the fridge for awhile, that it grew mold. I always get suspicious of things that don't grow mold after being opened, so it was nice knowing that I was consuming something that was riddled with preservatives.

I had a little bit of leftover topping leftover, so I put it on my yoghurt one morning - delicious! This crust would make a lovely "granola" topping for breakfast, there's nothing bad in it.

One thing with raw desserts, especially a "cheezecake", is that you're never going to be able to replicate the texture of the original entirely, and you try all you want, but I'm fairly convinced that this is just not something that can be done. It is a dense cake (so. many. nuts), and while it has the looks of a cheesecake, it's definitely not soft, nor squishy like a regular cheesecake is. This is ok though, because the density of it makes you want to consume less, which is good, because I really believe that everything, even good things, should be eaten in moderation :). The texture was very smooth, but next time I'm going to process it more so that I can fully liquify any little bits of nut that hang around. That, or I might try straining it. All in all this was a fantastic recipe and next I'm going to try making a raw tart! Mmm.

Things to do: Meet Chef Michael Smith. CHECK!

2010-05-23T17:40:00.001-07:00

I have so many food creations that I did over the last month that I want to blog about, but that is going to be put aside for the moment so that I can instead tell you about one of the most exciting days of my life!

I have been working with a food specialist/stylist for the last few weeks and in addition to working on recipes I got to see the media side to her job. We arrived at the A Channel for 6:30am and I helped set up for two segments, both for Dairy Farmers Canada. I set up a cheese plate and helped with last minute prep things. I had to sit in the audience during the filming, but if you happened to catch it you do see me lurking in the background! Anyway, that was loads of fun. I decided then that I love tv.

Our next journey was to Rogers TV, where Chef Michael Smith of Chef At Home Food Network fame was doing a segment on seafood and talking about the P.E.I appreciation that is happening in a lot of Ottawa restaurants. I didn't do any of the set up for that, but I did get to meet him! And I got to meet the hosts of Rogers TV, Derick and Terrilynn (I'm so sure that I'm spelling her name wrong...). I watched the taping and got to take pictures during it. Michael Smith is the most down to earth man ever. So calm, so gracious - a fantastic and inspiring man. I wish I could have had the chance to talk to him, but everything was happening so fast that I blinked and it was over!

I lovelovelove tv studios. I love cameras, I love film crews. Perhaps someday I'll pursue a career in tv or film, but for now this food styling thing is really quite neat. The woman who did the set up has such an eye for elegant simplicity.

Michael Smith and I. To give you an indication of his tallness I am 5'6, and he is slouching down a bit.

P.E.I. potato vodka. Smelled divine but unfortunately I didn't get to try any.

Oyster dressing - pickled red onions and dill. So simple and delicious.

The shucker was made specially for him.

A very VERY large oyster was unveiled here.

I got to eat this oyster after ;). They're my favourite.

I have so many more photos from this day so these are just the highlights. I was on such a high for the rest of the day. Even though I ended up passing out at 9pm (I had been up since 5am) it was such an overwhelming but fantastic day.

The coming months are going to be very transitional for me, job wise, and I'm doing my best to just go along for the ride and not continually second guess myself. I know that by not having to bake every single day I will begin to appreciate it again. Hopefully I'll also be able to get more sleep and rid myself of these awful sugar cravings and skin problems that I've been having. I'm also hoping that I will have more time to pursue my other interests and develop those more - music, art, and sewing. I'd really like to have an Etsy shop set up by the end of the summer, and I also need to produce another piece of music. I'm aiming for another string quartet, just to get the ball rolling again. I also need to practice more art so that I push forward and finally get to painting, but charcoal is hard!

Anyway, I'm digressing! Next post will have raw cheesecakes (yes, I did it!), lots of chocolate cakes, and new recipe lemons that get turned into lemonade!

Restaurant Review: Le Saint O

2010-04-24T10:35:00.000-07:00

Photo Credit: Le Saint-O website

Ottawa is full of fantastic restaurants. Granted, we do not have as many as Toronto or Montreal, we still do really well in our medium-sized city. There are names that are automatically associated with Ottawa - Beckta, Fraser, Play, Stella, Murray Street... the list goes on. One restaurant that stands out amongst these is not located downtown, nor is it located in an area that you would think it would do well in - the corner of St. Laurent and Hemlock near Manor Park (right opposite the Dairy Queen... yes you Ottawa people know which one I'm talking about!).

Specifying in traditional French cuisine, Le Saint-O has been around since 1990, and I've been going there with my family since around 2002. It has never failed to disappoint me and is one of the main reasons I am so interested in food and went to cooking school in the first place. It is run by Natasha and Phillipe, a husband and wife team - Natasha is the host and Phillipe the chef. Natasha always welcomes you with a smile and such genuine pleasure to have you at the restaurant that you know you will be treated well that evening.

The whole dining experience is as if I was transported to France for a fraction of the cost! The music, the ambiance, the French staff, the food, it's all perfectly put together. The decor isn't modern but it's cozy and intimate. As for the food? Don't expect any modern adaptations here. There are no fusions, no molecular gastronomy experiments, just straight forward, honest French cuisine. It's heightened versions of dishes I learned about in school, which of course involves cream cream cream, butter, more cream, reduced stocks and foie gras.

The last time I ate at Le Saint-O was for my 3rd anniversary with my honey, Ryan, on March 18. Before I go on, if you read the New Edinburgh News at all there is usually a coupon for 15% your meal on Tuesdays to Thursdays (I believe, check out the coupon to be sure). We both got the Table-D'Hote which, for between $34-40, you get either a soup or salad, main course, and dessert with tea or coffee. Pretty fantastic deal!

For the main course, while the salads are delicious, you must, and I say MUST go for the soup. It is their signature dish because it is two soups placed side-by-side. I wish I had a photo to share but alas at the time I didn't want to interrupt the other patron's meal with an obnoxious flash. I've had great combinations in the past, one in particular that stands out was the onion and raspberry soup. You would think that these two ingredients would not be a good pair, but my mind was changed as soon as I tried it! The soups that I had that evening were beet...... Mind blowing, as usual.

