The Macaron Tower!

Over the course of a year, La Bonne Vie pastries have changed drastically...due to our exec pastry chef changing.  One thing that remained on the menu (and probably the only thing that "survived" the change, other than the chocolate eclair and macarons) is the Lemon Chiffon.  Although it evolved quite a bit from the original, its base remains the same, as a pastry with a vanilla chiffon base, lemon curd filling, and Italian meringue waves.

With the sous chef now in charge, he added another twist to it.  He now wanted the entire thing evolved into a tartlet.

So here it is... Lemon Chiffon Tartlet.

It's a tartlet shell filled with a thin layer of vanilla chiffon, lemon curd filling, and Italian meringue waves--exactly like the previous versions.  The golden dew drops are crystal glaze dyed yellow, for a touch of color to otherwise plain pastry.

A slew of new pastries plus a wedding cake has kept me quite busy.  This was actually my first time helping at work with a wedding cake.  The bride wanted a macaron tower/tree to top her wedding cake, so the guests can pick the macs off the tree to eat them.

She wanted 400 macs, in shades of vanilla, light green, and light peach.  I can make at least 134 macs per batch, so I did three batches, which made a little over 400 macs.

The sous chef made a cone using styrofoam cone and pastillage.  I stuck the macs on using white chocolate and cold spray to instantly set the chocolate (that way, I don't have to stand there holding the mac for a while waiting for the chocolate to set).
So here it is...

Other than a few misaligned macs, turned out fine.  Some aren't angled correctly, but not bad for my first time.  If there is a next time, I at least know what to do.

New stuff at La Bonne Vie...again

Back in the middle of July, our executive pastry chef resigned....ALREADY.  He was with us for less than a year.  He had his family back in Las Vegas where he's from, and decided to go back for his family.  We supported his decision to leave--family is important.
But we are now in the process of looking for a new exec.  In the meantime, our sous chef has taken charge, bringing about a lot of changes in the La Bonne Vie pastries.

He had been gone for a week for a sugar-work class in Paris.  When he returned, he was raving about the pastry shops of Paris, and excitedly reported that what we're making at La Bonne Vie is pretty much the same as those of Paris...which is pretty awesome I must say.  He now wanted to incorporate a lot of his discoveries ideas into our pastries, making them more fancy and refined.

Over the course of a week or two, he came up about a dozen new pastries, while keeping a few of our previous ones.
#1 Peanutbutter-Mousse Decadence
A block of peanutbutter-chocolate mousse, on rectangular tart shell filled with ganache and crispy chocolate pearls.

Here's the cross-section.  It's decadent, but not very sweet, which tones down the overall richness.

#2 Passionfruit Globe/Dream
A chocolate sphere filled with passionfruit mousse, on a square tart shell filled with passionfruit curd and feuilletine.  Our sous chef loves to play with textures, so I like how his pastries incorporates the full range of textural contrasts.  As for the flavor...not a big fan of this one.  While textually interesting, the flavor is predominantly just passionfruit, making it somewhat one-toned.

#3 Fruit Tarts and Red-Berry Tarts
Pretty self-explanatory.  We switched out the puff pastry for tart shells, which is readily available.  No need for us to bake off the puff strips every morning.  Filled with pastry cream and topped with mounds of fruits.

#4 Bienenstich eclairs (i.e. Bee-sting eclairs)
Bienenstich is a German dessert that consists of sweet yeast dough with caramelized almond and honey topping filled with cream.  This is chef's eclair version of that.  Filled with almond cream, Bavarian cream, then capped with a piece of honey-almond florentine wafer.

#5 New flavor of macarons
We are making peppermint (in the middle of summer, which is odd) and passionfruit-raspberry (below).
The passionfruit-raspberry is filled with passionfruit curd and a dot of raspberry jam in the middle.
I think (especially)during summer, peppermint needs to be paired with something else.  Chocolate, for example.  Or add a dot of lime curd to make it Mojito macaron. Or add bourbon whiskey to the peppermint buttercream to make it Mint Julep macaron.

The end result...The display cake looked GORGEOUS!!

 Oh, I forgot to mention...see the green glittery macaron?  It's our pistachio macaron, all glammed up with gold glitter sugar.  It's glitzy enough to be worn as a bling.

I'm sure once the new exec arrives, more changes will happen.  Stay tuned....

My friend's wedding! ...AND a birthday cake

Oh.  WOW.  The month of July was EXTREMELY busy.

The month started out with a family friend's surprise birthday party.  Her husband secretly ordered a small dessert buffet:  strawberry mini-cheesecakes and double chocolate brownies, and a decadent chocolate mousse birthday cake.

Now, the following day was my co-worker's wedding...and she had asked me to make her a three-tier wedding cake.  This will be my first time making a multi-layer cake outside of school, and I was up for the challenge!  She wanted it simple, with white buttercream frosting (she hates fondant);  and she emphasized that it has to taste good.  Of course, I am not going to argue;  most wedding cakes are known for looking pretty but not tasting as good.  I was determined to make her cake look elegant, pretty, AND tasty!

But first things first...

I got the cheesecakes and the brownies done pretty quickly (he only requested 30 pieces or so of each).  I used a cake mix for the chocolate cake, and put two layers of chocolate mousse.  The cake was finished with chocolate buttercream, chocolate decor, fresh fruits, and a few Lintz truffle balls (cuz they're cute!)

I did the piping with melted white chocolate.  As soon as I delivered all the goodies, I had to drive to Park City, (a good half-an hour drive up the mountain) to finish my friend's wedding cake.  Her wedding was held at Waldorf Astoria hotel.

There's a story behind this.  When our sous chef found out that she's getting married, and that she had asked me to make her the cake, he offered to let me use the ingredients and the equipment at our workplace.  Which meant I didn't have to bake the several batches of cakes (in my teeny oven) or make the huge batch of Swiss buttercream (in my dinky mixer) at home!  I was more than happy to accept the offer.  So up until this day, I stayed a few hours later each day assembling the cakes (I was clocked out of course).

She wanted one tier chocolate cake w/chocolate mousse and another tier vanilla cake w/strawberry mousse.  I didn't stack the tiers, just filled and frosted it.  All I had to do was take the three cakes to Waldorf-Astoria and finish the cake there.  There was NO WAY I was going to transport the assembled three-tier cake up the swervy canyon road to Park City!

Once there, I stacked the cakes and finished decorating.

Very simple but elegant.  I put the cake away in the hotel's walk-in fridge and left for the night.
The next day, (the big day!) I arrived early to do some finishing touches...

I

 The florist gave me some flowers and the cake topper.  I stood back and thought, "...THAT. IS. CUTE."
Indeed, it turned out to be a very cute wedding cake, enough for about 70 people.

 After the ceremony, all of us congratulated the bride and the groom with some cocktails.  I didn't drink, since I'm a major lightweight and I'd prefer not to be tipsy while driving down a canyon road on the way home.
The next day, she texted me, telling me that the cake was delicious and the perfect amount!  *phew* Despite a few mishaps (yes, the cake ended up with a few scratches and dents during transit that I had to fix), the cake turned out awesome!