Check Twice ~ Perform Once

This past week in class, my group was assigned baguettes to make during production.  We made the preferment on Tuesday and scaled the dry ingredients first thing Wednesday morning. We started to mix in the spiral mixer when Chef came over to us. He looked at the dough and asked us how many times we multiplied the recipe. We said we only made one batch, but when we looked at the production schedule, it said we were supposed to make 1.5 times the original recipe. Not that it is an excuse, but the original production schedule was altered so when we transferred the information, we just wrote "baguettes." It is EXTREMELY important to make sure you don't make that mistake. If it were a real bakery, we would have been in major trouble. If there is an order for a certain number of baguettes, you need to make sure you have that amount. Our batch only produced 13, where the desired batch would produce 16 or 17. 

Besides production, we were also working on our rooster showpieces. Mine was a south pole theme with penguins and a lot of snow. The dough we make and call "white" isn't really that white, it is more like tan. To make everything look like snow and ice, I turned to the WhiteWhite to solve my problem. There are many different things you can do with it in order to get the color you want. First, I mixed some WhiteWhite into the dough. This made the base color more white, which I used for my snowballs. The second technique I did was paint the dome of the igloo with it before it went into the oven. The third technique I used was parbake the tunnel for the igloo, paint it with WhiteWhite, and bake it again. Lastly, as I was gluing the showpiece together, I wanted my base to be white. I painted it with the WhiteWhite even though it wasn't going to be baked again. Everything I did was very risky. I just went for it, all in. If it didn't work out, I was screwed. If you were to try a new technique, you should always test it first. Cut a random piece of scrap, try the technique, and see how it reacts in the oven or when sprayed with shellack. The WhiteWhite could have changed colors in the oven on my igloo pieces, or make it softer and less structurally stable. The WhiteWhite I painted on the base could have had a negative reaction with the shellack since it wasn't baked. You never know what can happen. I was extremely lucky that all my pieces turned out the way I wanted them to. 

Moral of the story: make sure you check everything before you commit to it. Double check the production schedule to make sure you are making the right amount of everything or see if there is any special change needed. And test new techniques before you do it. If you don't your one shot could get messed up and backfire. It is a lot harder to try and fix a mistake after it happens to your key components than it is to spend the extra couple of minutes testing it before you execute it. 

Baguettes, Baguettes, Baguettes

Every one loves baguettes. All of my friends always go crazy whenever I bring them home to them. However, what most people fail to realize is how a baguette really isn't simple. You have to be on your game and pay attention to every step of baking starting from the scaling process. Making a consistent baguette is a true test of a baker. One thing that I have always struggled with is the scoring of the baguette. It is so disappointing when you ruin your bread when you go to score it because you have just spent two days preparing the product and then in a matter of seconds you can ruin all of your.

So here is a good picture that shows you the right angle to score you baguette at.

The first step begins with holding the lam. Hold the lam with your finger tips and don't choke up on the handle. Next is to position your body. This step seems silly but is actually crucial. You want to stand horiztonal to the baguettes and you want to be able to move with the baguette as you continue to score farther down the baguette. Now comes the trickest step, the angle of the blade. To get the right angle pretend the lam is a key that you are putting in the door. Put the key in the door, turn it to the right (if you are a righty), then drop down the top part of the blade. Another way to double check if you have the right angle is to hold the lam like you are eating soup with it. After you get the angle right you want to make a quick score so that you don't tear at the bread too much. Additionally, have the lam moving before it hits the bread will help with reducing tearing. For baguettes, you want to make either 5 or 7 cuts starting at one end and ending at the other. You want to overlap the cuts by about 1/3 and make sure you don't go too far over the edge.  A good way to practice this is to draw a baguette on a white board. Next draw two lines to keep you from going too far over the edge and then practice making the lines. This picture below shows you how to practice.

It is always great to keep in mind that practice makes perfect. Repetition is the key.