Ryan and I bought an extra appetizer of escargot with blue cheese, chardonnay, fig and honey crostini and chive oil bruschetta. Despite all the rich ingredients it did not leave us feeling heavy and regretting the meal to come. The blue cheese was subtle, and it gave the escargots a break from their typical garlic butter sauce. I could have use more of the fig and honey crostini, but I can be greedy! The chive oil bruschetta was light and fresh. The whole plate was devoured in 5 minutes.

Four our main course Ryan had their surf and turf which is a half leg of Mariposa Farm Duck Confit and Jumbo Black Tiger Prawn, with a Juniper Berry, Maple and Veal Stock sauce. We have both had duck confit in the past and are huge fans of this, but people, get thee to Saint-O immediately should you have a confit craving. It was the perfect level of both crispy outside, but juicy, fall of the bone meat on the inside. The shrimp was enormous and rich. Every dish comes accompanied with a veggie patty that seems to be mainly comprised of root vegetables, and it was just the right size so as not to be overwhelmed.

My dish (one of the specials) was cornish hen stuffed with veal and filled with... oh goodness, my memory is failing me! I remember it being scented with rosemary and thyme. This sounds rich, and it was, but there was just enough to feel comfortably full, not overwhelmingly so. The herbs were so fragant and didn't overpower the wonderful meat at all.

If you're going for the first time I highly recommend the sweetbreads. It is a signature appetizer and main course. Just make sure you don't load up on equally rich appetizers/mains as these little guys are very filling! I had to take some home in a doggy bag and instead of the regular styrofoam box I was presented with a tinfoil swan that contained the remainders of my meal.

For dessert I had their trio of creme brulees, again another signature of theirs. If I can remember correctly this time I had lychee, mango, and rum raisin. In past I have had basil and that one was fantastic. Never too sweet, perfect silky texture, and always a wonderfully thick burnt sugar topping that gives me great glee when I crack it with a spoon. Ryan had their house made ice cream, which had pistachio in it. There is nothing like home made ice cream!

This is a long and fan-girl like review, I realize. So let me break it down what you should have if you go to Le Saint-O for the first time:

Appetizer: The Soup Duo and, if you're a hungry hungry hippo, the sweetbreads as well
Main: Sweetbreads (if you haven't had them already as an appetizer), Surf 'n' Turf, or one of the Specials
Dessert: Trio of Creme Brulees

This is definitely a special occasion restaurant, even the lunches are indulgent with mains ranging from $11-$26. The wine selection is vast and if you have trouble picking just one, Natasha is full of knowledge and will point you in the right direction. Also, the bread basket is filled with warm rolls and to die for garlic bread - try not to eat the whole basket! As I've mentioned before, you need your hunger about you. I usually eat a very light lunch, or none at all, so that I can walk out without the feeling of having a food baby in my stomach.

The wait for food is well timed, the atmosphere cozy and unpretentious, and the service is consistently welcoming and knowledgeable. This is one of my favourite restaurants in Ottawa and I hope it could become one of your favourites as well.

Raw food and a special birthday!

2010-04-13T08:38:00.000-07:00

Well, Easter is finally over, phew! And one would think that things would calm down at work, wrong! We've been fairly busy still, especially since we took on an event that Jane Goodall is hosting! That was a pretty exciting event to prep for.

This week's schedule has been a little weird for me - I have a three day weekend, work Wednesday-Friday, get Saturday off, and then work Sunday. Not sure how next week's schedule will, but I'm getting a little frustrated at the lack of consistency. Slip ups and egos are also littering the work environment, and I hope that will subside soon.

Anyway, here is a little raw concoction that I whipped up one day! Raw spaghetti, which I found here. I wish I had a spiral cutter, as that would have made life so much easier! I tried cutting the zucchini in my pasta cutter... no dice. So I had to do each individual one. A bore, but worth it! I also didn't make the meat balls, so I made more of a "meat sauce". It was delicious! Even my boyfriend, who usually scoffs at my raw adventures, enjoyed it! I felt very satisfied and "clean" after eating this. You know how some food can make you feel bogged down and gross? I just felt really good.

This past Saturday was my boyfriend's birthday! I made him carrot cake with cream cheese icing, but I wanted to decorate it in a way that would make it really personal and awesome for him. So I found this cake and used it as my inspiration. Joy Division is his favourite band, so how could I not do it? I really wanted to make a bagpipe cake (that's his instrument), but maybe next year.

Happy Birthday, Ryan! <3

We stayed in and had a few friends over, and let's just say we had a bit too much fun! We felt a little under the weather the next day, so we wanted something comforting and light. We ended up making a glorious clean-out-the-fridge soup that had chicken, spinach, onion, carrot, peppers, mushrooms, and a little red curry paste and lime to give it some kick. Perfect!

Here is a tart that I made for my old work - they wanted something with strawberries, but that was light. I made a white chocolate mousse tart with strawberries as the garnish, which were brushed with a strawberry and lemon glaze.

I made a post a few weeks ago about the tragic death of the fiance of the girl who's bridal shower cake I was making. Here is the cake in its almost finished state. I only needed to draw on the Metallica logo on the shirt and paint the face.

I really would have loved to have finished the cake and given it to Jaimen. I'm still so saddened by what happened. I'm sure her loved ones are really looking out for her.

Anyway, stayed tune because next time I'm going to make Raw Orange Chocolate "Cheesecake"!

Happy Easter!

2010-04-04T19:18:00.001-07:00

I hope everyone is enjoying the long weekend, and for you Ottawa dwellers the uncharacteristically warm weather! The fact that I already have tan lines and freckles fills me with great joy. This past week has been hellish and although I love Easter, I'll be glad to see the back of it! Long, LONG days and little sleep does not a happy Jenn make. I'm hoping for a bit more normalcy this coming week. I get a day off on Wednesday to make up for the fact that I had to work on Friday, yay!

I've made tons of goodies, both at home and at work, so I'd like to share them with you!

First off we have my easter cupcakes - chocolate with vanilla buttercream. The nests were made out of kataifi dough and we had jelly bean eggs to go on top.

The cookie section at the front

Macarons with white chocolate ganache

Me (looking sweaty and tired, please ignore) with the cookies that I sold to one of my best customers!

My Easter dinner - lamb leg with lemon and rosemary, potatoes roasted in the lamb pan, baked cauliflowers with raisins, and breaded parmesan asparagus. So good!

