Monday, January 21, 2013

Valentine's Day Strawberry Marshmallow Lollipops

Today I began prep for my Valentine's day catering menu. Strawberry Marshmallow Lollipops is the first item on the menu.

Two marshmallows on a lollipop stick. I used pink clausen confection coating chocolate and dark chocolate. I used to color my own white chocolate but I find using colored confection coating chocolate is the way to go. The color is more attractive. Some color dyes for chocolate tend to make the white chocolate milky . Colored coating chocolate offers a sharper color.

The lollipop is then garnished with Valentine's Day decor to make it festive.
These are served on platters, or can be displayed in glass cubes filled with colored sanding sugar.

Sunday, January 20, 2013

In the beginning

Welcome to my blog. I am an African American Female Pastry Chef, and first generation Jamaican descendent born in the USA from The line of Agnes Campbell.

I am 34 years old (soon to be 35 next month). I am an Executive Pastry Chef in the Washington DC Metropolitan Area.

I am starting this blog to record my experience corporately and personally. I was also hoping to attract other African American Pastry Chefs in my area, because I have yet to meet one.

On this blog I will post photos of mass produced food and discuss my day to day challenges. All are welcome to read this.

Yesterday I made Big Bellied Argentinean Empanadas. The filling was made from ground beef chuck, onions, scallions, red bell peppers, garlic, cumin, cayenne pepper, oregano salt, pepper, hard boiled eggs and Spanish olives.

I liked the pastry part (the outer shell). I made it with cake flour, Crisco, eggs, water and a touch of salt and sugar. The cake flour produces a light texture pastry than if you used all purpose flour.

It was very easy to make this. You can make the filling and the dough and let them both chill up for 1 hour before assembly.

Next time I will post the recipe.