First week at the DEFLE

It's been a hectic first week, and a fairly difficult one too... for me, at least. I was placed in the most advanced level, the 3eme degré, for some unknown reason, considering I half-assed the tests in an attempt to be put into an easy (in comparison) class, and I am now trying to switch down to a lower level but they said I had to stick it out for a week... which I did.

The first day was rather lonely as I still didn't know anyone so I sat by myself and struggled through my first classes alone (Phonetique and Stylistique - the former is rather straight forward, just on pronunciation, but the latter is going to be a killer because I didn't understand a single thing). The second day I had Littérature Actuelle -- modern literature -- with a friend of mine in the 2eme degré so that was alright, and then I had Oral Communication which was torturous as I hate having to speak in front of a bunch of people I don't know. By Wednesday I'd made actual friends, a Polish girl and an American girl, so I had someone to sit with through Espaces Européens -- literally translated to European Spaces, but is pretty much a modern European history class -- and Grammaire, where, incidentally, I got picked on during a demonstration for this verbs game where someone chooses a verb and a tense (in this case, s'asseoir and the present tense) and then a person to conjugate it (in this case, me), and luckily I actually managed to do it correctly, but now I hold a grudge against the Columbian guy who picked me for putting me on the spot like that, haha. On Thursday I had a writing class then Compte Rendu which is the worst idea ever for a class... we listen to an oral piece such as an interview twice over then we have to summarise it, and if you don't understand the piece at all in the first place -- such as in my case -- it is literally impossible to summarise. And we have a two hour exam for that in December, goodness knows how that'll be conducted. Only had one class on Friday afternoon, Civilisation, where we are just taught all about France... I think I'd really enjoy that class once I can better understand what is being said.

Bought lots of French books yesterday, mostly grammar/orthography/conjugation help books, but also The Great Gatsby, The Virgin Suicides, and The Stranger in French. They should be easier to read as I pretty much know those books backwards in English as I've read them so much. I also bought my first ever cookbook, on all things chocolate! Hopefully I'll have an oven by next weekend so I can get back to baking. I cooked for the first time ever this morning though, and made pancakes in the mangy kitchen they provide us with.

Boring entry, I know. Haven't been up to much lately besides classes, it has started raining a lot here and I'm still getting used to travelling miles just to get groceries or do laundry. I don't have a proper internet connection from my dorm room either, and right now I'm sitting in the cold and rain on a step outside the DEFLE building just so I can get the university's wifi. I do love it here though, I really do.

On the first week in Bordeaux

Bonjour à tous!

Well, I'm finally in Bordeaux... and not surprisingly, the kitchen here in the dorms SUCK, to put it bluntly. All they have, literally, is a sink and an electric stove. No fridge, no microwave, NO OVEN. I do have -ahem- contacts, however, and I could very well procure my own mini oven within the next month to keep in my already very tiny dorm room, but hey, I'll gladly make space. Fingers crossed!

Classes at the DEFLE don't start until next Monday, although we had our placement tests a couple days ago and we find out which level class we're in tomorrow. The tests weren't considerably harder than what I've done in the past with IB French, but they were difficult considering I hadn't exactly been keeping up with my French skills over the summer. I completely blanked halfway through my oral test, mainly because I wasn't expecting to be asked that much since most people had really short conversations with their professors where they were only asked about themselves, and I babbled on about myself in perfect French but once I got asked about anything else, I suddenly forgot everything and ended up actually asking my professor at one point, Parlez-vous anglais? because I didn't know how to explain myself in French, haha.

Not much else to say from this point except that France is a foodie's paradise, through and through. Bordeaux is fascinating, and last Sunday we came across a farmer's market and wow. I was speechless with awe.

Gorgeous strawberries for sale.

Homemade cheeses... the smell around this stall was quite strong, as you can imagine.

Artisanal breads and cakes, mmm!

Delicious looking pastries that I wish I had tried.