Daily Production- The True Test

The main focus of the class is on making the the three different showpieces, however, what cannot be forgotten is your daily yeasted product. Having to do these products everyday, even just one product, is a true test of your time management and mise en place. While in the middle of working on your showpiece components you have to keep track of what time your dough is ready. When it will need a stretch and fold, when it has to be divided and having how long it will take you to mise en place what you need for that particular part of the baking process. My advice for you is to take good notes when the other groups do the product for the first time and to review the recipe the night before and when come in first thing in the morning. Knowing ahead of time what you have to do will save you vaulable time. You will quickly be able to mix, divide, and shape your yeasted product.  However, if there is a question, it is always better to ask Chef. He has no problem answering questions and it is always better to ask him then to screw up your product.
Communication is also the key here. Our class had a lot of miscommunication between the groups and I had some with in my group myself. My other large suggestion is to divide the work. Within my group, I was the leader when it came down to the yeasted production. I felt like no one else in my group had any idea what was going on with the production for that day and without me nothing would have been done right. On Day 7 we made baguettes and I took them out of the oven and my group didn't even realize it. Even when it came down to working with the dough or simply folding it no one else wanted to do it. I found this extremely unfair that it was always me taking time our of working on my showpiece to do these things. I had to make my rooster again because the leg broke and from then, even with working at home, I was slightly behind and despite this no one in my group wanted to say "hey let me do that I know you're a little behind because your rooster broke". It was disappointing to me. My last suggestion is check up on each other. Have two people set a timer ask the others what is going on. It is not rude or doubting them in anyway just with everything going on it is easy to forgot. On Day 6 we had to make pumpkin brioche and I had made the pumpkin pastry cream. With everything else going on, I forgot that I had it in the blast chiller and it was frozen solid when we went to use it. I take full responsibility, however, it would have been nice if any of the rest of my group members had thought about it at all and double checked with me on it.

Day 7

So yesterday was day 7, the pace of the lab has picked up extremely and our dead dough showpiece was due at 11:30am. For those of you that do not know our dead dough showpiece was completely our own idea and theme. The only thing it had to include was a rooster. Wednesday night I was a mess with only one thought on my mind…was this showpiece going to come together as I pictured it in my head. We could not build our showpiece unless we had everything baked, and I still had a lot more to do. I would advise to future students not to panic. If you move at a quick pace and know what you need to get done, it will be okay. If you panic and tend to worry there are things you can do ahead of time. One: look at your sketch you have already drawn/should have drawn and check off what you have already made.  Make a list of what you need to do. Two: make extra pieces because things can break and it is always better to have extra then not enough. Three: take home foam board and physically create your showpiece. This is also good to get an idea of what size/dimensions you will need for your showpiece. (I used foam board to find out the appropriate size of my mountains I needed for my showpiece. This also came in handy because I now had a template of what size/shape I needed my mountains and the next day all I had to do was roll the dough out and cut). Another important thing to be wary of is the time. When 10:45am rolled around everyone including myself went into panic mood. Things really got crazy for me because I thought we had to be done right at 11am. Therefore, I was running around like a chicken with its head cut off. I acted like this until 11am came and everyone was still working. It was not until then did I realize we had till 11:30am to finish. A weight was lifted off my shoulders and I could relax and take my time adding the finishing touches. To all future students: THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS TO FOLLOW DIRECTIONS AND LISTEN CAREFULLY. I cannot stress how important this is. In doing this you will learn better which will result in a better grade.  That is all for now, time for bed.

Goodnight J     

After a stressful week, I think that it is safe to say the BPA 3010 is no longer a "walk in the park". Monday was a semi easy transition from the weekend, however by Tuesday, I feel that we all began feeling overwhelmed. Producing a showpiece is very enjoyable. To be able to make, sculpt, bake, and assemble the dough into a showpiece is satisfying. However, the addition of making other products in class, as well as meeting with our groups after class to work on our marketing projects, added a whole new level of stress. 

Over the past week, I have learned that time management is key in the production of a nice showpiece. Without this you will fall behind and not know what step to take to finish the piece. Time flies by in this class, you look at the clock and its 7:00 and the next time you check its almost 11:30. This is why it is necessary to create a plan of what you are going to do in class and the order in which you will complete things. 

I found this video on Chef Hitz's Youtube channel. I find it very insightful and suggest you watch his series of dead dough production videos. 

Have a lovely weekend and enjoy sleeping in!

Day six was a particularly stressful day for my group.  Due to the lengthy rooster demo on day 4 our group had to produce two yeasted products in addition to working on our rooster showpiece, and planning our final marketing project as a group.  Personally the most challenging part for me is remembering that our groups production takes priority over our showpieces.  There is a standard that Chef Hitz reminds us of frequently and in order to meet that standard we must focus our attention on executing each product so the customer is satisfied.  This of course is  much easier said than done. I think one of the most challenging aspects of this course is finding a balance in your production schedule that allows you to not only successfully produce the required products, but also make progress on ones showpiece.  

Getting a game plan so to speak before the days production is critical to ones success in this course.  In addition to preparing for the next days production, working on dead dough pieces at home should become a part of your routine.  So after a physically and mentally draining week I finished my rooster showpiece and am quit relieved to have completed it successfully.  Although these past few days required a lot of work and focus, it was really rewarding to see my hand crafted showpiece come to life.  Whenever I am going through a challenging point in any lab I always keep in mind that " when the going gets tough, the tough get going".  

Best of luck!

Here is a video that might be a refresher from today's demo