Edible Art!

Hey everyone :)

The weather is definitely getting colder here - one girl in class this morning announced to our class that it is supposed to *snow* this Thursday! The news, as I'm sure you can imagine, was well-received by everyone...especially since this was around 8 o'clock on a Monday morning. ;)

Honestly, though, I'm kinda looking forward to the snow - I don't know if I'm ready for it to snow on Thursday per say, but I'm excited for all the winter activities I'll get to do - I really want to go snowshoeing! I heard about it at Cornell, but I never got to try it! Apparently it is a really popular thing to do in Ottawa, so I'm looking forward to trying it! I also might give a go at skiing! Several of the people I have met here are *in love* with skiing and have been talking about going once it gets colder. Again, apparently there are some really good places to ski nearby, and this is also something I've wanted to do since my freshman year at Cornell, but never got the chance to try, so maybe I'll get to this winter!

Anyway, despite the unpleasant announcement that began class this morning, the rest of the class went really well! Today we worked in the practical kitchen and got to try out our piping skills! We practiced piping buttercream (Italian buttercream, that is) and chocolate :) It was a really fun class and was basically like an art class, except instead of paint, we got to use icing and chocolate! The Chef demonstrated some piping techniques at the beginning of the class, and after that, the rest of the time was ours. Chef told us we could be as creative as we wanted, but it seemed like most people stuck to copying what he did, especially with the buttercream. We're all basically beginners, so it's hard to really be that creative yet when we haven't had all that much experience. I *did* get a little creative with the chocolate in the end though... ;)

Chef's demonstration with the buttercream - the ones at the top are stars, then the next level down are rosettes, then after that he did various "shell" patterns, any of which we can use to decorate the circumference of cakes.

Chef's demonstration with the chocolate - he made the palm tree for me, the "Florida girl"! lol

At first I tried doing all the fancy swirly loop things with the chocolate, but it is harder than it looks - you have to hold the chocolate piping tool just so and you have to be fairly quick because the chocolate hardens in seconds! Anyway, I was getting a bit frustrated with it, but Chef came over, saw my frustration with the swirly patterns, and asked me if I ever doodled any shapes or anything with a pencil on paper. I said I did, and he asked me what it was that I doodled the most. Actually, I told him, I *always* seem to doodle palm trees and beach landscapes - not necessarily swirly lines or geometric shapes. "Then, that is what you should try with the chocolate!" he told me. "Start by doing what you are the most comfortable with."

So that's what I did! Once I was done, Chef came over to see it my beach landscape and said it was wonderfully detailed! After that, everyone wanted to come over and see my "artwork" - it's funny though because I think they all thought I had some kind of knack for chocolate decorating when all I did was what I was most comfortable with lol

My home :)