Wednesday, January 21, 2015
Monday, January 19, 2015
Pie Station
Pies are a
very common American dessert. Pies are very easy to make. There are two kinds
of pie dough’s. There is the flaky pie dough and the mealy pie dough. Flaky pie
dough is fat cut into flour until it resembles the size of peas with salt and
water added. Mealy pie dough is fat cut into flour until it resembles coarse
cornmeal with salt and water added. I learnt that letting the pie shells rest
for half an hour to an hour before baking stops the pie crust from shrinking.
This is because when forming the pie dough the gluten gets worked a lot. I did
some research about pies and I found a lot of interesting facts. Apple pie a la
mode means apple pie served with ice cream. Pies used to be made with meat
inside first. The invention of fruit filled pies came later. Very early
Americans had a take-off crust for pies. They first baked the apples with the
crust and then they took off the top crust and added sugar and sometimes added
spices. Next they put on the top crust and the apple pie was ready to serve.
Cookie Station
A few weeks
ago I was in the cookie station and I noticed that cookies get sold very
quickly. The creaming method gets used a lot for cookie recipes. My favourite
part in this station is scooping and flattening the cookies. It’s fun making
different kinds of cookies and learning what gives cookies different
characteristics. For crispy cookies less liquid is added. Crispy cookies
contain a high amount of fat and sugar. They get baked longer so that more
moisture gets out creating a crispy texture. They're usually small and thin
shaped. For soft cookies lots of liquid is added and not so much fat and sugar.
Under baking also makes them soft. Chewy cookies contain a high amount of sugar
and liquid but they are low in fat and they contain more eggs. Chewy cookies
are mixed a little longer so that strong flour or gluten develops during
mixing. Cookies that spread contain a high amount of sugar. Here's an
interesting fact the word cookie comes from the Dutch word koekje. Koekje means
“little cake.”
Yeast Station
My second time in the yeast
station was very interesting. For the first time I made croissants and It was
fun and a lot of work to actually make them from scratch. Making yeast products
requires lots of rolling out dough especially croissants and Danish dough.
Making croissants takes a lot of time therefore it seems like the more work you
do the better the product tastes. What I really like about the yeast station is
that it doesn't take a long time gathering all the ingredients. For making
bread for example the main ingredients are flour, water (or milk), yeast and a
little bit of salt. The longer part of the process is actually waiting for the
dough to mix until the gluten has developed enough so that it can be proofed
and the production can go on.
Friday, January 16, 2015
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
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