Reflections from my last 16 weeks of culinary school

I made croissants for the first time—one of my life goals!

As I start the second half of my second semester of culinary school, I wanted to spend some time reflecting on my last 16 weeks of classes, which differed significantly from the first 8 weeks (read more here). I took my first two baking and pastry classes, a class about breakfast foods, and a customer service class. The baking classes were my favorite. The incredible Chef Jenni Shouppe taught both classes. She is hilarious and so talented and knowledgeable. It was truly a joy to learn from her.

The two classes I took were Introduction to Baking and Classical Pastries and Chocolate. 

The first class, Introduction to Baking, was exactly what it sounds like—an introduction baking course. Here's a list of some topics we covered: custards, mousses, donuts, pâte à Choux, pies, crepes, cakes, and yeast breads. The Classical Pastries and Chocolate class focused more on classical French desserts. We made meringues, laminated dough, tarts, tortes, candies, cakes, and cheesecakes.

There's a cafe at the school, and in my breakfast class, the students were responsible for making the breakfast orders that came into the cafe. I practiced flipping eggs, made French omelettes and American omelets, prepared souffles, and learned how to make fluffy waffles.

For my customer service class, I learned the important roles of the front of house staff in a restaurant (non-kitchen staff) and how they must work with the back of house (kitchen staff) to provide the best experience possible for the customer. There's also a full-service restaurant on the top floor of the school, and for this class, I practiced serving. Working as a waitress is tough, and I have a newfound respect for anyone who provides good service and makes it look easy.

For the last 8 weeks of this semester, I'm taking a class about yeast breads (one week in, I've already learned so much and consumed a lot of delicious carbs) and a class called garde manger, pronounced gard man-zhay. Historically, the garde manger chef prepared the cold foods in a restaurant, like chilled soups, fruit, salads, pates, caviars, and some cold desserts. In my class, we will also learn how to make sausage and prosciutto and how to smoke fish and pickle vegetables.

I'm going to share a few things I learned that really stood out to me. And if you have ANY questions at all on any of these topics, please feel free to reach out to me, and I would be happy to answer your questions. And if I can't answer it, I will contact one of the chefs at school and ask them!

Culinary school during a pandemic means masks plus face shields

Mousses

• If your mousse calls for gelatin, you must "bloom" it in cold water. The gelatin absorbs the water and softens so it will easily dissolve when combined with the rest of your ingredients. Bloom gelatin in five times its weight in water. 
• Gently warm the gelatin to dissolve it before adding it to your recipe. But do NOT heat the gelatin above 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

This cake is called a Charlotte. It's made with lady fingers and Bavarian cream. I made it for the final in my Classical Pasties and Chocolate class.

White chocolate mousse cake with raspberry gelée

The outside of the cake

Chocolate mousse cake

Custards

• Stirred custards are cooked on the stove, and you have to be really careful because they will curdle at 190 degrees Fahrenheit. Common stirred custards are pastry cream, crème anglaise, and lemon curd.
• Baked custards, like cheesecake and crème brûlée, should be baked in a bain marie (a water bath). A bain marie provides gentle, uniform heat to delicate foods like custards. It also stops the top from drying out and cracking before the inside is cooked. 
• Use a roasting dish with high sides for your bain marie, and pour the water into the roasting dish after it's already in the oven so you don't have to worry about accidentally splashing water on top if your custard while placing it in the oven. The water in your bain marie should go halfway up the sides of the dish.

Custard for crème brûlée before it was torched

Crème brûlée, final product

We made ice cream with crème anglaise

Pâte à choux

• Pâte à choux in itself is not sweet. The texture is soft yet crisp. This is the dough used for éclairs, cream puffs, and my new favorite dessert, Paris-Brest (pronounced paree bray).
• The choux dough is first cooked on the stove. You know it's done cooking when it leaves a little skin or film at the bottom of your saucepan.
• The only tricky part about it is determining the number of eggs that will go in the dough. The number of eggs in the dough is NOT consistent, and you may NOT use all the eggs listed in a recipe.. Humidity and the size of the eggs create inconsistencies. You will know that you've added enough eggs when the batter is thick, shiny, and a pipeable consistency. When you lift up the beater on your mixer, the batter should slowly slump down into the bowl.

Choux dough piped into eclairs

Baked eclair shells

Eclair shells filled with cream and covered in chocolate

Paris-brest (pronounced paree-bray) is my new favorite dessert. Pâte à choux is piped into the shape of bike wheels and topped with almonds prior to baking. Afterwards, each wheel is cut in half and filled with praline cream. It is divine and my new favorite dessert. Sadly, I didn't get a picture of the final product.

