Food Porn, part two

Last time I was serious about dieting, I found myself drawn to cookbooks, and blogs about cooking.  Or more accurately, BAKING. 

It occurred to me one evening as I sat in a dark room, alone with a computer, while everyone else was asleep, as I was pouring over various websites with glorious pictures of the most amazing looking desserts that I had a pornography problem.

Only not the kind of pornography that the rest of the world thinks of.  That kind of stuff holds no allure for me.  I'm talking about cakes, and cookies, and pies, and tarts, and candies, and cupcakes and all manner of glorious confections for me to fantasize over.

So, after almost three weeks on weight watchers,  I am finding myself drawn back into that world.  I've steered clear of the usual problem areas.  I don't allow myself to peruse the cookbooks at the book store at all. There was a time when I might have gone over there with the plan to find a healthier eating cookbook, and walk out with a book on decorating cupcakes. (true story)

But I wasn't prepared for pinterest. 

I had avoided it up until now as I had heard that it was a "total time suck" (hours can go by with no notice) and then there's issues like staring at pictures of other rooms with the intention of getting inspiration to redecorate your own home, can lead to a dissatisfaction in what you already have.

But someone showed me the app and how it was all too easy, and soon I was mesmerized by pictures of places I'd like to visit, and cute ideas for just about everything, and tips for cleaning my house, and quotes that made me laugh or think or smile, and recipes. 

Oh, the recipes.

Cause my mom probably has no idea what pinterest is, I will explain briefly. In the same way that once upon a time people would cut things out of magazines and file them away, or hang them on a bulletin board for inspiration or whatever, now there is a website dedicated to doing all that virtually.  You set up your "boards" or files, and as you look at picture after picture of everything under the sun that everyone else has posted, you can choose to "repin" those pictures to your own boards, to save for a later date, and everyone you know will see what you chose to pin, and they might like what you liked, and choose to repin it, and it goes on like that.   I just ran across this hilarious article on the subject, which totally falls into the "it's funny cause it's true" category.

So, yes, recently I've spent a little bit of time perusing the pictures.

After only a few days, the patterns that are emerging on what interest me the most aren't that surprising.   I won't give you a complete run down, but at the low end, "healthier living" comes in with four pins on that board, "for the home" has 14 pins, "places I'd like to visit" has 40, and "recipes to try" is leading with 56 pins. (and yes, there are a few ideas for redecorating, though at this moment I am choosing to focus on what is plausible, and I will worry about my gorgeous kitchen remodel later should it ever become a reality.)

And you'd be right in supposing that 90% of the recipes aren't exactly diet friendly.  Of course I could have a piece of a chocolate mousse brownie, I just have to count the points. (After making sure I have enough in the first place, and then not have seconds or thirds)

The point of weight watchers is that nothing is forbidden, and you have choices, but you do quickly learn that if you make good choices you get to eat more food , and if you make bad choices,  you might be out of points before you ever even sit down to dinner.

While there is definitely not the same feeling of  forbidden-ness that I had with catz (brownies were NEVER okay) I still find myself sitting alone in a room, staring at a computer screen and fantasizing about what I really shouldn't have.

And I know it's very closed-minded of me, but I have a hard time with recipes that are lightened up.  SOME are very, very good.  SOME have me begging for the recipe.  But for the most part, if I am going to have a dessert, I want a good dessert.  Not an 'okay' one, I want to really enjoy those points, not just wishing I was enjoying them.

Anyway, the old saying is still true.  "We want what we can't have."  And I want cake.  And cookies. And gooey caramel bars. And homemade bread with homemade cinnamon honey butter. And cute holiday themed treats.

Darn you, food porn!

better late than never

Madison finally had her birthday party last weekend.  My kids only get them on even years. December is hard so she had to wait 6 weeks.  That's nothing though.  Nick has been waiting 13 months for his 14th birthday party.  I'm not good at throwing parties, and figuring out how to entertain 14 year old boys (now 15) isn't something I've figured out yet. (seriously- any ideas would be welcome)

Anyway, Madison had a French cooking themed party.  (I told you I wasn't good at parties.)  It was the best I could come up with.  She's a little obsessed with Paris-

And I was trying to figure out how to throw an around the world type party, like have each room be a different country and the activities would be stuff you would do in that country, for example,  Mexico would be on the back porch and we would break a pinata.  Only that was about the only other country I could come up with a fun activity for, and then the decorating and preparation was overwhelming (and had the possibility of breaking the bank)  and I thought a "where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?" type scavenger hunt would be fun, but after a couple hours on the computer the ideas weren't flowing, and all I could remember about that show was the theme song, and I wasn't sure that kids these days would even know who Carmen Sandiego is, or why they should care, (I think it was popular when I was 12)  That and a party game based on geography clues doesn't sound all that fun.

