first exam: tarts & cookies unit

on march seventh, i had my first ever pastry school exam, finally completing the seemingly never-ending tarts and cookies unit. the objective was straightforward: take a forty-five minute written test, and execute three recipes from our unit. sounds simple enough, right?

the recipes we had to execute were randomly assigned to us on exam day, but some of us had heard through the grapevine/listened closely in lectures to deduce the following:

• no linzer torte
• no tarte tatin
• no fig newtons

and so on. really, the list just meant that we wouldn't be asked to produce a recipe that took forever, which makes sense when you think about it. we only had three hours to execute three recipes, so we couldn't possibly be asked to do something that was so time consuming.

i drew the following recipes:

• two four inch clafoutis
• one eight inch tarte aux pommes
• five spritskakor cookies

read more after the jump!

and so, this was the itinerary that i came up with:

• MEP (mise en place)
• apple compote
• dice apples
• make parchment paper cover
• combine with sugar and place over medium heat 
• roll and chill brisée
• spritskakor cookies
• make and bake
• cuire à blanc (blind bake) clafoutis shells
• tarte aux pommes
• slice apples
• fill shell with compote, top with sliced apples
• bake
• custard
• prepare
• strain
• fill chilled shells
• bake
• organize baked items, pick the best for presentation
• clean up!

i needed my apple compote to cool enough before making my apple tart, and i needed the shells for the clafoutis to be blind baked and cooled before finishing them, so i figured that this was the best way to organize my time.

because so much time has passed, instead of walking you through the whole night, here are the highlights of the evening:

• for the written exam, we had to do conversions. because i'm a genius i had to do them...without a calculator. hello long division! long time no see.
• since the compote recipe was for two tarts, i halved everything. except for the sugar. oops. this made for a beautifully translucent and slightly sweet product which my chef instructor only mildly appreciated. it wasn't quite dentist visit worthy, and i countered it by not topping the tart with sugar, but still.
•  when baking anything normally in class, our chefs will help us determine whether our product is done. obviously during the exam, this was not possible. so it was especially excellent to have them questioning us when things were coming out of the oven. "are you SURE that this is done?" couldn't tell if it was a mind game, or if it was genuine help being not-so-discreetly offered.

when all of the very serious hustle and bustle of the exam was said and done, there came the evaluation. we were evaluated across the board, based on everything from organization to execution. most of the grading actually took place after the exam, but the last three pieces of the grading did take place right in front of us: analyzing the final product. we presented our products to be graded on the following criteria:

• taste
• presentation
• execution 

so in anticipated response to anyone who says "whatever, it tastes great!", as you can see, that's only half the battle. or well, really a third of the battle, but basically, it's important, but not the only thing worth thinking about. that being said, i was quite shocked to see chef t give me a 7.5/10 for taste, just after saying that everything tasted great! her only complaint was the sweetness of my tarte aux pommes, which i had expected to lost some points for...but not that many!

i did well on everything else, but that 7.5 stuck with me. yes i could have done worse, it wasn't really that bad, it was my first time, etc. but still. i guess i'll just have to keep pushing harder, right?

all (minor) setbacks aside, i made it. we got our results back last week, and even with my 7.5, i still made out just fine. and so, whisk and motivation still intact, i survived my first written and practical exams.