Last day

As 2013 comes to a close, so does my time at Joel Robuchon, HK.

My last day today at Joel Robuchon, HK

The Perfect Roll Cake

It’s weird to get excited about roll cake.

Even though I love all forms of pastry and sweets, roll cake doesn’t quite get my pulse racing.  I enjoy it when craving cake, but I never find it memorable… until I finally had the roll cake that changed my mind.

Christmas as a pastry cook

This year marks the 3rd year I’ve been working full-time in the industry.

Around the Christmas holidays is hands down the craziest time to be in a kitchen. So far I’ve experienced this holiday sugar madness in three cities: Toronto, Paris and now, Hong Kong. 

Rainy HK days

I made a stupid comment a couple of days ago about how it hadn’t rained in a while.

Surely enough, with a couple of days off work to spend with my visiting best friend, its been raining relentlessly.

We braced the wet yesterday anyway, spending the whole day eating and exploring Jordan.

Today we slept in, the rain and whistling wind only making it easier to sleep longer.

We spent the day entirely in pajamas, eating leftovers and getting reacquainted with Netflix.

I love having her here, and rain or shine, we always have the best time.

Stories in chocolate

Like any pâtisserie or bakery, we offer customized inscriptions on orders if a guest is celebrating any sort of occasion.

Depending on the shop, some places will pipe the message directly on the cake. Others will write on a piece of marzipan (a confection of ground almonds and sugar ) and some will use chocolate plaques.

Writing an inscription directly on a cake can be tricky if the cake’s design doesn’t allow room. The marzipan used for inscriptions are not exactly pleasant to eat. It’s tasty in its original form as a soft, fragrant and pliable confection. But for it’s use as a plaque, the marzipan is rolled out thin and left to dry until hard. At that point, it’s a chalky, crumbly thing, serving only as a template for the message.

Chocolate is the tastier option, but there is a moderate level of skill involved since the chocolate needs to be in temper. If it’s good quality chocolate, that is.

At Robuchon, we use marzipan. Or at least I thought we did.

Matcha latte musings

It’s almost 2pm on a Monday. I’m in a coffee shop in an enormous, though expensive and boring mall in Sha Tin. It’s one of the few times that I’ve gone up this “north” in HK.

I’ve just about finished my delicious matcha latte, having spent the last couple of hours replying to emails on the shop’s complimentary computer.

It’s been productive and I’m happy, but also I feel incredibly overwhelmed.