Day 85
Today was ultra sinful. We started off by whipping up some creme chiboust which is a pastry cream with the addition of gelatin that is folded into Italian Meringue (classic meringue with the addition of boiling sugar syrup which allows for a more stable soft meringue) and a bit of fresh orange and lemon zest. We then filled the profiteroles (that we made yesterday) with the cream and dunked them in hot caramel. After attaching the caramel-covered profiteroles to the base of the Gateau Saint Honore (cake)
we filled the middle part of the cake with more of the creme chiboust.
we filled the middle part of the cake with more of the creme chiboust.
Next we filled the eclairs (also from yesterday) with the creme chiboust and then proceeded to dunk them into bittersweet chocolate ganache.
Then, as if the day could not get anymore indulgent, I made up the croissant dough that I had been working on the past three days. I rolled out classically shaped croissants, pain au chocolat (basically a square-shaped croissant filled with bittersweet chocolate) and pain au fromage (square-shaped croissant filled with gruyere cheese). Before today, the very best pain au chocolat that I had ever tasted was from Jean-Philippe Maury at Bellagio in Las Vegas. Now I no longer need to trek to Vegas for his pain au chocolat.
And I leave you with this...a Spanish proverb:
Las cosas claras y el chocolate espeso.
[Ideas should be clear and chocolate thick.]
Sarah Simms