All posts tagged: Food Adventure

Black Sesame Orange Tart

Published by

What better to do with a Saturday afternoon than to hole up in your kitchen for several hours experimenting? It all started with my relatively simple idea to actually practice some of what I learn in school on my own time and in my own kitchen, but then as all ideas I have tend to do, it quickly snowballed as it encountered the semi-jilted feeling I had of not having my recommendation to use black sesame in an entremets be well received. One thought led to another, and before I knew it I was dragging three bags of groceries home filled with more butter and eggs than any normal person would consume in an entire week, and I was ready to go. Even when I started baking though, I can’t say that I really knew what it was that I would be making. I knew the elements and I thought of ways I might combine and shape them into creating one dessert…but it wasn’t until about an hour into the process that I had an ‘ah …

La Bottega del Buon Caffe

Published by

What better way to explore the world and expand your horizons than through food? After some intensive research and frantic emails and phone calls exchanged in order to try to get a table for one at some of the most exciting looking locations, I ended up going to four different Michelin starred restaurants in four different cities within 10 days. I know–what more could a person ask for in life? La Bottega del Buon Caffe came up again and again as I researched things to do in Florence, Italy, and they were able to squeeze me in one of the nights I was in the area. I was already excited based on what I saw on the website before going, but oh my lord was it ever worth it. When I go to a restaurant (particularly a nicer restaurant) there are a handful of things I am looking for in order to determine whether it is a good destination or not. I’m going to give you a little overall review, but feel free to keep …

Coconut Mango Entremets

Published by

Baking for my younger brother allows me the chance to reach into the crazy section of my creative side and try things and combinations that I usually wouldn’t try out on other people. I’m just going to come out and say it; he’s a complete weirdo. Since he is returning home from college this week, I decided to be a nice sister and bake something for him. This time my train of thought started out with a layer cake. Maybe I’ll make an exotic layer cake covered in coconut, I thought. Then I flipped to Miette’s Coconut Mousse Cake and thought maybe I would add in some coconut mousse layers… and then that led me to thinking about adding in some mango…and before I knew it, the idea had changed into an entremet with a never-before-seen liquid mango juice center. So I started in with my experimental creation–making a mango puree and simmering it with some simple syrup before straining it and putting the juice into some silicon molds. At the same time, I made …

Honey Matcha Castella Cake

Published by

I told myself I wasn’t going to do any baking this week. I was going to avoid the kitchen in lieu of being productive and getting important things done in all the other areas of my life. And then the spark of an idea led to me tumbling down the rabbit hole–flipping through a handful of cookbooks and spending a solid hour furiously Googling subsequent ideas… Until not only was I in the kitchen, but I had about four projects in various stages spread across every available counter space as I vaguely listened to 30 Rock playing from my computer while sitting cross-legged in front of my oven, carefully regarding the cakes inside. Despite not understanding how the oven in my parents new house can simultaneously over and under cook the things I try to bake, my evening baking adventure turned out to be quite a success. Half following some recipes and half throwing in ingredients haphazardly like the rebel I am, I ended up with a Honey Castella Cake, Almond Matcha Mousse, Matcha Spread, …

Diner à Le Ciste

Published by

It should be no surprise that I went on another food adventure this past weekend. But what makes this adventure more exciting than any of the others is that it was at the restaurant where the lovely Babette works–and I had the great pleasure of dining at the restaurant with her husband and sister while she was slaving away in the kitchen creating pastry masterpieces. Johan was nice enough to come pick me up in Juan les Pins, and we arrived at le Château de la Bégude just before 7:00pm. While Johan and Antonia went to change out of their beach clothes and into something more multi-course-dinner appropriate, I snuck into the kitchen. Actually, I basically just waltzed right in and nobody even questioned it. It was beautiful. Even though I’ve only been in the kitchen once before, it almost feels like its my kitchen too. I was able to chat with Babette for a bit while she ran around her kitchen making all the final preparations for the service. A part of me wanted …

Pastry and Beach Adventures in Cannes

Published by

Sunday morning we all woke up at a decent time…and then managed to not leave the apartment until like 10:30…and then didn’t get to Cannes until like 11:45 because of train schedules. Its fine. I could tell that my crew was about as skeptical of Cannes as I was before the first time I went there–and I was determined for them to love it as much as I have come to. There was a lot of pressure–I had less than a day to find the best parts of a city I had only been two a small handful of times! We started off by walking next to the water as we headed to a lookout point I had only ever seen from a distance. I really didn’t know what to expect from the top of the little hill, and to be honest I was worried it would be an incredible disappointment. Luckily for all of us, after a brief uphill walk we arrived at a little stone mansion/castle/church (aren’t I great at observing things?) which …