So we went with just Paris. And Paris is known for 2 things- fashion and food. I thought I'd stay in my comfort zone and stick with the food.

I kicked the boys out of the house, and a good friend Chelsa gave up a weekend night to come help.  One of the girls asked her if she was Maddie's aunt.  Without missing a beat, Madison answered that "yes she is!"

First we decorated aprons - nothing too fancy- just fabric markers and a couple stamps- an Eiffel tower and a fleur de lis, then we made ham and cheese crepes, I have a fairly fool proof crepe maker so the girls had fun with that, I also picked up some mini-quiches from Costco, then we made little mini tarts.  I pre-made the shells earlier that day, I wasn't too impressed with the way the shells turned out, but most of the girls had never even heard of tarts, so it probably didn't matter.  They seemed to have fun with the fillings.

Instead of a cake, I assembled a croquembouche.  What's that you say?  It's basically a tower of cream puffs. Usually it's pretty fancy, and bakers can show off their mad skills decorating it. 

Don't be too impressed though, I just glued the cream puffs together with chocolate frosting from a can. And it totally collapsed before Madison got to blow out the candle. 

And then the girls didn't even hardly eat any of it, needless to say there were tons of leftovers.  (good thing I didn't join Weight Watchers yet.  I almost did the day before, but Christopher was sick, so that fun starts tomorrow)

Anyways that's about it... we had some time to spare so we played some games, including a fun relay race with balloons, and then some outdoor activities.

 When it was all said and done, Madison said she had a great time, so that's a win in my book.

That's love.

So remember how I mentioned learning how to make my own vanilla extract when I was taking those cooking classes in Paris?

It's pretty simple, just two ingredients.  Alcohol and vanilla beans. (1/4 cup alcohol for every 4 beans)

And the best part is they can be used vanilla beans.  So, say you are making something like creme brulee and instead of just tossing the used bean away once it's been scraped of all it's goodness, instead of just tossing it (sometimes I would stick it in my sugar to flavor the sugar a little bit)  you can stick stick it in a jar of alcohol and let it stew for awhile and voila! you have homemade extract.

So why bother?

It's supposed to be better than regular extract.

As my teacher explained to us, with regular extract, if you have two identical cakes and you forgot to put store bought extract in one, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

So I'm curious.

I found the vanilla beans on Amazon.  That's the cheapest I've found them, except when Costco had them.  At the grocery store they average about $8 for 2 beans.  YIKES. 

The alcohol proved to be a little trickier.  Being a Mormon, it's not like it's exactly something I buy on a regular basis. Actually, I can't say if I've ever bought alcohol before, except of course for vanilla extract, mouth wash, rubbing alcohol, and cough syrup, etc.

Did you know they don't sell liquor at Target?  I spent 5 minutes in the wine and beer aisle worried someone I know might see me.  Cause that's what happens.

So I sent John to the grocery store.

He sat there in the liquor aisle, staring at the plethora of bottles in front of him. In my class, they said either vodka or rum works best, and their personal preference was dark rum.  So he called a co-worker he knows who is quite the expert in that area and spent several minutes on the phone discussing the different options.  He settled on a bottle, stuck it in the cart, even turned the label inward, trying to be discreet, and then as he was walking out of the liquor aisle, you'll never guess who he bumped into?

Actually everyone I've related this story to guesses right on their first guess, cause it's just so predictable.  That's right, he bumped into our Bishop and his wife.  No, they didn't seem to notice the contraband in the cart, or what aisle he was walking out of, but still...

I mention this today because John brought me home a couple little presents yesterday and it jogged my memory. (that last story happened in December) 

Being the thoughtful guy that he is, he thought of me as they were handing out mini-bottles of vodka at some charity golf event he was playing at. Ü

So, I have the beans, and now I have not one, but two different kinds of alcohol so I can experiment and see what I like best.  I just need to get cooking and use those beans.  See that jar of brown liquid?  That's exactly 1 cup of dark rum.  What you can't see is there is exactly 1 vanilla bean soaking in it. Which means I need to put 15 more in to get it to the right ratio.  Right now it's just slightly vanilla-y flavored rum.

