Buona Pasqua!

The base consisting of pâté a choux and pâté brisee

 This week of school just flew by. Consolidating and packaging products while baking them in five different ovens without using timers; then switching the next day to solely making biscuits and muffins, it all was a blur but I learned a lot and had a lot of fun!

So today is Good Friday, and what with having a four day weekend from class, I decided to make a gâteau; one called Saint Honoré. Maybe you haven't heard of its name before but I am sure you have come across it's trade mark choux profiteroles which are all neatly ringed around a cream topped short pastry.

pâté a choux with set caramel

 There is a great guide and formula for this baby in our student text book so I have thought of attempting to make it for some weeks now. The results turned out well but it definitely took quite the time and patience to create. From making a batch of fresh Diplomat cream to the painstaking dipping and reheating of the caramel to sticking all those little suckers on the short dough, this is a cake that will test ones patience. 

the finished product; Gâteau Saint Honoré

 The part most fun about making this was the caramel, albeit it's difficult and extremely hot handling, watching the sugar threads dance around like silk while forming a nest out of them was great.
The worst part is just assembling. You have to balance each profiterole on hot caramel to make sure it will set and stay all the while the cream filling and topping begins to reach room temperature and begin to melt :S

This was definitely a great learning experiment and had a blast figuring out the percentage of ingredients I needed plus imagine how I'm going to build it from crust onward.

 At the same time my rustic mamma was making and fermenting her Cuzzupe di Pasqua (Calabrian Easter bread). Needless to say it was busy in the kitchen and with two very distinct-but very opposite-baking styles going on, one would laugh at the circus the two of us make. me with my scale and to the gram measurements versus my mom, a bowl, a glass and completely winging measurements yet always resulting in the perfect product :)

That nibble wasn't me...