I unfortunately didn't get to do the Easter egg hunt this year - my uncle claimed he is "too old" for it! :( However, when my family came by to see the apartment my mum sneakily hid little chocolate eggs all over the place! I've found 4/10 so far! Today I took the shortest trip to Kingston in history to have dinner with my boyfriend's family, where we had more traditional fare such as ham, mashed potatoes, corn, stuffing and... turkey!? It smelled like Christmas but felt like Summer - what a juxtaposition. Tasty nonetheless!

I'm excited to be getting new business cards soon! I have a very talented friend who has done up one prototype so far and it's fantastic! Hopefully I can sway her into doing my website and blog layout, but one step at a time ;)!

Want to impress at a dinner party? Make this Lemon Meringue Tart!

2010-03-28T12:13:00.000-07:00

I don't know what the weather is doing outside of Eastern Ontario, but it's sure a confusing time over here! We have summer weather before it's officially spring, and then when March 21st rolls around the temperatures drop to Winter ones and before you know it we're trading in our dresses and sandals for scarves and gloves! However, the weather is supposed to improve this coming week in Ottawa, and it's about time the weather apologized to us!

I love Spring. It marks the end of yet another winter, flowers start popping up, the weather improves by a few degrees each week, and people emerge from their cocoons and take advantage of the outdoors again. Spring baking is also loads of fun - the flavours are fresher, brighter and lighter in taste. Soon we won't have to deal with chemically pumped berries but ones that are in season and therefore at their natural best. Fruit filled desserts are a treat for the eye as well as the taste buds.

What I'm going to divulge today is my go-to recipe for Lemon Meringue Tart. Although delicious all year round, it just has a proper place in Spring and Summer. It's pretty easy to do, and to die for! You'll never want to buy it from the grocery store again!

Here are the various components that are in it:

- Lemon infused sweet dough

- Almond Cream

- Lemon curd

- Italian Meringue

Sweet Dough

200g flour

100g butter (at room temperature)

70g icing sugar

3 egg yolks

4ml milk

1 lemon, for zest

Pinch of salt

1. Pre-heat oven to 400F. Grease pie shell generously. Use one that is preferably with a removable bottom.

2. Sift icing sugar and add lemon zest and salt to it.

3. Sift flour, set aside.

4. Separate eggs - save the white for the meringue.

5. In stand-up mixer or with hand mixer cream butter until fluffy, scraping the bowl from time to time. Add icing sugar mix and beat until all is well incorporated.

6. Add yolks one at a time making sure each has been mixed in well before adding the next.

7. Add flour and beat only until everything is mixed well - don't over mix!

8. Flatten into a round and wrap in plastic wrap. Chill in fridge for 20-30 minutes, or until a little stiffer but not so hard that it can't be rolled out.

9. When dough is ready, flour your work surface and roll around dough, rotating it constantly so that all sides are of equal thickness. Dough should be no thinner than 1/4" thick. It's the right size when you place tart shell in the middle of it and you can fit 2-3 fingers on each side on the remaining dough.

10. Roll on to pin and lay into tart shell going backwards. Push dough into bottom, roll over the top with the rolling pin to remove excess dough. Pull the edges up slightly at a 90 degree angle and remove the excess with the back of a small knife. Place in fridge for 10 minutes.

Mis-en-placing (as my pastry supervisor calls it)! Clockwise, from top: Almond cream, butter, yolks, flour, naked lemon, and zesty icing sugar. Sorry there is no picture from the rolling out of the dough, that probably would have been a little helpful. D:

Almond Cream

60g icing sugar

60g butter

60g almond powder

6g flour

1 egg

1. Melt butter. Add all the dry ingredients, mix well and then add the egg. Pour into tart shell, spreading all around with a spatula or the back of a spoon.

2. Place tart shell on baking tray and put in oven. Rotate after 10 minutes. Tart and almond cream are ready when the crust and cream are slightly golden and the cream looks slightly spongey. It will firm up when it cools.

Lemon Curd

2 lemons, juiced

1 lemon, for zesting

100g sugar

100g butter

2 eggs

1. Zest lemon into sugar. Juice the lemons and strain to remove any pulp and seeds.

2. In a medium saucepan add the zesty sugar, lemon juice and the eggs.

3. Over medium heat continuously whisk until the mixture becomes thick and bubbly.

4. Remove pan from heat and add butter, whisking to dissolve it. Pour into another bowl and set aside.

5. Once cool, add to tart shell. Chill in fridge until solid.

Italian Meringue

(This can get a little tricky, so I'll do my best to explain it)

120g egg whites (about 4, and at room temperature... cold whites seem to not want to whip as well)

240g sugar

80g water

Slivered almonds

This recipe has been doubled because I always find that I'm out of meringue before I cover the whole tart, and I also can't get enough of its marshmallowey texture!

1. In mixer add whites and beat gently so that it foams, about at 2-5 setting.

2. In a small sauce pan add the sugar and water. On high heat get the sugar and water boiling. When it starts to boil run a wet pastry brush above where the sugary water is to prevent crystallization. Up the speed on the whites. You may have to lift the bowl up so the whisk touches the bottom and thus whips all the whites, not just the top.

3. Get a bowl of cold ice water (I'll get into this in a minute), or a candy thermometre. The temperature we are looking for is at 120C/240F. This is 'soft ball stage'. The sugary water will boil furiously for a bit, but it gets close when the bubbles aren't as fast.

4. If you are brave and want to get up and close with the sugar, here is what you do - when you start to see the bubbles slow down, with one hand tip the pot towards you, and dip the fingers of the other hand into the ice water. Quickly dip your cold fingers into the sugar, pulling some out and dunking your fingers and the sugar immediately into the water. When the sugar firms up and you can roll a ball and squish it, it's ready. Or you can use a thermometre, but I don't trust those things!

5. The whites should be almost at firm peaks at this point. With the mixer still running, slowly pour the sugar down the side of the bowl. If sugar strands get caught on the sides, that's ok!

6. Put the mixer on the highest setting and let it go for about 5 minutes. It will double in volume and it will be ready when you feel the bottom of the bowl and it's at body temperature. It will also stand up on its own and look like a bird beak (see photo below!).