Pies

• I had only made pie dough a few times in my life, and I never really felt like I knew what I was doing. There are so many tips and tricks available online—it's overwhelming. The pie dough we made has just 5 ingredients, and we mixed everything with our hands. 
• There are two types of pie dough you can make using the same recipe: flaky pie dough and mealy pie dough. The only difference between the two doughs is the size of the pieces of butter. 
• In mealy pie dough, the butter pieces are very small. This creates a crust that is good at repelling moisture, which is necessary when making fruit pies or custard pies, like pumpkin. No one likes a soggy bottom crust. 
• In flaky pie dough, the butter pieces are larger. So when you bake the crust, the butter melts and creates tender, flaky layers. This crust is best for the top crust of double-crust pies or for no-bake cream pies.
• When blind baking crust for cream pies, it is important that your pie weights come all the way up to the top of your crusts for added support to the sides. It's a little confusing because most pie weights are sold with only enough to cover the bottom of the pie. You need to either buy multiple containers of pie weights or use dry beans.

This is a Linzer torte, a traditional Austrian pastry. The crust is made from flour and ground hazelnuts and almonds. The filling consists of raspberry preserves and citrus zest.

This was another new favorite dessert!

Apple galette

I made an apple crumb pie, soft yeast rolls, and chocolate chip cookies for the final in my Introduction to Baking class.

Crepes

• Unlike pancakes, there should be no lumps in your crepe batter. For the silkiest smooth batter, use a blender.
• After making the batter, allow it to rest 30 to 60 minutes (or keep it in the refrigerator for up to 2 days). This gives the gluten a chance to relax and creates more delicate crepes.
• Use only 2 to 3 Tablespoons of batter per standard 8-inch pan.

A dozen crepes stacked together to form a crepe cake.

Different flours

• There are many types of flours, and the difference in the types is the protein content. Higher protein means more gluten, which means more strength.
• Cake flour has the lowest protein content of all flours at 5 - 8%. This means less gluten and softer, more tender baked goods. It's best for cakes and muffins.
• Pastry flour falls between cake flour and all-purpose flour with 8 - 9% protein content. It's a good choice for pie crusts and tarts.
• All-purpose flour is a staple in most kitchens. It has 10 - 12% protein content. We can use it for any number of baked goods: cookies, pancakes, etc.
• Bread flour's protein content is the strongest at 12 - 14%. It's great for yeast breads because the gluten is necessary for making the bread rise properly.

Challah

Using a peel to retrieve baguettes from deck oven

Baguette with poolish (a pre-ferment) straight out of the oven

Eating bread straight out of the oven is absolutely heavenly.

Foccacia

Soft yeast rolls

Laminated dough

• Puff pastry, croissant and Danish dough are called laminated dough. Fat is incorporated through a process of rolling and folding, producing alternating layers of dough and fat. 
• The fat must be kept cold and not allowed to melt into the dough during the lamination process. Laminated doughs get their flaky texture because water from each layer of butter steams up, creating separate layers.
• Making laminated dough is a LOT of work, especially if you do it by hand. And it takes a LOT of time because you have to refrigerate it between folds to ensure the butter doesn't melt into the dough.

Croissant dough

Very excited about making croissants for the first time

Apple tarte Tatin made with handmade puff pastry. It's much prettier once it's flipped over, but sadly, I didn't get a picture of it.

Cheesecake

• One of the worst things that could happen to a cheesecake is cream cheese lumps in the batter. I don't know why, but it really is terribly gross. Avoid this by first letting your cream cheese come to room temperature. Beat it by itself with a mixer before adding any other ingredients to the bowl. Then add just the sugar and beat it really well. The sugar granules will help cut through the cream cheese. Make sure to scrape down the bowl well. Add the eggs one at a time, beating and scraping down the sides of the bowl between each addition. Once it's smooth, add the rest of the ingredients.
• You'll want to bake the cake in a bain-marie, which is a water bath, in a low oven. The water bath ensures even heat distribution. The ideal baking temperature is between 250 and 300 degrees Fahrenheit.
• It is imperative to not over-bake the cheesecake. Once the surface appears to “jiggle as a whole,” it is done and must be removed from the oven. It will continue cooking outside the oven.

Waffles

• To create the fluffiest waffles with a crisp exterior, start by separating your egg yolks and your egg whites. 
• Whip the egg whites, either with a whisk or with an electric beater, until they form stiff peaks. Set aside and prepare the rest of the waffle batter as normal, but without the egg whites. Fold the whipped egg whites into the batter with the rest of the ingredients, being careful to not over-mix so you don't deflate the egg whites. 
• Proceed with the rest of the recipe as normal!

