learning French pastry

Over the past 2 months, I have spent a lot of time cooking,

learning the secrets of French pastry.

You would think that being French I would know,

but it is not a requirement when you leave the country! :)

(you do not get an Eiffel tower either!)

So I went to L'Academie de Cuisine, a French cooking school,

and learned the proper techniques.

 You might have heard of it through Top Chef,

Carla Hall graduated from this culinary school.

There were 9 students in the class and we worked hard

and ate a lot of good desserts that we sometimes shared with our family...

Our instructor was Chef Samantha Weigand,

she made it all seem so easy....which it is not really!

So here some of the pastry we made:

In case you are wondering, yes there is a lot of butter in all these!

the apple tart was my favorite dessert,

and Mon Cheri enjoyed the cheese straws.

The cake was Miss C.'s favorite!

The lemon tart was also a favorite of the adults,

but Brick Master's least favorite,

he ate everything else, I mean, he ate most of the croissants and brioches!

He was most helpful in making my homework disappear....

Thank you Chef Sam!

I remade a lot of the desserts at home,
but I am not sure I will make my own croissant or puff pastry from scratch,
it is so much work and there is so much butter.....
it does taste like the real thing!

Happy day!