7. With a funky pastry tip (I use the St. Honoree one from school) pipe the meringue and sprinkle some slivered almonds on top.

8. With the oven at 450F, put the tart on a baking tray and leave it in there just until the meringue and almonds have browned a little bit. No one wants burned meringue, but having it just slightly caramelized is divine!

Foamy whites!

This step looks silly but hell hath no fury like sugar crystallizing! It's like a domino effect!

The bubbles are starting to slow down. They become larger and fewer as a result.

Soft ball - it's not that scary to play with sugar!

Pour the sugar flush to the side of the bowl is ideal (I was taking this action shot so I was a little off balance), because when it's at this high speed the air from the whisking will shoot the sugar everywhere!

The meringue doubles in volume as it cools.

This is the 'big bird', as one of my school chefs would call it.

Piped meringue, pre-toasted.

You'll be worshipped for this tart, I kid you not. It's lovely for any occasion and the almond cream adds a wonderfully indulgent quality to it.

Happy baking! I'm having a unusually (but wonderful) bake-free weekend. I love what I do but sometimes taking a break helps me recharge my batteries and not become burnt out from too much baking. This upcoming week at work will be very insane as we are preparing for Easter and we have a million catering events. So far my only personal commission has been for cookies, which I love. Decorating cookies is very zen for me right now and I love figuring out what designs I'm going to do!

Tragic news

2010-03-25T19:52:00.000-07:00

A few months ago I received a phone call from a woman who is a friend of one of my wedding clients. This woman is the maid of honour for her friend's wedding and she wanted to order a bridal shower cake from me. The mother of the bride had completely taken over the wedding and this cake was to be a fun jab at this fact by having a nice Tiffany-blue cake, decorated with white scrolls, and then a figure of a bride wearing a Metallica t-shirt juxtaposed on top of the cake.

The writing was to say 'May Jesse rock your world forever. Congratulations, Jaimen!'. A sweet and fun message.

Today I receive a phone call from the maid of honour with horrible news - the fiance of the bride was killed in an accident this morning.

I am so shocked an saddened by the news and my thoughts and sympathy go out to Jaimen and Jesse's family. I am so sorry for your loss.

To anyone reading this that works in, or knows someone in labour like this - keep safe at all times. This was a horrible, horrible accident that shouldn't have happened.

Red, Lemon, and Cheesecake all over!

2010-03-21T18:20:00.000-07:00

This has been a very topsy-turvy week - my pastry head adjusted our schedule mid-week so that we would have more days together, thus enabling us to get more Easter themed desserts out ahead of time. So this week I have had not one, but two weekends! I had Wednesday and Thursday off, and now Sunday and Monday. No complaints here, I've really needed the time off to relax. I've been dealing with some nasty heartburn and general tummy troubles. Suspecting that my high consumption of caffeine could be the culprit, I've completely cut it out to see if it would have any effect. It's been quite a few days and no heartburn! Though I have to say, my caffeine addiction runs deep - the headaches are quite bad and the fatigue even worst. However, today is day 6 and it's getting a little easier. Will I ever drink coffee again? Of course, but only after Easter has passed and my stress levels go down as a result.

On to the cakes! My most loyal client, 107 4th Avenue Wine Bar wanted something different for one of the two orders for this week, so I suggested Red Velvet cake with Vanilla Bean buttercream. Of course, this is delicious. I'm not the biggest fan of using so much dye, and I actually might take some out because it does get quite scary red! I also didn't have buttermilk on hand, but several sources said that you substitute sour cream and yoghurt for the buttermilk, so I did just that! However, this makes for a much thicker batter, and also makes the cake a little more dense, and this cake is dense to begin with!

Of course, I had a little batter left over for cupcakes ;D.

I've had very little editing to do on these photos so far - the natural light seems to be my friend this week!

Next up, cheesecake! I had my parents over for dinner tonight and I wanted to make a nice dessert for them as they so rarely get to fully taste the fruits of my education they so lovingly paid for. I had leftover cheesecake batter, so with a little coffee extract and a teaspoon of cinnamon I created a delightful cinnamon coffee New York cheesecake with chocolate cookie crumb base.

The ratio of cheesecake to crust in my first run was vastly different, so this time I kind of overcompensated... oh well, it was delicious!

And wine! Because this one is going to replace the Fuzion that I've been drinking for months and months. Wonderful body and depth of flavour for a good price, around $10 a bottle I believe?

For those that read this blog I would like share with you the recipe for Lemon Polenta cakes that I found in Delicious magazine. These are seriously the easiest things in the world to make and are the biggest crowd pleaser ever!

Lemon Polenta Cakes

225 g unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus extra for greasing

225 g caster sugar (I used regular granulated)

3 eggs, lightly beaten

110 g ground almonds

110 g shredded coconut

110 g fine polenta (and by polenta they mean cornmeal)

Finely grated zest of 2 lemons, plus 2 1/2 tbs lemon juice (hah, I forgot the lemon juice, which actually made for a nice subtle lemon taste)

1 tsp baking powder (don't be silly like me and accidentally put 1 TABLESPOON! eeeek!)

1 tsp vanilla bean paste (I put in a tablespoon... again by accident... but it tasted fantastic!)

Icing

225 g icing sugar, sieved

2 tbs lemon juice

NOTE: I didn't make this icing this time around, but I'm sure it's ok, albeit a bit too much lemon, unless you like that.

Preheat the oven to 150 C (my sketchy mental conversion says this is actually 300 F, and that worked fine!). Grease 36 holes in 2 mini muffin trays well (I made regular muffins/cupcakes... so methinks this actually yields about 20-24, depending on how full you fill the cups).

Beat the butter and sugar in an electric mixer for 2 minutes or until lump free (it doesn't need to be light and fluffy). Slowly beat in eggs, then fold in ground almonds, coconut, polenta, lemon zest, lemons juice, baking powder and vanilla. Divide among muffin pans, then baked for 20-30 minutes until the cakes are golden. Cool in the pan, then turn out onto a wire rack or plate.

For the icing, mix the sugar and lemon juice in a bowl until smooth. Spoon over the cakes, letting the icing dribble down the sides a little. Leave the icing to set before gobbling up with your friends.