So, hopefully sometime in the not too distant future, I'll have some opinions on storebought extract vs. homemade, and dark rum vs. vodka.  That's the plan anyway.  I'll let you know how it goes.

toasted

Have I mentioned my toaster before? No?

Odd, because I love my toaster.

John doesn't care much for it, and it tends to eat Eggo's, but I think Eggo's are gross, so I'm okay with that.

Anyway, my toaster is awesome.

It's so awesome Nick's orchestra teacher requested it be brought to school so the kids could make toast before the field trip.

I believe the conversation went something like this-

The teacher, shocked that most kids didn't know the song 'It's a Small World' asked the kids who did know it to raise their hands.

Nick said he sheepishly raised his hand, then explained that his toaster plays it every morning when the toast pops up.

He also explained that it burns Mickey's face into your toast.  (on a side note, Zach says it looks like Mickey's mug shot.  "Face forward, now turn to the side...")

So she thought it would be something fun for the kids to do while they waited to load the buses to California.  (And Disneyland!)

 Anyhow, that's the story of how I ended up taking my toaster to school.

Nick's birthday aka Christmas Eve

This year we actually celebrated Nick's birthday on the day after Christmas for a couple of reasons-

Firstly, my parents would be arriving that day and when it comes to birthdays, the more the merrier.

And secondly, we got an invite to spend Christmas Eve with some friends.  They said, "We'll get a ham, and you can bring dessert!"

Nick wanted chicken enchiladas for his birthday dinner (this is how I know he is actually my child- that was my standard birthday dinner request growing up) so, I figured we could either force our will upon our gracious friends, or wait a couple of days.  Wait we did.

Dinner was good.  No, it was great.  I know I'm beating a dead horse here, but I love the fact that despite the fact we don't live near family, we're surrounded by plenty of people who through the years have stepped in to fill that void.

So, I was asked to bring A dessert.  I brought three.  First, I decided to make a tart.  The one on my food blog with the pastry cream.  Only instead of strawberries, I did a mixed berry kind of thing.  Actually there was a picture of that in one of my cookbooks, and Madison paid me a compliment by (sincerely) saying that "it looked exactly like the one in the picture!".  I don't mean to brag, but that is the first time that has ever happened.  Seriously, my reality rarely (never) matches those gorgeous professional pieces of art you see in cook books.  (recipe found here)

But then I decided that it might be "too grown up" for some of the kids, and I might not want to share with those who don't know any better, and one of my kids said "But what about Santa?!?! We NEED to make sugar cookies!" Kill two birds with one stone.  Santa gets his cookies, and the kids just might stay away from my once in a lifetime glorious tart. (cookie recipe found here)

And then just cause I am a glutton for punishment, and I swear the cool-whip was calling to me from the refrigerated case in the grocery store, I had to make chocolate balls too.  If I didn't make them for Christmas, when?!?! Before you know it, New Years and it's dang resolutions would be upon us, and I might not get around to making them for a very long time, so I had to.  I just had to. (easiest recipe ever found here)

And other than the usual opening one present (pajamas) that was our Christmas Eve.

The day after Christmas, Nick got his chicken enchiladas, and I even surprised him with butterbeer cupcakes. He's been in love with butterbeer ever since we visited Harry Potter world,

so I found these little cupcakes and I thought I'd give them a shot.  He USED to request what we call "strawberry dessert" but now he has told me that from here on out, he'd like butterbeer cupcakes, thank you very much. I didn't take a picture, cause my cupcakes didn't look nearly as good as the picture on blog I got them off of, (pathetic, really) so for those interested, here's a link to that blog for that recipe.

Both days turned out great, but sifting through my pictures I am saddened to see that I didn't get a single one commemorating my oldest child turning 15.

This picture will have to do-

He was getting ready for the big New Year's Eve dance the next week.  That's his snazzy "Official replica 11th doctor bow-tie" from the Doctor Who series.  He spotted it on the website ThinkGeek.com, but it was sold out clear until Christmas!  He was seriously distraught and checked back regularly so I could buy it for him. Somehow though, Santa worked his magic and was able to procure one which he found in his stocking on Christmas morning.  True story.

