Pastry Journey

I want to share some fun information with you!

As you know, I do have a passion for all things chocolate so the logical next step is pastry. My chocolate hero, Amaury Guichon (if you don’t already follow him on Instagram, go do it now, I’ll wait) announced he’s opening a pastry academy this year. His first class starts in the fall and the second class, in January. I’m enrolled for January. Sooooo very exciting!

Anyway, in the meantime, I’ve gotten a copy of his book and I’m going to work through all twelve creations and share them with you. I’ve found that if I try something on my own, I then have an idea of what I don’t know and can ask better questions. For instance, one of Guichon’s videos shows him braiding chocolate strands as though they are string. All the google searching couldn’t tell me HOW he got the chocolate to behave like string – was it modelling chocolate, some tempering process or some addition to the chocolate?

I tried everything I could think of with no success. So when I went to the Chocolate Academy in Montreal, I asked Chef Philippe Vancayseele (who is a MASTER of chocolate), he said, oh sure, that’s thermal shock, I’ll show you how; and he DID! I was dazzled! He also told me how to “polish” chocolate after it’s been cast too. neat tricks. If you get a chance, I highly recommend taking any class that Philippe is teaching!

So I figure I’ll have plenty of questions for Chef Guichon.