Pretty much anything goes with these cakes. First I put some blackcurrant cream on them, then on this batch I put on some leftover caramel buttercream. These little cakes are so adaptable and delicious with whatever topping you want!

I find myself quite jaded with baked goods at times, but these cakes made me feel like I was indulging in desserts for the very first time again. My innocence returned! The angels sang! And I ate three of these in a row!

Next post will be a detailed description on how to make my (and by 'my', I mean I took it from my Cordon Bleu coursework) lemon meringue tart. I am a firm believer that everyone needs a good lemon meringue tart in their dessert arsenal! Spring has finally sprung (despite the snow that the Weather Network is trying to dangle over our heads), so let's break out the fresh and bright flavours!

Weekends are never lazy over here

2010-03-15T19:18:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday! ... I don't know why I'm so chipper about that, it hasn't been the best of days. However, the work day is over and tomorrow will be better.

I had this past weekend off so on Saturday I decided to treat myself to a fancier breakfast than my usual muesli and soy milk - I made Breakfast Blini's, which came from this book:

A favourite! I love the photography and the simplicity of the recipes. It's also British, which means everything is weighed in grams, my favourite < / endnerdhere >.

Looks like slop, but wait!

Almost...

There we go!

Topped with frozen blueberries, yoghurt and agave (no maple syrup, but this was a delicious substitute!), it was a wonderful and fairly healthy breakfast. Easy too!

Breakfast Blinis

Serves 4

125 g (4 oz) self-raising flour (I used all purpose)

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

15 g (1/2 oz) caster sugar (I used raw cane)

grated zest of 1 orange (no oranges, limes instead!)

50 g (20 oz) sultanas (the only raisins I had are in raisin bran, so I cut up dates in their place)

1 egg

200 ml (7 fl oz) milk (I used soy)

50 g (2 oz) bran flakes, crumbled (raisin bran, baby!)

a little olive oil (coconut oil was my greaser of choice)

1. Sift the flour and cinnamon together into a bowl. Stir in the sugar, grated orange zest and sultanas, then make a well in the centre.

2. Beat the egg with the milk, then pour into the well. Stir to combine and form a smooth batter. Stir in the crumbled bran flakes.

3. Heat a large non-stick frying pan, then wipe with kitchen paper dipped in olive oil. Drop tablespoonfuls of the batter into the pan, spacing them well apart to allow room for spreading. Cook for 2 minutes until set and golden underneath, then turn with a palette knife and cook for a further 2 minutes.

4. Serve warm, with yoghurt or fruit if you'd like.

Easy peasy! So good!

On Sunday my boyfriend and I hosted a dinner party for his family, and the parents of his best friend.

Saffron Chicken with Cilantro and Almonds

Lemon Polenta Cakes with Blackcurrant Cream

A roaring success overall!

Today I made a traditional favourite for an order - banana coconut cream pie.

I used coconut cream instead of just coconut milk and it made for a much richer flavour. My bananas were also at a perfect ripeness. I'm actually jealous that I didn't get to eat this!

I leave you all with this teaser - what will this become?!

Cakes, condos, and more raw adventures!

2010-03-08T18:27:00.000-08:00

First off, I'd like to mention that I have finally moved into my new condo with my boyfriend. We've been living here officially for a week now and we absolutely love it. It's also got a much cooler colour scheme than that of my parent's home so my forthcoming pictures will look less dark and overwhelming. It also doesn't help that we're on the 3rd floor and south facing. Lots of sun! Which also means if I ever need to get butter soft for buttercream, the microwave isn't necessary... I have my 82 degree apartment to do it for me!

Secondly, I'm learning how to make my pictures look better. I don't have a fancy-schmancy camera so I'm relying on iPhoto to help me out, so bear with me as I experiment my way to prettier food photos!

It's always an adventure trying out new stoves and ovens, seeing how long it takes to heat up, how off the oven temperature actually is, etc.

First picture is of my signature cake - Chocolate Cardamom Cake with Muscovado (or Demerara, depending on what's on hand) French Buttercream and Caramel. I used to use a Genoise cake, which is a traditional French sponge cake. I had received feedback saying that it gets a little dry after a few days. This is true, as it barely has any fat to keep it moist, and it rises purely because you whip so much air into the eggs and sugar that it rises like a souffle. And like any baked good that only has air in it to keep it up, it gets dry eventually. So after a bit of research I found a new cake that I think will be a good replacement. It also happens to be HUGE.

This cake is around 3"-4" high. Lots of slices!

I have been feeling very unhealthy recently. I know, I know, I'm a pastry chef so consuming tons of refined sugar on a daily basis goes with the territory. Perhaps it is a bit of an oxymoron but I am very conscious about my health and maintaining a good balance of the good and indulgent. I used to do eat things in excess but now find them more enjoyable if I have them once in awhile. However, at work I've been sampling far too much and I do notice a change in my cravings and my skin. But I do have a sweet tooth, so what am I to do? Well, make raw chocolate mousse of course!

I found this on Rawmazing. This is the first time that I've been to their site, and I was so delighted with the result that I hope to find more raw desserts that satisfy my cravings. Instead of using a full 3/4 cup of cacao (different than cocoa... not refined. You can find this in health food stores at a pretty penny), I used 2/4 cocao and 1/4 carob, because I like the malty taste. I also used cashew butter instead of almond because that's all I had on hand.

I tried to feed this to my boyfriend pretending that it was regular chocolate mousse, but he could tell right away that it wasn't. Foiled again! He said it tasted very powdery and that if I could somehow dissolve the cocao/carob in the almond milk than that might improve the texture and taste. We'll see how that goes next time! I like that this has a lot of good things in it, yet it tastes so rich and indulgent.

I'm also in love with the robin's egg coloured tea cups that I got from my Omi. Perfect pretty mousse cups!

Today was one of my day's off so I went with my mum to a couple of kitchen stores to buy St. Patty's Day and Easter cookie cutters. Being the addict that I am, I bought a cookbook... Oops.

I put off buying this book for awhile, but then as I kept browsing through it I knew I had to get it. I hope to someday get into vegan and gluten-free baking. There was a glimmer of working in a vegan bakery at one point, but alas it wasn't to be, so for now I will practice on friends and family! I find it to be a huge challenge to recreate baked goods with no eggs, butter, and flour so I think this will be a good first step. Then I will take my knowledge and apply it to recipes that I currently have.