Sachertorte is a chocolate cake with apricot filling. The baker must write Sacher in chocolate on top of the cake. It was invented by Austrian Franz Sacher.

Strudel dough is stretched to the size of a table.

Lemon pound cake

There was a time in my life in which I ate ice cream with lemon curd and lemon pound cake for breakfast.

Dense, fudgy brownies

Pumpkin muffins

Eggs over easy

Bougatsa pie

This is a sponsored post by Challenge butter, but the text and opinions are all mine. Thank you for supporting brands that make Kylee's Kitchen possible.

Bougatsa is best described as a Greek custard pie with warm spices and a phyllo crust. When I visited Greece, it was served every morning for breakfast. But it's delicious any time of day. I love the contrast of the creamy filling with the crisp phyllo.

It's typically baked in a large casserole dish and cut into squares, but in honor of Pie Day, I made it into an actual pie in a skillet. The phyllo dough serves as the crust to the custard filling.

I use clarified butter whenever I work with phyllo. The butter we buy from the grocery store consists of butterfat, milk solids, and water. Clarified butter is the butterfat with everything else removed.  Because the milk solids are removed, clarified butter has a higher smoking point. Phyllo dough is very delicate and using clarified butter helps it to brown evenly. I recommend using a good quality butter like Challenge European Style Unsalted Butter. Challenge European butter is churned slower and longer than other butters to produce a more flavorful butter with less moisture and higher butterfat. In fact, it consists of 83% butterfat, whereas standard American butters contain 80% butterfat.

I have a bit of advice if you haven't worked with phyllo dough: Use a damp towel and work quickly to prevent the phyllo from drying out. It's important to first allow your phyllo dough to come to room temperature, but don't open the package until you're ready to work with it. Once you open the roll and expose it to air, it will dry out. This is problematic because phyllo becomes brittle and breaks easily when dry. I recommend you lightly dampen a tea towel and use it to cover the phyllo you aren't currently using while you layer and butter each phyllo sheet in the skillet. Use one entire roll as the base of your crust. A standard roll has 20 sheets. If one or more of your sheets rips, that's okay! Just use as many sheets as you can.

Bougatsa pie

Yield: 8 servings

Ingredients

For the clarified butter

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) Challenge European Style Unsalted Butter

For the custard

• 3 egg yolks
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup (80 grams) semolina flour (can substitute with 60 grams all purpose flour)
• 1 1/4 cups (283 grams) whole milk
• 3/4 cup (170 grams) heavy cream
• 1 1/2 teaspoons (7 grams) vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cardamom
• 20 sheets phyllo dough, thawed

Directions

For the clarified butter

1. Melt butter in small saucepan over low heat. Don't stir!
2. Skim off foamy milk solids that rose to the top.
3. Carefully ladle golden butterfat into bowl, leaving behind residue of milky white solids that settled at bottom of pan.
4. Keep clarified butter at room temperature throughout duration of spanakopita recipe. When finished, cover and store in refrigerator.

For the custard

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. 
2. In large bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, eggs, sugar, and semolina flour. Add whole milk, heavy cream, vanilla extract, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt and cardamom. Whisk to combine.
3. Brush bottom and sides of 10-inch cast-iron skillet with clarified butter. 
4. Lightly dampen dish towel. Unroll roll of phyllo dough and lay dish towel on top. Keep towel on top of unused phyllo while you work to prevent dough from drying out.
5. Working quickly, remove one phyllo sheet from rest of stack and gently press in bottom and up sides of skillet. Lightly brush entire sheet with butter.
6. Repeat with remaining phyllo sheets, rotating each sheet in a different direction as you add it.
7. Pour cream mixture into skillet. 
8. Carefully crimp overhanging edges of phyllo so it looks like pie crust. Lightly brush exposed surface of phyllo with butter.
9. Carefully move skillet to oven and bake until phyllo is golden brown, about 30 to 35 minutes. The edge should be set, but the center should still be a little jiggly. Double-check with an instant-read thermometer. The custard is done when it reaches 170 degrees Fahrenheit.
10. Remove skillet from oven and let cool for 10 minutes before cutting into 8 wedges and serving.

Spanakopita pie

 This is a sponsored post by Challenge butter, but the text and opinions are all mine. Thank you for supporting brands that make Kylee's Kitchen possible.

Spanakopita is usually described as spinach and feta pie, but it's typically baked in a large casserole dish or shaped into triangles. But in honor of Pie Day, I made it into an actual pie with phyllo dough serving as the crust to the spinach and feta filling.

