Culinary Arts: CUL 124 - Baking and Pastry

The bread at San Francisco's legendary Tartine Bakery was developed by renowned baker Chad Robertson over a decade of working with the finest artisan bakers in the United States and France, followed by another decade baking solo in a small wood-fired oven on the coast of Northern California. The following for this singular bread far exceeds the bakery's daily production. Now, clear instructions and hundreds of step-by-step photos show you how to make this elemental bread using just flour, water, and salt. Also included are more than 30 sweet and savory recipes using the day-old bread to make sandwiches, soups, puddings, French toast and kale Caesar

Today we understand more than we once did about how ingredients of food scientifically interact with one another and how to change them to make them different using methods such as jellifying, powdering, foaming--methods common to what is known as molecular gastronomy. As a result, modern pastry chefs are making amendments to time-honoured recipes to suit the modern palate. They are not cutting corners to make a less professional or delicious product. They are using new technology and knowledge that was not available 100 years ago, and they want to explore the creative side of pastry.

Sixteen French pastry chefs gather in Lyon for three intense days of mixing, piping and sculpting everything from delicate chocolates to six-foot sugar sculptures in hopes of being declared winner of the prestigious Meilleurs Ouvriers de France competition (Best Craftsmen in France). The blue, white and red striped collar worn on the jackets of the winner is more than the ultimate recognition for every pastry chef--is a dream and an obsession. Filmmakers D A Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus secured exclusive access to shoot this epic never-before-filmed test of France’s finest artisans. The film follows chef Jacquy Pfeiffer, co-founder of Chicago’s French Pastry School, as he journeys back to his childhood home of Alsace to practice for the contest. Two other finalists are profiled in the film--chef Regis Lazard, who was competing for the second time (he dropped his sugar sculpture the first time), and chef Philippe Rigollot, from Maison Pic, France’s only three-star restaurant owned by a woman. During the grueling final competition, chefs work under constant scrutiny by master judges and the critical palates of some of the world’s most renowned chefs evaluate their elaborate pastries. Finally, these pastry marathoners racing the clock must hand carry all their creations, including their fragile sugar sculptures, through a series of rooms to a final buffet area without shattering them. The film captures the high-stakes drama of the competition--passion, sacrifice, disappointment, and joy--in the quest to become one of the Kings of Pastry.