Pastry School Diary – Superior Pâtisserie, Weeks 9-12

Hello, friends. It’s been awhile. It’s amazing how much things have changed since my last blog post. At this point, and after all that’s been happening, exams feel like a lifetime ago. (In reality, it’s only been a couple of weeks!) And while in the grand scheme of things pastry school seems pretty insignificant compared to all that is going on in the world, I am still really proud of my achievement. I worked really hard to do well on my exams and to earn my diploma.

So as we’re all at home now with not much to do, I thought I might as well write the final recap of my last couple of weeks at Le Cordon Bleu:

Mock Exam

We dedicated the last few weeks of Superior Pâtisserie to prepping for our final exam. This included a mock exam, which was essentially a trial run at the dishes we’d make for our final. We worked under the same timed conditions, with pre-measured ingredients, and all of the other exam rules and regulations. Though a bit intimidating, the mock exam was a great way to practice one last time. Afterward, I felt like I could go into the final examination with a sense of confidence. After all, if I could be successful in the mock exam, I could do it again in the final!

I felt pretty good about my performance in the mock exam. Here is my technical entremet, a play on the classic Millionaire’s Shortbread. My entremet featured banana mousse, a shortbread base, caramel cremeaux, dark chocolate glaze, lemon sponge wrap, banana-caramel tuile, and tempered dark chocolate decoration:

Plated Desserts

During the mock, we also made our plated dessert. (The mock exam and the final exam both last for five hours. Students can break up the time however they want, as long both the entremet and the plated dessert are finished on time.) For my plated dessert, I made a white chocolate blondie with coconut and lime. I paired it with banana mousse, a rum caramel sauce, lime fluid gel, coconut bon bons, tempered white chocolate, cubed mango, and a banana caramel tuile.

After my fairly disastrous initial try at a plated dessert, this one was a big improvement! I received generally good feedback from the chef. Her only big suggestion was to replace the caramel sauce with something that could cut the sweetness. (For the final,I ended up doing a mango citrus sauce instead of the caramel.) Otherwise, I was pretty pleased with the presentation, the taste, and especially my successful white chocolate tempering!

Final Exam Prep

After the mock, we had some time off to prepare for the final exam. In addition to practicing our dishes, we had to finish the written component: a portfolio of all of our work, including recipes, diagrams, costing, photographs, and a self reflection of our time at Le Cordon Bleu.

My favorite part of the portfolio was drawing the illustrations of both of my dishes. As you might know, I love to draw food, so this was right up my alley! (I was also very happy about the new set of markers I’d impulse-bought on Amazon a few weeks earlier!)

We had to include a top view and cross section of our entremet, as well as a top view and detail drawing for our plated dessert:

Pastry Theory Exam

In addition to the final portfolio, I also spent some time reviewing my notes for the theory exam. The theory exam is a written test (multiple choice and essay questions) covering everything from vocabulary to recipes to health and safety information, and counts for a portion of our final cumulative grade for Superior Pâtisserie.

Exam Day

After a pretty good performance in the mock exam, I was less nervous than expected going into the final. A few jitters right at the very beginning, but I relaxed as soon I stepped into the kitchen and started cooking.

I thought my overall performance was pretty good. No major disasters, no forgotten components, nothing burned, nothing dropped on the floor! Both of my chocolates tempered nicely on the first try, and my entremet was perfectly frozen. I also finished a few minutes ahead of schedule. So, I was happy about that.

Of course there were things I could’ve done better. The glaze for my entremet was slightly colder than it should’ve been upon application. My sponge wrap was a tiny bit too short, and my tuiles didn’t hold their shape quite as well as they had in the mock. My shortbread disc cracked at the corner as I applied it to the entremet. And for the plated, the mango sauce was a little bit chunkier than I had expected it to be. But all things considered, I was happy with both of the dishes I presented for grading. (Oh, and no phones are allowed in the examination room, so unfortunately I don’t have pictures of my final creations to share!)

Final Debrief and Heading Home

A few days after the final exam, I returned to school one last time to receive my test results. And I’m happy to report that I passed! As a bonus, I received a strong score on the portfolio, too.

Due to the current state of the world, my last few weeks at LCB didn’t go quite as I’d expected. I had planned to have a couple of weeks after exams to travel, see shows, have goodbye drinks with friends, and visit all of my favorite London spots one last time before heading back to the States. I was also planning to walk in the graduation ceremony, and had already purchased a pretty dress to wear for the occasion.

But as we all know, the universe had other plans. I ended up scrambling to re-book my flight, pack up my apartment in a matter of days, and head back to the US as quickly as possible. Most of my classmates also left London as soon as they could, as LCB cancelled the graduation ceremony and people wanted to return home while still able to travel. I hope that the school might allow students to walk in a future graduation ceremony, as we missed out on the chance to celebrate our achievements, receive our diplomas, and don a chef’s hat for the first time!

As for London, I miss it already. I miss school, and my friends, and the city that very quickly became my second home. I now feel as much like a Londoner as I do a New Yorker, and I can’t wait to return as soon as it is safe to do so. I’ve already booked a place on Chef Nicolas Houchet’s Sugar Art Essentials Techniques course for September, and can only hope that the world will be somewhat back to normal by then.

What Now?

In the meantime I’ll keep practicing and improving my skills, so long as grocery stores can keep pantry staples in stock. (If anyone happens to know where I can purchase FLOUR of any kind, please let me know!) Over the next few weeks I’ll try to post some recipes that are easy to make, whether you’re an experienced baker or a complete newbie using all of these extra hours at home to try your hand at baking for the first time.

I’ll try to stick to tools, ingredients, and equipment that most people already have on hand. (Or at least things that should be affordable and readily available.) This is especially important during a time when many of us are short on funds, and purchasing a cold application glaze or an exotic fruit purée really isn’t much of a priority. And I’ll try to include plenty of substitutions, tips for stretching your ingredients, and best practices for freezing your homemade products, too.

If you’re at home with a pantry full of odds and ends and lots of hours to fill, shoot me a message on Instagram (@bastecutfold) and let me know what you’d like to bake, or which ingredients you’re trying to use efficiently, and I’ll help to customize a recipe for you.

Stay safe everyone, and happy baking!

---

About Rebecca:
Rebecca earned the Diplôme de Pâtisserie from Le Cordon Bleu London in 2020. She kept this detailed diary as a record of her journey, and as a way to help others decide if pastry school might be the right choice for them. Rebecca also holds an MSc in Culinary Innovation from Le Cordon Bleu and Birkbeck, University of London, and a Professional Chocolatier’s Certificate from Ecole Chocolate. She currently works as a recipe developer, food stylist, food photographer, writer, and pastry chef. Feel free to make one of her original recipes, or to follow her on Instagram @bastecutfold for more baking and pastry inspiration!