A macaron tower at a chocolatier's in the city.

Rustic -- but ever so yummy, of course -- homemade macarons I bought at the farmer's market.

Vineyards, a very common sight in this city. This one is just down the road from my dorm building, and there are loads more all over the university campus.

I have yet to try Bordelais specialities such as the wine and canelés, but naturally, I will blog about it when I do!

On baking doughnuts... or not

I'm always up for a good healthy alternative to something otherwise pound-inducing. It's hard to turn away from the fried foods, though, as everything seems to taste better when it's deep-fried. Why is everything that is so bad for you have to just taste so good?

Onto doughnuts (no, not donuts). Nowadays you find all these special-flavoured doughnuts with funky-coloured icing and well... it's just wrong. Nothing beats your basic, sugared -- or even better, glazed -- doughnuts, and to me all those weird flavours just ruins an already perfectly good thing. The original glazed Krispy Kreme doughnuts? I can guzzle down a dozen of them without any hesitation... it's not until after they're all gone that I realise how many calories I just devoured. It's disheartening, really, to know you have to eat all of these delicious snacks in moderation as you have to worry about how much fat and sugar and god-knows-what-else you're consuming. It almost makes you want to stop eating... until, of course, you have that box of doughnuts in front of you, 'cause damnnit, they're just that irresistable.

Now, a baked doughnut? Really? I was a skeptic, and honestly, I still am. These were all right if you are really, really concerned about eating something fried for whatever reason, but otherwise... don't bother. They are dense and fluffy and quite different in texture from your typical fried doughnut -- and no, not necessarily in a bad way -- but it just does not compare. I baked half of the batch and fried the other half, and I must confess, I much preferred the fried ones! Just eat only vegetables for the rest of the day and spend a few hours at the gym, it is worth it. (FYI - the pictures are of the baked ones. There were no fried ones left to take photos of, aha.)


Baked Doughnuts
From 101 Cookbooks
Makes 1 1/2 - 2 dozen medium doughnuts

1 1/3 cups warm milk, 95 to 105 degrees (divided)
1 packet active dry yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)
2 tablespoons butter
2/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
5 cups all-purpose flour
A pinch or two of nutmeg, freshly grated
1 teaspoon fine grain sea salt

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon

Place 1/3 cup of the warm milk in the bowl of an electric mixer. Stir in the yeast and set aside for five minutes or so. Stir the butter and sugar into the remaining cup of warm milk and add it to the yeast mixture. With a fork, stir in the eggs, flour, nutmeg, and salt - just until the flour is incorporated. With the dough hook attachment of your mixer beat the dough for a few minutes at medium speed. This is where you are going to need to make adjustments - if your dough is overly sticky, add flour a few tablespoons at a time. Too dry? Add more milk a bit at a time. You want the dough to pull away from the sides of the mixing bowl and eventually become supple and smooth. Turn it out onto a floured counter-top, knead a few times (the dough should be barely sticky), and shape into a ball.

Transfer the dough to a buttered (or oiled) bowl, cover, put in a warm place (I turn on the oven at this point and set the bowl on top), and let rise for an hour or until the dough has roughly doubled in size.

Punch down the dough and roll it out 1/2-inch thick on your floured countertop. Stamp out circles with a 2-inch cookie cutter. Transfer the circles to a parchment-lined baking sheet and stamp out the smaller inner circles using a smaller cutter. If you cut the inner holes out any earlier, they become distorted when you attempt to move them. Cover with a clean cloth and let rise for another 45 minutes.

Bake in a 375 degree oven until the bottoms are just golden, 8 to 10 minutes - start checking around 8. While the doughnuts are baking, place the butter in a medium bowl. Place the sugar and cinnamon in a separate bowl.

Remove the doughnuts from the oven and let cool for just a minute or two. Dip each one in the melted butter and a quick toss in the sugar bowl. Or, like I did, whip up a quick chocolate ganache by mixing equal parts warm cream and chocolate, and dip the doughnuts in that.