15 years ago, I became a mom to the teeniest, tiniest little thing. (3 lbs 11 oz)

And he hasn't stopped growing. He passed me up long ago, and any day now he'll have his dad beat.  One thing I have to mention,  although I look at that picture, and it feels like a lifetime ago, and so many other details forgotten, I can still feel the ghost of that teeny little body in my hands, feel the weight of him (ha ha) as he slept on my chest. crazy huh?  And I remember the feeling of terror the day we finally got to take him home. I couldn't believe those nurses were just going to hand a totally helpless tiny human being to us kids and say "good luck!"  I'm not much of a kid any more, and Nick isn't so helpless, but 15 years later, I am no less terrified.

and on that note.... Happy Birthday, Nick, I love you.

I'm just here for the food, part 2

So, day two in Paris.  (note to self- don't procrastinate.  It's hard to remember details more than 2 months later, and it gets harder to write by the day)

I woke up bright and early and headed back to my cooking class. This day we were baking.

We learned to make a basic croissant dough  and used it to make 4 different types of breads/treats.

Did you know it takes three days to make croissants?  Day one you just make the dough, then it has to rest in the fridge over night.  He even wasted some dough to show us what happens if you don't let it rest long enough.  Not good. 

Day two you add the butter.  This is the tricky day.  First, you have to have a nice cool kitchen, because you DO NOT want the butter to melt.  VERY, VERY BAD.  If it melts, it won't form those layers that make the croissants so flaky and wonderful.  I was told by my teacher that I was in trouble because I live in Phoenix. Anyway, you start by rolling out the dough in a perfect rectangle, then you roll out the butter into a perfect square that is exactly 2/3 the length of the dough, but exactly the width. Then you do some folding action and make an envelope, or a letter, I can't remember which, and then you need to roll out another perfect rectangle, and fold it again. And do that again, and again, and again.  And possibly again.  It's best to put it back in the fridge/freezer every couple of roll and folds to maintain the integrity of the butter.  When you are all done, you will have something like 60 layers of dough and butter.   

The next day the dough is ready to use.  You can roll and cut out triangles to make croissants.

Interesting fact, these croissants aren't burnt.  In traditional French baking, things come out a little more "rustic".  It's the whole "layers of flavors" thing.  The bitter taste of the darker bits, combined with the flaky yet softer inside, and the sweetness of the butter, make for an over-all "true experience".  It's hard to find them, (cause it takes three days, so most people have their dough shipped in) but if you stumble across a little place that claims to make their own and they look a little on the burnt side, chances are you've found yourself a gem. He even pulled out a traditional cookbook and in almost every picture of food in it, there were little blackened bits on the food. 

You can add chocolate to make pain au chocolat, (yes, that's the same picture, but now you are looking at the heavenly rolled up thing in the top right corner)

Then we rolled out the croissant dough,  spread pastry cream on it, sprinkled on some gingerbread-type spices and rum raisins and chopped up pistachios and then sliced it up into little wheels and baked it (sorry, no "after" pics)

And finally we made little danishes with pastry cream and raspberries.  He showed us how to cut and fold it to make a little bowl for the filling.  This was the teacher's before we baked it.  He made a little one, mine was bigger (more raspberries, but once again, alas, no pictures of the finished product) 

Finally,we made a focaccia.  I was wary about this one.  We started off chopping up green olives (I'm not a fan- the black ones in the can I can eat in one sitting, but any others cause my nose to turn up in disgust) we added that to the dough we prepared (a different dough, not the croissant dough) and added Parmesan cheese as well. Then we added the dough to a "greased" pan.  And by "greased", I don't mean "just enough to cover the bottom and sides"  I mean like half a large bottle of olive oil was poured into the pan. Then I was the lucky contestant who "won a spa treatment" and got to spread the dough out in the oil and try to make the dough fill out the corners.  It didn't work that well.  Although, after I cleaned off the oil that was literally dripping from my hands, they did feel pretty soft. So I did get a bonus spa treatment out of it after all.   The teacher cut some diagonal slits in it in a pretty design, then we let it bake.  One girl asked where the oil went (cause the bread came out pretty dry looking).  The teacher told us it "evaporated". 

So I was prepared to not like it very much.  Green olives + the entire annual production of virgin olive oil from a whole tree = not something I would normally enjoy. 