The book I really want right now is Raw Food Real World. Next time!

I messed about with a cropped version of one of 'mousse and me' photos, so I think I'll make a nice header out of that soon. I also have someone making me new business cards - I'm so excited!

Valentine's Day... and puppies!

2010-02-21T13:05:00.001-08:00

A bit overdue, but here they are! My one big Valentine's Day cookie order. I really love decorating cookies. First of all they're easy to do, and you can have so much designing them. Royal icing is my best friend. I still need to work on my piping skills, but slowly but surely I'm getting better. I had loads of fun making these, and I received a lovely e-mail from the woman that I made them for, so I was satisfied :).

pr0n cookie!

As a pastry chef, Valentine's Day is a hoot because of all the cute things you can do for the shop - Linzer heart cookies, meringue hearts, chocolate pate hearts, pink macarons, etc. As a day I'm not a huge fan - I try to show those whom I love how much I love them on a ongoing basis, so I feel like having one to "prove" your love is a little silly. However, were I to pick a Valentine, it wouldn't be my boyfriend...

It would be this little guy, Wally!

Cookies! And new purchases

2010-02-09T18:30:00.000-08:00

Before I go into my baking banter, I want to show off my new purchases of the day. Domus has a retail shop next to the restaurant where it sells everything from baking tools, to pretty towels, to the best knives, a whackload of espresso machines... it's seriously heaven for me. Well, little did I know that I was walking into a sale! Of course I went hog wild. Can I justify buying these things? Not really, especially since my Toronto blow out was not two weeks ago! Oh well, I call them investments ;D.

My biggest splurge - Nielsen-Massey products. Decently priced too. I'm super pumped to try out the rose water on some macarons.

Ok, this purchase isn't so bad. I hate using water bottles at work that I just have to throw out later, and I only have a small metal bottle, so I wanted this big one, because I love my water. It was only $5 too.

I'm actually getting paid back for this, so this is ok! I bought this for work as the one digital scale we have is crap and tends to go crazy and/or turn itself off after 5 seconds of being on.

A few weeks ago I made some cookies for a family friend's baby shower. They were a hit! Though, silly me, I was only asked to do 24 cookies, but for some reason the words "two dozen" translated as 48! I must have been exhausted. Ergo, being the perfectionist that I am, I did a bit of a rush job and thus I wasn't as happy with my end result. Apparently I need not have worried because I've never received so many compliments as I did that day!

(some of them got a little squished during the day)

I seem to have wormed my way into a very lucrative market - motherhood. There's so many events that you can bake for! Baby shower, baptism, first birthday, second birthday, pregnant hormones that crave cake... the list can go on!

I made a coconut cake this week for my old work, and it was a bit of an ordeal. I just happened to pick both cake, filling, and frosting recipes that worked against me. The cake too forever to bake, the filling took forever to cool and combine, and the buttercream did not yield enough to cover my huge cake, nor did it have a good consistency for working with. It all turned out alright in the end. I had some fun with the borders this time by changing from my usual round tip or star tip to my leaf tip. Simple but a nice change!

Back to cookies! I got a number of people wanting to order from me, and so far I've gotten one lady who wants multiple things from me, starting with Valentine's Day. You guessed it, heart shaped cookies. Here they are in their naked state.

Dun dun dun... to be continued! Next post I'll show them in their finished form.

New job and my wee adventure in Toronto

2010-02-02T17:12:00.001-08:00

Well, I started a new job last week and it was quite an adjustment, to say the least. I went from working in a cake shop that pretty much has a small set of flavours, the only variety being pan sizes and shapes, to working in a catering company/take home food shop that changes things every single week. I also happened to start on a particularly crazy week, so with that coupled with a 7am start meant I was feeling turned very upside down!

I'm into my second week now, and things are slightly better. I enjoy my co-workers tremendously and the pastry head has been fantastic and very encouraging. Basically people trust me and don't treat me like an idiot, which is refreshing. I'm forced to use and stretch the skills I have acquired, and they also know that I love to decorate, so they let me have some free reign with that as well. I'm also a 7 minute drive away, so new job is proving to be a success. My schedule needs to be improved upon, but I won't make a peep until after my probation period :).

Going back to decorating, I think people have it all wrong when it comes to the kind of education needed for cake decorating - everyone assumes that you need to focus solely on cake decorating techniques alone. While that is helpful on some level, I do believe that it's visual arts that are far superior. Having taken art classes for the last 3 months I've already noticed an increased improvement on my presentation, my dexterity, and general ability to 'eyeball' things. My teacher is fantastic and I want to stay with him as long as I can, but what I think would really help is taking a fully comprehensive course in the arts, with a focus on sculpting, as that is something I have yet to master and my current teacher does not provide. Having travelled to Toronto this past weekend for a friend's birthday, I find myself wishing to live there and attend Ontario College of Art and Design. I have a grand variety of artistic interests - pastry, fashion, and classical art techniques, and I would love to study that. But I am just moving into a new apartment and my boyfriend is looking to start a career in Ottawa, so moving is not in the books, so one can only dream of a crazy life in the big city and in the mean time do the best with what is available here :).

But I'm digressing! Here are a few photos of late. I find my decoration lacking in something... I need to figure out something that makes an individual slice look good, since that is what the customer sees, rather than a whole cake.

Chocolate Genoise with Raspberry cream and Chocolate Ganache - I find I can never flat ice it really, really smooth. Ah well, it's tasting nonetheless!

Pumpkin Crunch Torte - this is apparently a HUGE favourite, yay!

Brunch at Queen and Beaver in Toronto - French toast with chocolate hazelnut praline and maple smoked bacon. Um, delicious? Yes.

Cinnamon Apple pancakes with vanilla creme fraiche. Fantastic!

Of course, the old standby - Full English! Minus blood pudding, but the bread was fried perfectly so that is forgiven.

And a blatant non-related shout out to my most favourite purchase of the weekend, my fur hat! The mink goes really well with my crazy leopard coat.

