Final class: chocolate

Our last cooking class was atypical. For one thing, it was held in the pastry kitchen, a room into which I had often poked my head hoping for free handouts, but had never actually worked in. It's smaller than our kitchen, and much more metallic. A row of big mixers and whisks line one wall, and burners magically pop up from beneath the countertop when needed. It feels more like a lab, which is fitting since successful pastry generally demands more precision and accuracy than does, say, frying up a pork chop with a nice dollop of butter.

A long time ago, Nina looked at me knowingly (and somewhat accusingly, I might add) and said, "You prefer pastry to cuisine." She's right. It was my dirty little secret all this time, and I will now come out of the closet. Left to my own devices, I almost always end up baking. When I fantasize about owning a restaurant, it's usually a dessert bar, a boulangerie or a tea salon that dishes up decadent cakes and lovely liqueurs (and, oh yeah, tea). I signed up for the cuisine course because I wanted to increase my knowledge about meat, veg and all those foods I shy away from because I'm too busy making buttercream.

So when our once-weekly pastry class rolls around, I show up with a big goofy grin, excited to be back in familiar territory. Nina grumbles a bit, because she's happiest when there's a panful of oil and a big pile of mushrooms that needs to be sautéed and flambéed smoking away in front of her. And Nastia smiles at me, always excited to make something beautiful and laughing at my giddiness.

Our teacher, Chef Forais, has worked at the Ritz for ages and is infallibly jolly, with rosy cheeks and a naughty streak. I have to assume that pastry and jolliness go hand in hand. A certain degree of rotundity is also frequently par for the course.

The class involved making four kinds of chocolates: two kinds of truffles, bien sur, and also bonbons filled with Grand Marnier and raspberry ganache. Ganache is easy to make, just a combination of chocolate, heated cream and any flavorings you care to add. We were told to be careful how we stirred the mixture, however, because if it's done too vigorously, pockets of air will form and cause the ganache to go rancid more quickly once it's been piped into the bonbon shells we used.

Mixing a bit of butter into the ganache.

We poured some ganache into a big square mold, chilled it, and then coated it with a thin layer of chocolate before cutting it into smaller squares. This created a hard surface on each square which made it easier for us to slip the chocolates off the dipping fork when we coated them in their final layer of chocolate later on. Because tempered chocolate is thick and cool, it can get sticky really easily, so getting the finished product off the fork always ends up being half the battle.

Spreading chocolate on chocolate.

Cutting into squares before dipping.

One type of truffle that we made looked like little hedgehogs. I'm still not sure whether they have an official name or not, but you form their spiky, rough exterior by rolling them around on a metal grill and letting them cool. They're the perfect beginners' truffle, because the exterior doesn't have to be glassy and smooth. The more you rough it up with your untrained hands, the better.

Rolling the hedgehogs on a grill.

Mana goes postal on the truffles.

Finally, we pasted little flecks of gold leaf onto our bonbons and called it a day. We were photographing our work when it suddenly hit me: cooking school was over. All we had left was a week's worth of examinations, and we would be finished.

Our finished chocolates.

It was kind of like a punch in the gut (or was that sensation just the result of stuffing myself with too much ganache?). I can honestly say that my last four months here have been some of the happiest of my life, and that is an amazing fact given that I am thousands of miles away from everyone I love. There are, of course, difficult days (today was one of them, but I'll go into that later. Peeling quinces and being rebuked at a cafe do not a happy Cindy make) but most of the time, I've woken up every day excited by the prospects ahead of me and marveling at my good fortune. I've eaten more and gotten less sleep here than ever before, I've made incredible friends and I've gotten to indulge my passions on a daily basis.

And now back to my regularly scheduled sarcasm...