  

That being said, it was SO GOOD.  Especially when we spread raw butter made from unpasteurized milk with a little sea salt mixed in for good measure. (BEST BUTTER EVER.  I need to figure out how to get my hands on some of that.  Make friends with a dairy farmer or something.) And PS- it was still really good later that evening when it wasn't quite as fresh, and there wasn't even any butter. Once again, sorry no pictures. My hands were too busy (and dripping with oil) to take any "befores", and I was too busy eating to take any "afters".  Priorities.

So that concludes my culinary adventures in Paris.

I spent the rest of the day wandering around Paris.  I intended to spend the afternoon at the Louvre, but it was closed. So, I intended to just wander the streets on foot, soaking it all in until I had to catch my train back to Belgium. 

I did just that for a little bit, but then I got accosted by a gypsy and a con artist while crossing a bridge.  At least I assume that's what they were.  They made me for a stupid American, and I was caught in their clutches.  The first one tried to give me a "gold ring" she thought I dropped, and it was good luck if I gave her something.  (Money, naturally)  She claimed to be starving, and needed money to buy bread.  I gave her the coins in my pocket, which amounted to about 3 Euros.  By this point, I was a little annoyed I had been taken.  I knew she was a professional beggar, pretending to return worthless pieces of metal to their owners, then demanding a reward for her act of kindness.  Then, I fell into the clutches of a deaf mute (yes, deaf and mute) He was clutching a clipboard, with a piece of paper masquerading as a petition for the advocacy of all the deaf mutes in France.  (seriously) I am sure the guy was a con artist, but he had the perfect con going on claiming he was both deaf and dumb, therefore any arguments I had literally fell on deaf ears as he had me trapped on that bridge shoving the clipboard in my face, begging I write my name and country of origin in their correct spots. Then he pointed to the donation column and demanded some money. All the while creeping me out while he kissed his hand and wiped it on my shoulder like I was some kind of angel saving him from his wretched life. I handed him the smallest bill in my wallet, 5 Euros, (all my change having just been given to that gypsy)  and then he pointed out the small handwritten note written on the side of the paper "Minimum donation- 10 Euros."  He was really annoyed I wouldn't give him more than the five.  I finally got away, really annoyed with myself and with them (cause I truly believe them to be con artists- I saw several more people with clip boards going after tourists, and when I started to think about why the petition was written in English, and why there were SO MANY deaf mutes in Paris, I knew I was taken.  Don't get me wrong, I have no problems giving to the needy, but usually I walk away feeling good, not angry and annoyed and stupid and taken.  

I elected to spend the rest of my afternoon enjoying a lunch inside a cafe. I was hungry and mad at Paris and myself, and food was the answer. (plus I had to use the bathroom, and that's for paying customers only).  So after a very leisurely lunch of a ham and cheese crepe, a coke, and a lemon tart, I was feeling much better.  I should mention that my lunch was also pretty entertaining as I watched the waiters and waitress interact.  It was a slow day,  so they'd stand around and talk, (in French, so I didn't understand them) but then the waitress slapped a waiter across the face, and he told me it was cause she was crazy about him.  She argued that he was the only crazy one there.  (In English for my benefit).  As I stood up to leave, I tied my scarf around my neck (it was chilly out), and a waiter (the one who got slapped) stopped me and adjusted the knot of my scarf for me, (not that I did a bad job, but it was more like a friendly thing. Sorta, "There you go, now it's perfect."

And with an "au revoir", and my renewed faith in Paris, I headed off to the train station to spend the evening with John.  (seeing as it was our 15th anniversary and all)

John and I met up that evening for a nice dinner in Brussels (he worked all day so even if I didn't go to Paris, we still wouldn't have spent any more time together, in fact I beat him to the hotel, and I got lost on the way) and then the next morning he dropped me off at the airport so I could head home while he stayed and worked.

It was a fantastic trip in almost every aspect, (I was definitely lonelier in Paris than I thought I'd be) but I was ready to come home.  I missed my own bed, and especially my kids. Plus, I was a little worried for my dad's sanity after being a mom to my four rugrats for 12 days.  Any longer and I might have found them duck taped to the wall. I am pleased to report they all survived.  However, I think it will be a few years before I will be able to convince him to do that again.   Kinda like pregnancy.  You have to forget exactly how bad it was before you can think about having another one. 

Oh, and this last picture is for Nick.  They were packing up as I walked by, but I passed a whole orchestra (at least a dozen musicians) playing in the subway. 

