We first attempted to make chocolate angel food cake. We weren't 100% sure how stiff the egg whites were supposed to be and, as was determined when the cake failed to rise properly, we didn't whip them quite long enough. Apparently we let them hit the soft peak stage but not the stiff peak stage. It still tasted good though. That's one thing about messing things up in pastry class. You HAVE to eat them if you mess them up to find out what went wrong.
Another team did a regular angel food cake correctly, though. It was light, airy, and YUMMY!
Then we made a pound cake. It turned out well. I think. We haven't tasted them yet because we are decorating them tomorrow, but they puffed up like they were supposed to and they look like everyone elses.
Then we attempted to make a high ratio cake. *Seriously. Every time I go to type that, I type ration and have to delete the n. Just thought I would share* We eventually determined that we must have added too much sugar and it weighed down the eggs. It, again, tasted ok, but it was very dense and egg-y. The other people who made theirs correctly had a very nice crumb to their cake. A high ratio cake has a very high sugar content and has a high liquid to flour ratio. Hence, "high ratio cake." You also have to use something called emulsified shortening. It is absolutely disgusting. It is a semi liquid shortening that looks like it was MADE to clog your arteries.
We then successfully managed to make a sponge cake. We finished off the day making a simple buttercream frosting. That turned out well, too.
Chef CJ made it clear that we were not going to fail the day because some of our cakes didn't turn out. It was important to learn from the mistakes, and that was what we are graded on. We also got our quizzes back from last week. I got a 95%. I missed one question out of 10 but received 5 points for working so hard at cleaning and being a good team player. One person a week receives 10 additional points for this and two people receive 5 additional points. I'm going to continue working super hard and try to get those extra points every week.
In safety and sanitation we had a quiz. Which I totally forgot about. I know. I was so mad at myself. I was so focused on the paper due, that I forgot about the quiz. The class average on the quiz was a 62%. I got a 70%. 7 out of 10 questions. At the end of class we had a chance to earn 6 extra points. Not sure what I got on that yet. I got a 100% on my paper, though!! That made me feel a little better. We did a group project in class today and I am certain I aced that as well.
Hopefully my items will turn out better in pastry. I'm off to eat dinner and study!
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