Back to work tomorrow, after a very unproductive day off. My schedule is very helter skelter at the moment, making for a very strange sleep pattern (6am wake up one day, 8am the next... my body's internal clock is struggling), but like I said, I'm still adjusting. At least I have the house to myself this week - my parents have gone off to Cuba! Lucky them, but they are bringing me back rum. I'm going to see if I can use a little bit in a baked good! Just a small thing though... Cuban rum is meant to be drunk, not cooked with.

Welcome, 2010!

2010-01-18T17:13:00.001-08:00

Yes, I know I'm quite a few weeks late to be ringing in the New Year, but better late than never, right? One of my New Year's resolutions is to blog more. Take more pictures, actually post them (and not 10 months after the fact... I'm notorious for this...), and familiarize myself with more baking blogs. In my own work I hope to take on more challenging projects. So far this year I have two wedding cake clients and as of today a bridal shower client. I've got my first dose of challenging material right here - the client wants a bride wearing a Metallica t-shirt, and how that's to be interpreted is up to me. I'll hopefully come up with 3 different ideas that have three different price points and go from there.

Now enough yammering, on to the pictures!

Macarons - I think I made over 200 of these during Christmas for sale. A few were considered 'rejects', but luckily my mouth is not so discerning ;).

Vegan Vanilla Cake with Hazelnut-Praline Tofu Icing. A real pain to work with - if you look closely in the back you'll see the border sliding off! It was delicious though.

Maple Walnut Torte. Maple whipped cream is fantastic, especially on waffles!

Pecan Bourbon pie. More alcohol was added to give it just that extra 'kick'. The alcoholic effects all get baked off of course, but the tangy sweetness still remains.

Christmas log! Mine get better every year, in my opinion.

Mummified pupas, aka: my encounter with baking dried figs

2009-11-29T19:09:00.000-08:00

I was going to post about the misconceptions often perceived when ordering a cake, but the draft was getting rather ranty to the point of being nonsensical, so I'm going to edit it for awhile until I feel it is at the perfect level of informative and vent-a-rific! I'm trying to use this blog partially as a teaching tool. Though few probably read this now, I'm hoping that in the future I will get more readers and that they can learn from my (frequent, haha) mistakes.

Anyway, on to the main subject of this post - dried fruit. Namely their pitfalls in baking.

The glorious thing about dried fruit is that you don't have to worry about it losing its beautiful plumpness and going bad and moldy. You can keep dried fruit for months, years even, as it has been proven in my household, where we are notorious for holding on to things longer than we probably should (NOTE: never fear, dear customers, as this behaviour does not ever translate into my baking. It is the only area where I am a stickler for freshness.)

Moving on, dried fruit is fantastic for many things - on salads, in curries, trail mix... the list could probably go on for a bit. What it doesn't really have a huge forte in is baking. Cookies are an exception because their baking time is relatively shorter than, say, a pie/tart. Unless there is a lot of liquid with the dried fruit whilst it bakes, you're going to end up with some burnt babies. There is a small window between having it warmed with the rest of the dessert in the oven, to it burning to a carmelized crisp. You have to really monitor it, and that was my huge mistake today. I set the timer and walked away. When I came back the fruit was crispy and not fit for selling. The fate of the tart is not a sad one, however - my family is more than pleased to indulge in my "screw ups"!

My first clue in baking the dried fruit should have been the fact that, well, they were dry enough to begin with. The high oven heat will only further this drying process to the point where there will be no more moisture to evaporate, and it will burn.

Below is the fruit of my negligence, no pun intended:

Mummified pupas. That was the first thing that came to mind. What could I have done differently to still obtain a baked dried fig tart? I could have mix all the sugar with the figs and added water, reducing slightly so that I have injected some moisture back into the fruit before baking, and also created a nice syrup that would help preserve this state during baking. I will test this next time and report back.

In other news, I made a raw tiramisu this week. Being a fan of the real thing, I scrutinized this dish a lot. The verdict? it was a nice thought, but nothing can replace the original. Especially when the replacement for the Frangipane cream calls for 6 ripe bananas. It's just going to taste like banana pudding with a cinnamon and coffee aftertaste! Pictures to come, though there really isn't much to look at. Next up, raw chocolate cake with raw chocolate ganache. Perhaps this recipe will be more successful.

Christmas is also coming up, and since I've gotten a full time job and thus am financially independent for most things, I am finding myself unable to be as fast and loose with my money this year. So everyone is either getting a box of chocolates, rum balls, christmas logs, or christmas cake. I still have to buy ingredients and chocolate moulds, but I'll spend a little to save a lot and besides, this is a much more personal gift anyway :).

Next post will hopefully contain more visually pleasing cakes. Lessons will take a backseat so that you can drool at my mad skills for a change, haha!

Website updates and even more cake adventures

2009-11-14T17:49:00.001-08:00

My website is filling out more! Hurrah! If you've forgotten the address already click here for cake and tart love. Yes, I've finally gotten myself together and put up the majority of the cakes and tarts that I sell. Weebly is seriously the greatest website host in terms of layouts. As I've stated before, my HTML skills leave something to be desired so I could never whip up great photo gallery frames, pop ups, etc, etc.

I was incredibly busy with cake orders last week. I had promised a co-worker that I would make a vegan cake for a presentation she was making at school. The other ones were two baptism cakes for a friend of mine. Only three cakes, you say? That doesn't sound like a lot! Well, when you take into account that I have 10 hour days (1 hour commute each way to work, and then my full 8 hours work until 5:30pm), by the time I get home that doesn't leave a lot of time for relaxation AND cake making! Don't misinterpret this as whinging - I love doing it, I was just mildly stressed this week :).

Here are some of the baptism cake photos (I don't think you'd want to see every single angle that I took!)

The pink cake was a vegan fudge cake with vegan chocolate icing, and the ivory cake was a vanilla genoise with pear and vanilla buttercream.

One thing I've learned when working with coloured fondant is - if there is some cornstarch left over, do not, and I repeat DO NOT try to get it to disappear with water! Yes the cornstarch will go away but it won't dry properly and it will remain sticky and weird.

My piping has been improving with practice, but what I find really helps is to reduce the amount you work with. I used a cornet that was filled with probably a tablespoon or two of buttercream for the ivory cake, and I found I had farm more dexterity that way than filling up a piping bag and worrying about my small tips shooting out the end (I'm still warming to the idea of couplers).

