Holy Cow! I'm in Culinary School!

Armed with my chef's bag full of knives and spatulas and my chef whites, I was really nervous and excited for my first day of pastry class in culinary school. Stepping into the classroom with the stainless steel tables, huge ovens, and refrigerators I felt like I was stepping into a whole new world. Just being in the classroom gave me the chills. I am entering a world that not many people get to see or do. This was awesome!

The first day we learned how to make pate sucree. A simple and very useful tart dough. We creamed butter and powdered sugar until light and fluffy. Eggs are added in one at a time then sifted cake flour and baking powder all at once. The mixture is mixed slowly until just combined. The dough is wrapped and refrigerated until firm.

Holy cow I made dough!

While our dough was chilling in the refrigerator we made an apple compote by cooking apple chunks in a little water, lemon juice, sugar, and a scraped vanilla bean until soft. We chilled this over an ice bath. Next we rolled out the dough and put it into the tart ring. Back into the refrigerator it went to chill the butter and relax the gluten. We sliced apples very thinly for the top of the tart. The tart shell was filled with the apple compote and then sliced apples were fanned out on top. Into the oven it goes. When the tart is done we brushed the top with some apricot nappage to give it that shine!

The best part of culinary school is getting to bring home what you've learned that day. I shared my apple tart with my mom and some friends. Oh my goodness it was so good! Especially good because I made it myself! Holy Cow!