Monday, August 6, 2007

A tale of two entremets

This week, I produced two entremets as a favour for my mom's friend who was hosting a dinner party. It was a chance to test my new KitchenAid stand mixer as well as to exercise my creativity muscle. The experience made me recognize how little space I have in my freezer and how important it is to taste everything that you make.

The first entremet was a repeat of one I created for my plated dessert assignment during my Pan Pacific practicum, except a strawberry gelée was used instead of raspberry. This gave me an opportunity to use a beautifully simple row of strawberries to garnish this entremet, with a touch of chocolate for movement.

The second entremet was composed of mango passionfruit mousse, pistachio coconut joconde sponge, some fresh mango, and coconut basil bavaroise. Having an abundance of basil currently in my patio herb garden, I was very excited about combining coconut with basil. Unfortunately, I have a tendency to underestimate the intensity of herbs and decided to add 5 grams of basil instead of 2 grams, resulting in overpowering basil flavour. The same thing happened during my pastry school final black-box exam when I underestimated the power of thyme in an apple-cranberry compote. When will I ever learn my lesson?

1 comment:

Evelin said...

the second one looks so wonderful! And, to honest, I'm not angry with you, even if there's too much basil!:)