Dessert Competition!

Hey everyone!

Incase you didn't know, I'm a full time cookery student. This year I decided to enter in a competition like I did last year!

I entered the following categories:

-Chocolate Fantasty
-Decorated Gateaux
 

Chocolate Fantasy:
In this class the criteria was that it had to be atleast 50% chocolate.

I gave my dessert a theme of:
The 3 Elements : Earth, Air and Fire
Earth: Pistachio Macaroon filled with white chocolate rested on a pistachio crumble

Air: White Chocolate Panna Cotta with homemade lemon jelly

Fire: Dark Chocolate hazelnut tart

Looking at my dessert now, I regret my portion sizes - especially for the tart! But I'm learning from my mistakes :)

Decorated Gateaux

This had to be a decorated cake that had more than one layer

My layers were:
Base: Cocoa crumb base
Dark chocolate Hazelnut ganash
 Moist Chocolate Dream cake
Berry bavarois

These pictures were taken at about 1am in the morning when I had just finished decorating the cake - sorry for the bad lighting!

Let me know what you think! Just leave a comment :)

Brit :)

Meat Lesson #2

Hey Everyone!

For my 2nd meat lesson we made:

-Roast Shoulder of lamb
-Navarin of Lamb - (made from leftover shoulder meat)
-Chicken Ballotine

This is the chicken Ballotine. We had to take out the chicken leg bone ourselves which was a great thing to be taught! This will be a handy skill for the future

Roast Lamb - This is from the lamb shoulder.

To make this roast we took apart the shoulder from scratch. This was completely new to me so I had no idea what I was doing! Lucky I had people to help and show me how to do it! I can't wait to do this again since I am more confident at it now. We stuffed it with a herbed breadcrumb stuffing - yummy.

Bones out

 Ready to roll

All tied up to roast.

Let me know if you have any questions about this lesson.
Hope everyone has had a great week!
Brit :)

Fish Lesson #2

En papillote - Blue cod cooked in a paper bag.

 Served on squid ink linguine

 Paupiettes of sole - Stuff with scallops on a white wine sauce

Grilled Salmon with a burree blanc sauce

Feel free to leave a comment :)
Let me know if you would like recipes!

Brit :)

Fish Lesson!

Fish!

Fish has to be one of my favourite meat product. It has great texture and flavour.

It is so good for you with Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids which can help prevent heart disease, stokes, it may help prevent some cancers and is said to help minimize symptoms of arthritis!

Currently in my studies I am learning about fish. In our first lesson we made,

-Sole duglere (roll fish fillets)

-Sole meuniere (pan fried)

-battered fish...(not my favourite..)

-baked filo parcel (yummy and healthy!)

-fish stock (this was mainly so we could make a white wine veloute sauce)

Sole meuniere - this was served with rice pilaf (which is an easy simple way of making rice that is almost fail proof!)
 If anyone would like the recipe I would be happy to share - just leave a comment :)

baked filo parcel - served with a white wine sauce, tomato concass and avocado oil
I loved making this dish, since I had never tried it let alone make it!
It is actually easier than it looks to make.
In case you were wondering what is in the filo..
Red pepper, blue cod fillets wrapped in spinach and yellow pepper

Listening to while writing this blog : Philip Philips - Home

Brit :)

Focaccia Bread! (Italian Flat Bread)

Ingredients:

10g Fresh Yeast
150ml Lukewarm water
225g Strong Flour
5g Salt
15ml Olive oil
+ extra for glazing
Flaky sea salt and crushed garlic for topping.

1. Mix yeast with water, leave for 10minutes

2.  Mix Flour and Salt In large bowl.

3. Add Yeast liquid and oil to flour mixture.

4. Knead for 10minutes until dough is smooth, elastic and very soft.

5. Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap.

6. Prove in a warm place until doubled in size (1-1/2 hours).

7. Roll out the dough and shape it to fit into an oiled, round pie dish (25cm).

8. Allow the dough to rest and rise for 30 minutes.

9. Using fingertips, press dimples all over the dough.

10. Cover with a clean tea towl.

11. Allow the dough to double in size in the warm area.

12. Brush the dough with olive oil and sprinkle with sea salt and garlic.

13. Bake at 200 Degees Celcius for 20-25mintues in an oven. Spraying cold water into the oven when baking.

14. Cool on a wire rack so that the base doesn't become soggy.

** I added Olives and Rosemary to my topping before baking.

First Chocolate Fantasy Competition.

This was actually last year, but I thought I'd Share some pictures of my practice desserts.

Please note I had no training before this and no professional equipment or anything.

If you have any comments or tip feel free to comment! :)