Hey, hey hey baby!
I want to know if you'll be my girl
Hey, hey hey baby!
I want to know if you'll be my girl

When I saw you walking down the street
I said that's a kind of girl I'd like to meet
She's so pretty, Lord she's fine
I'm gonna make her mine all mine

Hey, hey hey baby!
I want to know if you'll be my girl

When you turned and walked away
That's when I want to say
C'mon baby, give me a whirl
I want to know if you'll be my girl

Hey, hey hey baby!
I want to know if you'll be my girl

When you turned and walked away
That's when I want to say
C'mon baby, give me a whirl
I want to know if you'll be my girl

Hey, hey hey baby!
I want to know if you'll be my girl
Hey, hey hey hey hey, baby
C'mon, baby now.....

[Bruce Channel, "Hey, Baby", 1962]


That song's been in my head for the last two days. I thought I'd do something with it. ;-)

¶ 1:22 PM 2 comments

<siren/>
<confetti/>
<ballons/>
<music type="celebration"/>

Wow, this is such an honor! So many people I want to thank.... First of all, I'd like to thank the middle management over at unnamed technology company -- without them, I wouldn't have nearly as much ranting and raving to rant and rave about. And then... oh my gosh... I'd like to thank the guys over at the coffee shop for making coffee interesting. Wow, I uh... wow.... And I want to give a special shout-out to -- Uh, hold on, the producer's waving at me....

What?

What??

What do you mean, "98"???

MISCOUNTED?!

But, I....

So, do I...?

Well, crap.

<mumble/>
<mumble/>
<grumble/>
<mumble/>

¶ 9:28 AM 1 comments

As it turns out, everything I know about chocolate doesn't apply to a chocolate fondue fountain.

My entire pastry career has been spent mastering the art of making chocolate hard (tempering, glazes, ganaches, etc), and I think I have it down pretty well. Now as I'm trying to maintain a chocolate fountain, my challenge is to keep it runny.

It's a fine line between too thick and too thin for a chocolate fountain. If the chocolate is too thick, it won't flow freely over the fountain canopies. If the chocolate is too thin, it won't sheet as it falls. Then by virtue of the fact that the chocolate is falling, it's constantly losing heat to the air, thus becoming thicker.

Normally, if I were dipping things in chocolate, I would make a ganache, keep it warm over a hot water bath, and dip away. The warm ganache flows over the dipped food very freely, and sheets off nicely when I pull the food out. When the ganache cools, it becomes hard and shiny.

The ganache would have worked in the fountain, had the built-in heater been hot enough. Oh well.

In other news, I brought my cake into the coffee shop for display on Monday. Since then, I've sold 3 birthday cakes. I think my bosses are also having a fun time telling customers that I'm applying to the CIA. Everytime I turn around, someone's wishing me luck after being thoroughly amazed that I'm going to school rather than going back to school.

¶ 11:09 PM 1 comments

First place, Best in Show, People's Choice! That's $2,000, plus a full scholarship to the culinary school of my choice! :-D

This was a very valuable learning experience. I've found out that cake decorating really isn't my thing. But cake baking is. That is, combining flavors, optimizing the cake texture, etc. There was a cake tasting competition (Italian Cream and Chocolate cakes), and if I'd had time, I would have entered a chocolate cake. Oh well.

¶ 7:26 PM 6 comments

It's 4:45am. After a total of 8 hours of actual work spread out over 3 nights, I have a competition entry I'm satisfied with. After a icing emergency and 24 hours of mulling, I managed to solve a major problem (no, I won't tell you what it was).

It was really refreshing to get back into working with fondant, though very much out of practice I was. However, I think the final product turned out "good enough". I'm nervous about the competition because I know there will be master chefs adjudicating, and I know they will be scrutinzing every single little error, and questioning every single little technical aspect, none of which I feel is up to par. However, I just have to tell myself, "I'm not competing against master chefs." And that makes me feel a little better. A little. Only a little. I'll be ecstatic if I place, but I know this is good experience for me no matter how it goes.

You're probably wanting to see pictures. Your patience has rewarded you.

It started with a clean canvas:



Then eventually evolved into:



But I coudln't figure out what to do with the middle tier. Then all of a sudden, "Farfalle!"



Well, I should get some sleep. Three hours should be enough (yeah, right). I'll let you know how it goes.

¶ 4:45 AM 1 comments