I grew up making spanakopita with my mom and my Yiayia, so I want to share some tips I learned from them throughout the years.

Use clarified butter. The butter we buy from the grocery store consists of butterfat, milk solids, and water. Clarified butter is just the butterfat with everything else removed. Because the milk solids are removed, clarified butter has a higher smoking point. Phyllo dough is very delicate and using clarified butter helps it to brown evenly. I recommend using Challenge European Style Unsalted Butter. Challenge European butter is churned slower and longer, in the tradition of fine European butters, to produce a more flavorful butter with less moisture and higher butterfat than American butter (83% in European versus 80% in standard butters).

Use frozen spinach. I've used fresh spinach and frozen spinach, and I cannot taste a difference. Using frozen spinach is cheaper, and it eliminates the step of having to saute the spinach. You have to make sure to thaw the frozen spinach ahead of time and squeeze all of the water out of it. 

Use cottage cheese. Cottage cheese makes for a really creamy consistency. However, if you're very anti-cottage cheese or if you can't find it in the small curd variety, just omit it.

Use a damp towel and work quickly to prevent phyllo from drying out. Allow your phyllo dough to come to room temperature before working with it, but don't open the packaging until you're ready to work with it. Once you open the roll and expose it to the air, it will dry out. This is problematic because it will become brittle and break easily. Lightly dampen a tea towel and use it to cover up the phyllo dough you aren't currently using.

Spanakopita pie

Yield: 8 servings

Ingredients

For the clarified butter

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) Challenge European Style Unsalted Butter

For the spankopita pie

• 18 ounces frozen chopped spinach, thawed
• 3 bunches (about 6 ounces) green onions, white and green parts
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 8 ounces feta cheese, crumbled
• 6 ounces small curd cottage cheese
• 4 ounces Parmesan cheese, grated
• 3/4 cup parsley leaves, chopped
• 2 Tablespoons fresh dill, chopped
• 2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• Zest from 1 lemon (about 1 Tablespoon)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 2 large eggs
• 20 sheets phyllo dough, thawed

Directions

For the clarified butter

1. Melt butter in small saucepan over low heat. Don't stir!
2. Skim off foamy milk solids that rose to the top.
3. Carefully ladle golden butterfat into bowl, leaving behind residue of milky white solids that settled at bottom of pan.
4. Keep clarified butter at room temperature throughout duration of spanakopita recipe. When finished, cover and store in refrigerator.

For the spanakopita

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. 
2. Drain and squeeze all excess water from spinach. This is very important! A potato ricer works really well for this task. 
3. In a skillet, melt 1 tablespoon of your clarified butter over medium-low heat. Add green onions and garlic and cook until tender and fragrant, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and combine with spinach in large bowl.
4. Add feta, cottage cheese, Parmesan, parsley, dill, lemon juice, lemon zest, salt, pepper, and nutmeg. Combine with spinach mixture and season to taste with salt and pepper. Taste and adjust seasonings if necessary. Stir in eggs. Set aside.
5. Brush bottom and sides of 10-inch cast-iron skillet with clarified butter. 
6. Lightly dampen dish towel. Unroll roll of phyllo dough and lay dish towel on top. Keep towel on top of unused phyllo while you work to prevent dough from drying out.
7. Working quickly, remove one phyllo sheet from rest of stack and gently press in bottom and up sides of skillet. Lightly brush entire sheet with butter.
8. Repeat with remaining phyllo sheets, rotating each sheet in a different direction as you add it.
9. Spoon spinach-feta mixture into skillet and spread in even layer. 
10. Carefully fold overhanging edges of phyllo toward center of pan. Lightly brush exposed surface of phyllo with butter.
11. Cook skillet over medium heat on stovetop for 5 minutes to crisp bottom crust. 
12. Transfer skillet to oven and bake until phyllo is golden brown, about 20 to 25 minutes.
13. Remove skillet from oven and let cool for 10 minutes before cutting into 8 wedges and serving.

Recipe inspired by Skillet Spanakopita from NYT Cooking

Oreo crème brûlée

Crème brûlée is a rich vanilla custard topped with caramelized sugar. It gives the impression of a very fancy dessert—something you only order at a French restaurant. That's why many people are shocked to find out how easy it is to make. It involves just 5 ingredients: Heavy cream, vanilla, egg yolks, granulated sugar, and salt. Today I'm adding a 6th ingredient, Oreos, in honor of National Oreo Day on March 6.

