So I would like to teach you how to use a few fancy-pants pastry chef techniques, and today is Part One in the two-part series! These techniques can be slightly more advanced and are for those of you who are looking to up the ante on your baked goods, pastries, or desserts in general. The techniques I will be laying out include how to temper chocolate, which is basically making sure your chocolate looks nice and shiny and snaps crisply after you have cooked with it, and how to quenelle something such as cream in a slightly more sophisticated fashion than the good old dollop. Both of these techniques are great for the presentation of your dishes, so listen up if you're eager to impress! Today I will be covering how to quenelle.
How to Quenelle
What you'll need:
- Two spoons of the same size - go for a deeper spoon if you can, as it makes creating a rounder shape much easier! The spoons should be at a temperature warm enough to manipulate the ingredient, but not so warm that they melt it.
- The ingredient you wish to make in to a quenelle shape, e.g. ice cream, whipped/double cream, or mousse. The ingredient should be at room temperature - i.e. Not so firm that it can't be shaped, but not so close to a liquid that it can't hold it's shape.
Steps:
- Hold a spoon in both hands and scoop a reasonable amount of the ingredient into one of your spoons. Carefully scoop underneath the ingredient with the second spoon, transferring the contents between spoons.
- Transfer the ingredient back to the original spoon using the same movement. You will notice that this begins to create a smooth, rounded surface.
- Keep repeating this process, passing the ingredient between the spoons until you have the smooth, oval shape that you desire.
This can be a bit tricky, so if you need help see this video for further demonstration.
Source: http://www.finecooking.com/item/13273/making-quenelles
Posted by Clare Mannion.
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