Days 6 & 7! :D

Day 6:
I didn't write yesterday, so I'll just do a little recap. I worked with/did something for Wafa for the first time, she intimidates me, I'm not sure why. Maybe I just feel like she doesn't think I know what I'm doing, who knows. But she is nice, don't get me wrong! Anyhow, she had me make chocolate covered strawberries. After I did that, she had me drizzle them with white chocolate (using a piping bag), she showed me. Then I did it, and she said I was doing fine, although she was making me nervous and I wasn't doing as well as I could have. (It's super simple for goodness sake!) While I was doing that Salmina (lady from Bosnia, makes bite size treats), came over and was getting flustered, apparently she thought it was outrageous that I was using two hands on the piping bag. Wafa tried to tell her to just let me do it the way I was, to let me learn it first. Salmina just couldn't handle it though, she made me use one hand, by cupping the end of the parchment bag in my hand and then piping. This caused my poor left hand to be left out and just hang out awkwardly. I was quite baffled by the whole thing. JWU and NCCTC had both taught me to use two hands to pipe. One to guide and one to secure the end and keep the flow going. I guess that is just ludicrous to her and probably other Sweet Dreams workers though. I did notice that Amal Fruit was using just one hand while piping frosting onto her cakes. Anyhow, that was weird. Let's see, what else did I do...? I made cupcakes with Mai (girl from Thailand, younger, kind of quiet), she let me participate- unlike Stephen. I like working with her, she tells me how to do things, but doesn't hover over me and she trusts that I know what I'm doing. We made a bunch of Red Velvet & Chocolate cupcakes, (don't tell, but we used cake mix for those), to get the batter evenly into the liners, we used this neat little machine. The batter is poured into the top, which is open, then after the machine is turned on, it spins out batter according to a number system (we used 71 for these) there are 4 openings and they line up with the cupcake tins. That makes it super easy, convenient, clean, and fast to make cupcakes! Then pop them into the amazing, massive, rotating 6 rack oven, and wait for them to get springy and perfect. Oh, I also practiced frosting a styrofoam (round) cake. Melanie let me crumb coat 3 sheet cakes, which was nice. I think that's mostly all I did, I helped Amal in any down time I had.


Day 7
Let's see, today I worked with Amal again, she's my favorite!! :) I cut strawberries for her- everyone was using strawberries in their cakes today. Then I practiced with the sheet/square foam cake, that was pretty difficult, I haven't worked with anything besides round cakes before. Except for the one rectangle cake (present cake) I made in Specialty Cakes and covered in fondant. I practiced that for about 30 minutes, while Amal finished doing something before we assembled cakes together. After she was finished, we made assembled a new cake! Well, new for me! It's called "Death by Chocolate" haha! It's a chocolate chiffon cake layered with chocolate ganache, chocolate crunch bits, chocolate mousse, and then another layer, the whole thing is frosted with chocolate butter cream, & I think glazed in chocolate. Amal & I didn't glaze it, we just assembled it, and then she frosted it while I assembled the cookie dough cake. I was so excited that I got to make the cookie dough one! I've been curious about it ever since Amal showed me it in the display, the second or so day after I started. I removed the cakes from the pans, cut them in half, stacked them, put the 6" in the cooler while I worked on the 9". Each one is a layer of chocolate chiffon cake, whipped cream, chocolate chip cookie dough chunks, then another layer of that, topped with a plain cake layer. I think it's frosted with whipped cream then chocolate curls on the sides, and garnished with more whipped cream and cookie dough chunks, but I'll find out tomorrow. I made 20, 9" and 20, 6". That was the last thing Amal & I did for the day, we cleaned up then headed home. :)

Oh, I tried quite a few things today! I had little bits of the whipped cream, chocolate mousse, and chocolate ganache, which of course were all good. The whipped cream has a different texture and taste, because of the blend of regular and non-dairy creams. Amal also shared an apple and a banana with me, she always has to make sure I'm fed :P She also had me try flaky puff pastry. Then towards the end of the day, Saad (Wafa's husband, he does cleaning, ordering, makes things for the cakes to stand on, etc.) gave me a cup of Pistachio ice cream. I only know it's pistachio because of the chopped nuts resting on the top. It is seriously like nothing I've ever tasted, and I don't know if I'm in love or don't like it at all. It's truly intriguing! Obviously it's creamy, almost minty, bitter but very sweet at the same time, smooth. I can't describe it, you must eat it yourself and decide what it's like.

Stephen taught me two words during lunch today.
Banana- well I don't know how it's spelled, but it's pronounced something in between "mouse" and "malls" more like mouse though
Meat- la. hey. ma. Once again, no spelling, but that's the pronunciation.
Also I heard the word "charmoota" a lot today :/ aka bitch