I'm just there for the food

After we landed in Brussels, we had a few hours to walk around (in the rain). 

We wandered around,

stopping into my favorite cookie store to buy another tin of cookies,

We went in search of chocolate, which is of course ridiculously easy, as every third store is a chocolate shop, in fact the hard part is picking which store(s) to shop at or better yet, learning to not even look, and just walking away (after the first two or three stores of course). 

And I needed an overnight bag for my little excursion into Paris the next day.

Speaking of which- This is my train ticket. Ü

Clear up until the morning of, I was like "I can totally do this!  I've been to Paris before, I've got books, and maps, and Paris has a great subway system, I can do this. I took the kids to Disneyland on my own.  I can do this.  I drove the kids to Utah on my own.  I can do this. I'm a fairly independent person.  I can do this."

Of course courage gave way to nausea and anxiety the next morning. 

I had to get up at 4 to catch the 6 am train to get to Paris by 8 to be to my class by 9.    There's a lot of variables in there.  Finding the correct train platform, train car, my seat, hoping everything runs smoothly and on time, then once I get to Paris, I have one hour to make my way to my class.  Without getting lost.  And given that English is not the first language of most people I meet along the way asking for help or getting directions could prove difficult. 

Anyway, I didn't get breakfast that morning.  by the time I figured everything out at the Belgium train station, I had some time to spare, but my stomach wasn't up to accepting food just yet.  So I played sudoku on my phone. And possibly Angry Birds.

Everything went smoothly, and I arrived at my destination with 10 minutes to spare. 

So, I know it's no Le Cordon Bleu institute or anything, and in fact I think the name is a little cheesy, but it got excellent reviews, and it was all in English.  It was the perfect choice for someone like me.  Each class was 3 hours long, you learned to make about 5 different things, and class sizes are small (5 students). 

And I loved every minute of it.  Both days the other four students were pretty quiet, so I did most of the talking and question asking.  I wasn't going to waste my money being shy or worrying about asking stupid questions.

The first day my teacher was a cute girl named Briony.  I got her life story because I wondered what would possess someone to want to teach cooking to Americans in Paris.  She was a pastry chef who was born in Australia and has lived all over the world. But while living in Scotland, she fell in love with and married a Parisian, so this is where she has made her home. She owns her own cake decorating business but teaches there part time cause they asked her to and they are willing to work around her schedule. 

This is a picture of the ceiling.  I love it.

Anyway, on to the food.  I'm going to just start off by saying it was all really good.  Even if I had any reservations, I loved it all.  So, I am not going to comment how yummy everything was, because I would be repeating myself over and over.  

We made mango creme brulee.  You cut a mango into little cubes and place them in the bottom of the ramekins and then bake as usual.  I usually add fresh fruit to the top of creme brulee, but this was a first to bake it, and I never would have thought of mango.  She says raspberries would be really good too.

Next up was a chocolate souffle.  The only thing is, I would omit the shot of espresso and flavor it with orange juice or something.

The pear sable was a fun dessert.  We baked pears and basted them in baking spices and butter and honey.  Here's one of the places where I run into a bit of a problem recreating it at home.  It calls for "3 tablespoons of mixedspice (the kind used for gingerbread)"   Besides being in French, the label was pretty vague about what spices were in it. Ginger? Clove? Cinnamon? in what combinations?  I will probably just play around with it, trial and error, I might not get it exactly right, but unless I start getting wild and crazy and experimenting with non-gingerbready type spices I should be fine.  My next obstacle is finding the pastry rings that you bake the hazelnut sable in (the round cookie-cake thing under the pear)  They are expensive on Amazon.  I think I've heard tuna fish cans work great, I just haven't been able to eat tuna fish since before I was pregnant with Christopher.   Oh, and then we topped it with a caramel sauce.  

Next up we made Madeleines.  They are little tea cakes, sortof a cross between a cookie and a muffin.  I liked them so much, when I got home, I jumped on Amazon and bought a pan. 

Finally we made Napoleons.  This was hands down my favorite. 

Before I tell you about them, I need to mention something.  I didn't get to eat it until later that evening because I was so sick after class.  After not eating breakfast, and the anxiety and the adrenalin and all that, then eating not one, but three decadent desserts for lunch (the creme brulee, the souffle, and the pear sable- the ones that can't be transported easily) and I ate EVERY BITE, cause gosh darnit I paid for it, but I totally thought I had the flu that afternoon. 

