Incorporating Gelatine and Fonde Suisse

Todays lesson involved the use of gelatine and a commercial Mousse called Fond Suisse.

Points of imporatnce included:

You should all be able to identify the different types of gelatine used in the bakery industry, this should include sheet or leaf gelatine and powdered or granulated gelatine.

• You should know that gelatine originally came from the concentrated or refined product obtained by boiling the protein "collagen" contained in the bones or tissues of animals.
• Gelatine of a good quality should not have an unpleasent odour and be lear when dissol ved. Gelatine of a poorer grade will be darker in colour and have a glue smell.
• When using gelatine it is normal to reconstitute the powder or leaves by soaking it in cold water. This makes the gelatine dissolve more readily.

More information can be found by clicking on the following link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gelatine#Edible_gelatins

Black Forest Gateau

Hi All, click on the following link to find out the origins of the Black Forest Gateau:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Forest_gateau

Preparing and building the Black Forest Gateau:

Use the following pictures as a reminder of what we did in class, these will be helpful when you do your assessment in week 18.

Ensure you have all your ingredients ready prior to building the Gateau. This will include your chocolate shavings, kirsch flavoured soaking syrup, whipped cream, 3 layers of chocolate sponges, cherry filling and morello cherries for garnishing.

As each layer of sponge is used it is soaked generously with the kirsch stock syrup. The purpose of soaking the sponge well is enhance the eating quality of the finished product and assist in maintianing the shelf life of the Gateau.

The cherries may be added in several ways, they can be added to 1 entire layer or they can be placed in the layer as shown with the cream. This will look effective when the Gateau is cut.

After placing the cherries on first layer add a second sponge layer, syrup and top with cream.

Once the third layer of sponge has been add completely mask the gateau in cream. Use shaved chocolate for decorating the sides, mark the top in to 12 portions, place a rosette on each portion and a morello cherry on every alternate rosette.

Final semester cakes

Hi once again,

as you may remember we spoke in class about the two tier cakes you will be making as part of your final assessment. I have posted several photos of previous work to give you a few ideas on the different styles students have come up with. Remember to start thinking about what you would like to achieve or learn and bring your ideas along to class.

Some thing to think about:

• Decide on the occassion, is it a birthday, anniversary, wedding.
• Think about the style, is it a traditional classical cake or a novelty cake.
• Decide on the shape of the actual cake, round, oval, square, heart or is it to be built like a castle or dragon.
• Look at books with colour wheels and see what works well together. The library has an abundance of books and magazines on cake deocrating and the internet is also a great place to search for ideas. There is also additional information on chapters 15, 16 and 17 in your module book.
• Ask yourself if the cake displays the skills we are looking for when it is to be assessed. Does it show piping skills, have a top, side and base design.
• Think about the length of time you will have to produce this cake and what tasks you will do on each of the allocated days.

Well first of all I would like to congratulate you on succussfully completing your first lesson, there is only 17 left before your final exam!!

What we learnt (hopefully)

This weeks lesson focused on the production of emulsified and conventional sponges. We talked in class about the differences in their production and the advantages or disadvantages of each type of product. These included:

The level of skill required in the production process.

The differences in the batter stability and handling properties.

The variations in the recipe formulas.

A Commercial sponge uses the All in method of production with the addition of stabilising or emulsifiying agents. This enables the normally incompatible ingredients to combine and aerate to form a stable foam.

The Conventional or Traditional sponge is made using eggs, sugar and flour, baking powder is sometimes used to open the texture and assist aeration of the product. When melted butter is incorporated into a conventional sponge it's purpose is to:

• Close the texture of the sponge by removing some of the aeration resulting in denser crumb. This is useful when the sponge is to be soaked as it will more readily absorb the syrup with out falling apart.
• The melted butter also enriches the sponge enhancing the eating qualities.
• The addition of melted butter will also help extend the shelf life of the sponge.

This information can also be found on pages 45-47 of your text books, it