"Cheesecake"

Our next tasty creation was an all-time favorite of mine: cheesecake. It involved three different components: the cheesecake itself, a strawberry coulis and chocolate leaves (not pictured above.) We used a dark cookie crumb crust to begin with and made the traditional cheesecake to go with it. There was also orange zest that was added to this recipe to add flavor. We prepared a strawberry coulis by combining strawberries, orange juice and sugar and refridgerating that mixture. Finally, the last part of this recipe was chocolate leaves. We washed and dried the leaves and simply painted a layer of chocolate on the underside of the leaves. Unfortunately, the layer of chocolate wasn't thick enough and we weren't able to peel the chocolate off the leaves successfully. Even with that minor complication the cheesecake still tasted delicious and we managed to plate it in an attractive manner.

"Truffles"

This recipe was not successful for my group because the chocolate mix did not set in time and it wasn't hard enough to form balls to make truffles. We followed the steps of the recipe, however, refrigerating the mixture for two days was not enough to set it completely and when we tried to form balls the chocolate was still in a liquid state. We tried to use cocoa powder to help with the shaping but the truffles were hopeless. The liquid truffles tasted delicious but they didn't look very appealing.  

"Garnishes: Apple Bird"

Another garnish that we made out of fruits and vegetables was an apple bird. This provided me with many challenges because I found it difficult to make clean and smooth cuts using a crisp apple. The wings were the easier part of this assingment meanwhile the head was very hard. I cut triangles out of the bird's wings to ressemble feathers and once I got to the head, I did my best to cut out the proper shape and make an eye. In the future I would try and make my cuts smoother and more rounded because I was not very impressed with my final apple bird. 

"Noodles with chicken, mushrooms and snow peas"

There are very few savory dishes that are made in this class becasue decorating is more common with desserts. The reason for making this stir-fry was to work on presentation and garnishing. The peas were used to add color to this dish and the different components on the plate were supposed to be arranged in an attractive manner. I found it interesting to see how simply changing where things are placed on a dish can make the dish look so much more appetizing. I am a very big fan of asian cuisine and I thought the stir-fry looked delicious and tasted great.