In this post, I'll walk through each of the steps to better explain the process. I hope it makes the dessert less intimidating.

 

First step: Heat the cream just barely to a simmer. The reason we heat the cream is that later, when we combine the cream with sugar, the heat will help melt the sugar granules and ensure our custard isn't grainy. Also, by heating the cream, we can use it to slowly raise the temperature of the egg yolks so they aren't shocked by the intense heat of the oven later in the recipe.

If you are using an actual vanilla bean, add it at this time. But if you're using vanilla extract, wait to add it until after you remove the saucepan from the heat. That's because vanilla extract is around 35% alcohol, and the alcohol burns off when it's heated.

For Oreo crème brûlée, separate the Oreos and add the cream filling straight to the saucepan with the heavy cream as it heats on the stove. Crush the cookie portion and save the crumbs for later.

Second step: Whisk together everything else. It's important to whisk the sugar and salt with the egg yolks because they help to act as a temperature buffer when we combine the egg yolks with the heated cream. We use just the yolks for a richer, creamier custard. The proteins in egg whites clump at lower temperatures than egg yolks, so if we used whole eggs, the custard would be firmer and less creamy.

Third step: Temper the eggs. This is the process of slowly warming the temperature of the eggs so they don't scramble. We do this by slowly pouring some hot cream into the egg mixture while whisking. If you successfully tempered the eggs and combined the mixture with the hot cream, you shouldn't need to strain it. However, if you notice any clumps, strain the mixture through a sieve before baking.

Fourth step: Place your ramekins in a large baking dish (use 2 if they don't fit in 1). I recommend using shallow ramekins because the custard cooks evenly, and there is more surface area for the caramelized sugar crust. Pour the custard in each ramekin and top with 1 Tablespoon of crushed Oreo cookies.

Then pour hot water into the baking dish. You need enough hot water that it rises halfway up the ramekins. This is called a "water bath" or a "bain marie." The water will help to moderate the heat and it slowly raises the temperature of the custard so the edges don't overcook before the heat reaches the inside.

Your crème brûlée is done when the edges are set but the center is still a little jiggly. Use an instant-read thermometer to check the temperature. It's finished when it registers 170 degrees Fahrenheit. Cooking time will vary depending on size and shape of your ramekin.

Allow the custards to cool on a cooling rack for at least a half hour before moving them to the refrigerator. You should refrigerate them for at least 4 hours before serving to all for the custard to set.

Fifth step: The most fun part of making this dessert is when we brûlée the crème. I highly recommend getting a small kitchen torch for this. You'll find uses for the torch other than crème brûlée. I got one for about $20. The benefit of using a torch is it applies heat quickly and directly so you can caramelize the sugar without heating the rest of the custard.

If you're reading this and obtaining a torch isn't possible at this moment, heat the back of a metal spoon on your stove and lightly touch the sugar.

Start with a light coat of sugar, about 1 teaspoon, and make sure the entire surface is covered. There shouldn't be any exposed custard. Use the kitchen torch to evenly cramelize the sugar, making sure to not hold it in one place for long so the sugar doesn't burn too much. Repeat this process a second time for a thicker sugar crust. Once you caramelize the sugar, serve the Oreo crème brûlée immediately.

Oreo Crème Brûlée

Yield: 6 servings

Ingredients

• 2 cups heavy cream
• 8 Oreos, cookies and filling separated
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla paste or pure vanilla extract
• 5 egg yolks
• 1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated sugar, plus more for topping
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit. 
2. Heat heavy cream in saucepan over low heat. Add filling from Oreos to saucepan and bring to low simmer. 
3. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.
4. Whisk together egg yolks, sugar, and salt.
5. Temper cream into egg mixture by slowly pouring in 1 cup of cream while whisking. Continue to slowly pour cream into egg mixture until incorporated.
6. Place ramekins in large baking dish. Pour cream mixture into ramekins.
7. Crush cookies until texture is that of fine crumbs. Add 1 Tablespoon of cookie crumbs to each ramekin.
8. Fill baking dish with enough hot water so it rises halfway up the sides of the ramekins.
9. Carefully place baking dish into oven and bake for about 20 to 25 minutes. The edges should be set, but the centers should still be a little jiggly. Double-check with an instant-read thermometer. The custard is done when it reaches 170 degrees Fahrenheit.
10. Remove baking dish from oven and place ramekins on cooling rack for about a half hour before covering and moving to refrigerator. 
11. Chill custard for at least 4 hours and up to 2 days.
12. Before serving, top each custard with a thin layer of sugar (about 1 teaspoon). Caramelize sugar with kitchen torch and serve immediately.