The Croquembuche

This week I had an absolute ball making a croquembuche for the VERY FIRST TIME … with no real instructions … just following my instincts.  It probably wouldn’t have been so much fun if I wans’t teaming up with one of my cakie friends Miss Anne from Anne’s Little Cake Shop (vist her FB page and show her some cake love!).

Anne and I collaborated on this very special cake for our friend and fellow foodie Emma of Sister Spice.  I have always wanted to make a croquembuche and have been looking around for a workshop or lesson I could attend to learn this fine art.  Alas, I could not find ANY.  So I resorted to You Tube, Google Images and a few of my fave food blogs, such as Joe Pastry, and Not Quite Nigella.   Armed with these fantastic resourses and my already firm grasp of choux pastry, Anne and I spent a good 2.5 to 3 hours building THE CROCK!

In the end, it looked amazing, tasted pretty good too (the toffee was a little dark!) and left me with a very satisfying sense of achievement I have to say.

Apart from the piece de resistance, I have to say that I really enjoyed sharing the Pastrygene kitchen and having some fun cakie company while I worked.  I think it highlighted to me that working in a solo environment really has its draw backs, and its easy for me to get stuck in my own headspace … it doesn’t really suit my personality to work solo.  So, maybe I’ll collaborate more often!

In the meantime, some pictures:

 

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