After class I went to the Orangerie, which is a museum that is home to two rooms of Monet art that was specifically designed for that building. 

Two oval rooms where you are entirely surrounded by whole panels of water lillies. 

The art was amazing of course,

but by the time I left, I wasn't feeling so well.  I grabbed a "take-away" ham sadwich from a cafe, and headed up to my room.  I was hoping a little protein might do me some good.  But my room was freezing. and I just sat there in my bed with the covers pulled up, looking for something interesting on TV (which is hard since I don't speack any French other than "oui" and "non" and "see-voo-play" and "merci".  At this point I really started to think I had the flu.  Which would totally suck because I was all alone in a foreign country, with one ibuprofen to my name, and an appointment with a tour group to go up to the top of the Eiffel Tower that evening, and another class the next day, and I was headachy and nauseus, and freezing my tail off.  Anyway, between the one ibuprofen, some protein in my system, and an answered prayer to a speedy and full recovery,  an hour later I was totally fine.

At which point I was able to take my trip to the Eiffel tower, which was awesome, btw.  In Europe, the thing seems to be to pay a tour guide if you want to see anything.  You will pay about double, but you will learn something in the process, and you can avoid standing in line for HOURS.  The line to the Eiffel tower was incredible.  It was AT LEAST two hours long.   Anyway, it was fun. 

There are three levels, I went to the top.  I only have a fear of heights if there is nothing between me and falling to my death.  (Like I am on a ledge or something)

One cool fact I learned- when Hitler was occupying Paris, the elevator mysteriously "broke" the morning he arrived in town, and they didn't seem to be able to fix it until the day after the Allied forces regained control of the city. So Hitler never went up in the Eiffel tower.  

Anyway, after I settled into my hotel room for the night, I dug into my goodie bag I had stashed in the mini-bar, and thoroughly enjoyed a couple madeleines and the whole Napoleon. 

Sandwiched between two layers of puff pastry (which is literally a thousand layers of dough and butter, and oh so flaky and tender and delicious, was the most amazing pastry cream.  It was made with a praline paste, and I will tell anyone that listens that that stuff is like crack. 

In my class the next day, I was telling them how I took the dessert class the day before, (I think they were taking it later that day) and they wanted to know what my favorite was.  I proceeded to tell them about the pastry cream at which point the teacher produced a bag of it from the fridge, announced he eats that stuff all the time, and squirted a big gob on the back of his hand, licked it off, then passed it around so we could do the same. 

I kid you not, I have lost sleep over figuring out other ways to use this stuff.  Puff pastry takes three days to make.  I'm not that patient.   A filling for little tartlets? A filling for a cake? But what kind? Chocolate?  

And as a bonus, I learned to make my own vanilla extract.  Which I am really excited about.  All you need are vanilla beans (used ones are perfect) and some alcohol. Vodka or rum (Briony likes dark rum for this job).  And then you soak the beans in the alcohol- 4 beans to 1/4 of a cup for several days, and there you have it. I have the vanilla beans,  but the alcohol is proving to be trickier. Did you know they don't carry any rum or vodka at Target? Wine and beer, yes, but hard liquor, no.  I know this because I spent a few minutes perusing that particular aisle at the local Target, all the while worrying I was going to run into somebody I know.

Anyway, that was my first day in Paris. 

Bruges

how I love thee...

Yes, I've blogged about it before, (click here to read that exciting installation) but it deserves another shout out.  Best waffles you can find outside of Belgium, and there's a reason they are famous for their waffles.  It's well deserved.  (The chocolate fame is also well deserved)  And you don't have to take my word for it- I ran across this little gem awhile ago too.

Anyway Bruges waffles and frites = LOVE.

No trip to Utah is complete without at least one trip to Bruges. 

I forgot to take pictures until after I had finished my waffle (raspberries and dark chocolate)  but if you'd eaten there you really couldn't blame me.

Here's a picture of Christopher's half-eaten waffle.- He's a slow eater. 

His is plain, but that's okay too.  It's not like eating a plain American waffle. 

The frites (fries) are excellent too. 

See how beautifully golden they are?  The Belgians deep fry them twice. And they have like 10 different flavors of yummy mayos for dipping.  

Three happy kids:

(Nick was in NYC so we didn't feel bad about going without him, and we ended up going back again later anyway...)