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:
Anne at work … taking care of construction
The Crock!