Patisserie - My True Love

While it's true that I love to cook with all my heart, I absolutely love to bake/make sweets with all my soul.  I've had two stints in Patisserie so far in my stage: one quite quick and one a little more intensive. 

At the end of last week, I headed down to the basement where the patisserie lab can be found and told Monsieur Le Patissier that I needed something to do.  He promptly passed me a HUGE crate of pears and told me to peel them, slice them in two, and core them.  So, that is what I did.  Oh, I also took some chocolate financiers out of the oven and mopped the floor if that counts for anything :).  Regardless of my brevity in patisserie, I loved it.  It's like a little chemistry shop with all the different ingredients and scales and measurements.  I find it calming down there as I did in patisserie class at Ferrandi.  I just like being tucked away in a little room with all kinds of sweet treats that make people swoon when eating them. 

Today Monsieur Le Patissier had his day off, so I am helping a coworker do whatever needs to be done for service while he is away.  It was so exciting to see how all the plates are dressed with different types of chocolate, pistachios, and orange decorations.  I've only eaten one dessert in its entirety (a creme brulee marmalade - aka awesomeness on a plate), but have tasted this and that from other plates.  The variety of desserts is quite good in my opinion.  Creme brulee marmalade, three types of caramel - ice cream, mousse and a tartelette, prune and orange "soup" with orange ice cream, bordelou (pear) tartlette with sangria sorbet, brioche french toast with apple jam and calvados ice cream and of course mousse au chocolat.  Don't you think so? Now do you see why I love it so much?