Going back to the vegan baking, that's an area I'm really fascinated by. Being a Cordon Bleu graduate I'm supposed to revel in all things dairy and eggy, and my boyfriend constantly says that it's a "waste" of my talents working within vegan parameters. On the contrary! It's all too easy to whip up a buttercream and a wonderful sponge cake with good old butter and eggs, but what if you couldn't eat those for allergy reasons? Why should you be left out from having wonderful baked goods? If anything I find vegan baking all that more challenging. I'm currently striving to find ways to, for example, recreate a rich egg yolk laden French buttercream vegan-style. I've tried a recipe with the soy margarine from Earth Balance, but I'm not such a fan of that taste. Off to Loblaws for me to find more vegan butter substitutes!

Another adventure I'm going down is gluten-free baking. Eggs can easily be replaced by foods like apple sauce, but how do you get a cake to taste like cake with no flour? I remember a customer coming into my work wondering if we made gluten free cakes, and although we don't I offered her another place she could go, but apparently all they do is mousse cakes and I can still see the disappointment in her face knowing that finding a gluten-free cake that tasted like a gluten-full cake (what a mouthful!) is pretty near impossible in this city.

I really hope to start a line for vegans and celiacs. I want them to feel like they're getting in on the action without having to sacrifice their beliefs or compromise their health.

Website, Fundraisers and Raw Food, OH MY!

2009-10-16T19:05:00.000-07:00

With a bit more googling I managed to find a great host that not only offers affordable domain names, but also a very use friendly site building interface. My HTML skills are not what they used to be, so I jump at the opportunity for the idea of a 'drag and drop' system. Thank you, Weebly!

It is quite sparse right now (read: I have yet to publish the bare bones), but here she be! Tastes Like More

My fundraiser, which I have named Cakes For A Cause is well under way. I'm really grateful for those who have really dug into their pockets to help support this endeavour of mine.

October seems to be going by so swiftly that I think I will extend the fundraiser into November, which means more time for you to purchase Cakes For A Cause (because outlining the name once wasn't enough!).

Business talk aside, I've just received Ani's Raw Food Desserts. It has 85 amazing recipes, which range from sorbets and ice "kream", to cakes, to puddings and cobblers. I'm quite fascinated by raw food and the interesting substitutes it has. On another site I read about raw pasta, which consisted of thinly sliced parsnip and carrot which were coated in salt until it created an 'al-dente' texture to the veggies. I have yet to try it but it sounds delicious, not to mention much kinder on the hips!

I've already a couple of raw desserts. Working in a bakery means there is a lot of temptation, and I do have quite the sweet tooth, so in order to keep myself from inhaling the whole cake freezer I bring my raw chocolate mousse and raw cupcakes with me. You wouldn't believe the ingredients! Avocados, dates, carob powder, nuts, coconut oil... all wonderful things that are full in nutrients for your body but also taste amazing together.

My next raw dessert adventure will be making the raw tiramisu. Mmmm.

My only complaint with raw desserts is that a lot of the time nuts are used in order to give structure. I love nuts, but since I live at home at the moment I feel like my dad is really missing out on some wonderful treats since he is allergic.

I've been quite exhausted coming home from work these days (dealing with customers all day is quite tiresome and a test of one's patience, especially if you suffer fools lightly!) but I really need to get back into my old habit of practicing decorating techniques. I was asked to flat ice a bunch of 8" round cakes and I felt like an epic fail! Granted they use different tools than I do, but I just couldn't get a nice and smooth top! Which is ridiculous because I have done that multiple times on other cakes. Oh well, like Barbar says - practice, practice, practice!

Exciting news!

2009-10-06T20:10:00.000-07:00

I am happy to announce that after almost a year of being cheap, ahem, and using a blog as my business' website, I am now upgrading to the world of proper websites. Ideally I'd like to have Tastes Like More as a domain name, but we will have to see how the finances are.

This means that this blog will actually be used as a blog! What a concept! It will be updated more frequently with crazy pastry-related ramblings and photos. My cakes are my canvas and I fill my spare time by conceiving of new design ideas.

Lastly, and most importantly, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. To bring forth more than just awareness, I am hosting a month-long fundraiser. I will be donating 50% of all pastry payments towards research. Although my donation may end up being meagre, I like to think that each dollar will bring us closer to a cure. This is especially important, and personal for me, as my mother is a breast cancer survivor.

This is a win-win situation all around - you get a great product and the knowledge that your money is going to a great cause!

Forget silly fad diets and let us all eat cake!

Welcome to One More Slice!

2008-11-25T13:06:00.000-08:00

This blog has had an early birth. I had not even planned on marketing myself until after I complete my Pastry Diploma. However, recent events have dictated that I need not be shy and to jump start my career as a pastry chef! I may have only graduated from Basic Pastry, but I have gained a plethora of knowledge in all things dessert.

Let me begin my tale as to how my little business has begun. Two weekends ago I decided to practice Black Forest Cake for my exam, since it posed many challenges - even layer cutting, even cream distribution between layers, and most importantly - smooth masking. Having had so much cake pass through my house over the last 3 months, I decided to give the cake to my dad, where it would (hopefully) be devoured in the break room.

But this cake was destined for greater things! At the suggestion of my dad's assistant, the cake was put into an auction to raise money for the United Way. Approximately $60 in raffle tickets were sold. The winner, as I understand it, recently had a birthday party for her son, so had no need for another cake. She generously donated the cake to the afternoon treat tray, where it made another $30 in individual slices. I was speechless that my little practice cake raised $90!

This spawned the idea that I could see this as an opportunity to kill two birds with one stone - make some extra pocket change and hone my skills in the process.

Each post will contain a picture of the cakes I have to offer, each with pictures, ingredients list, and price. Some cakes can have their flavours and ingredients customized to accompany personal taste and allergies!

I deliver to the Ottawa area only. E-mails and phone calls are always welcome.

Edited on April 12, 2010:

Originally this blog filled the need for a website, which I have now have - Tastes Like More. All my cakes and tarts can be seen over there. This blog will be used to talk about baking, cooking, and the Ottawa food scene. It's all fun over here, no business :).