Day 2: The Study of Flour

Hey Everyone!

I am back at home after day two. We tasted all of the different types of granola first thing this morning. It was interesting how different they tasted with just a few different ingredients. As a class we decided to make our class' signature granola using the Salty Kick recipe as a base. The tweaks we made were adding cornflake, dried cherries, and chocolate. We also used coconut chips rather than shredded coconut that had been used yesterday. I didn't get the chance to snap a photo, but it looks like granola... It was a drier recipe, so there weren't big chunks of granola sticking together. We did a chocolate sampling to decide which type of chocolate we wanted to add into our granola. After much debate we decided on the 72%.

Chocolate Sampling (not pictured: chocolate pearls)

We then cut up pineapples which had the deepest eyes I've ever seen. It was really hard to get them out while keep the slices even, without wasting a lot of the fruit. We baked the pineapple pieces for 4.5 hours, before mixing them with chiles, lime zest, sea salt, sugar, and freshly grated nutmeg. This made a super delicious Spicy Pineapple Cocktail Snack.

Spicy Pineapple Cocktail Snack 

After lunch, we had the first lecture on wheat flour. We talked about how flour is milled and how the different parts of the groat (whole kernel) are separated.

Groat

Cracked Wheat

Bran

Germ

We also started discussing the protein/gluten differences between different types of flour. We looked at, touched, and even tasted various flours. Eating flour wasn't as unpleasant as it sounds, but I will say that I needed a glass of water afterwards. Fun fact: wheat flour doesn't concern any gluten (the proteins in the flour form gluten when they are mixed with water)--whole wheat flour is an exception to this. In order to really understand the difference the choice of flour makes in a recipe we began an exercise using a basic muffin. Each student made a batch of the same muffin recipe the only difference between them being the type of flour. all purpose, bread, cake, pastry, whole wheat. We also did a batch with two extra ounces of flour and a batch that had two less ounces of flour than the recipe called for. We controlled for all variables such as baking temperature, baking time, et cetera, like good little scientists. The muffins just barely had time to cool before we stored them in a full catering wrap for overnight. I will report back with the results tomorrow. I made the muffins with all purpose flour.

All Purpose Flour Muffins

Towards the end of the day we each made a butter kit for tomorrow. It was basically cream with a little buttermilk gently stirred together and stored in an air tight container overnight. I will share photos of my handmade butter tomorrow.

I will leave you with a waist up photo of myself in my uniform. Yes, I am wearing white and black houndstooth pants, in case you are wondering.

Goodnight! It is past my 10:00 PM bedtime!