Eat immediately if not sooner.

NB. Definitely make sure your inner holes are sufficiently large, or they will close up when you bake them like mine did. Unless you fry them, of course, in which case the holes are more likely to remain intact. (Another upside to frying, oh yes!)

On actually eating croissants for breakfast

I have spent the last week worrying about whether I was going to get my long-term visa for France or not, or rushing back and fro from the French embassy, and finally, after a month and a half of waiting, I have gotten it! It was such a relief that we already started preparing things I need to bring, even though I'm not leaving for another two weeks. We've bought so much stuff over the last week -- towels, bedsheets, a mini kettle, a mini iron, etc -- I think if I suddenly had to leave tomorrow, I'd probably be ready to. When I finally do go though, I must remember to smuggle out my measuring cups and spoons, because I am adamant to find some way to continue baking while I'm there.

This blog has been alive for nearly two weeks now, and I reckoned it was about time I tried to make its namesake. I've tried making croissants before, maybe a year or so ago, and the results were horrendous. They somehow turned into a greasy, grey mess and were practically inedible -- needless to say, that experience scarred me and I never wanted to attempt making croissants again. Perhaps one day I'll take a real pastry class and learn properly, but otherwise I'm wary about making real croissants at home. This is probably the wrong country to make proper pastry in though, as the heat makes it impossible to keep the butter and the dough ice-cold at all times.

I then found a recipe for Simple Croissants on Snippets and it seemed less daunting so I decided to give it a go. They were surprisingly good: a little bready and not as flaky as you'd want a perfect croissant to be, but good enough to satiate a croissant craving. I misread the recipe and accidentally tossed in two eggs instead of one, and also forgot to knead the dough after taking it out of the fridge, but they still seemed to turn out all right. Not as pretty as the ones on Snippets, of course, but I obviously still need lots and lots of practice. However, it is lovely that you can make the dough the night before and then bake them in the morning and have fresh croissants for breakfast.

Simple Croissants
Adapted from Taste of Home
Makes 32 rolls

2 packages active dry yeast
1 cup warm water
1 1/4 cups cold butter, divided
5 cups flour
1/3 cup sugar
1 1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 cup evaporated milk
2 eggs
1 tbsp water

Proof yeast in warm water for 5-10 min. Melt 1/4 cup butter and add to yeast mixture along with 1 cup of flour, sugar, salt, milk and 1 egg. Stir until smooth.

Put remaining 4 cups flour in a large bowl and cut in 1 cup of cold butter until you get coarse crumbs. Add to yeast mixture and combine until well incorporated making sure not to over mix or knead. Cover and let sit in the fridge for 8 hours (or overnight).

Punch dough down and score into four sections. Take one section out and knead on a lightly floured surface 6 times. Roll out into a 16 inch circle and cut into 8 wedges. Roll wedges up starting at the wide end. Place point side down on an ungreased baking sheet and curve to form a crescent shape. Repeat with remaining dough. Cover and let rise for one hour.

Beat the remaining egg with 1 tbsp of water and brush over rolls. Bake for 20-25 min at 325°F, until lightly brown.


Terribly lighted photo (one day I must really buy a DSLR, my point-and-shoot is way past its glory days), but this is just an attempt to show the innards of the croissant, it is quite light and fluffy.

On chocolate chip cookie dough and cheesecake

I worry about moving away and not having a decent kitchen in the university dorms, and consequently not being able to bake. There are three things I love to bake and probably bake the most often, and two of those three things are chocolate chip cookies and cheesecake (the third, of course, are brownies). All of them are comfort foods and I bake at least one out of the three once a month; I can't imagine going without any of them for months at a time (and shop-bought does not count: it must be homemade).

The first time I saw this recipe on Bake or Break I knew I wanted to make it. I tried making this recipe once before and absolutely loved it, and decided to make it again today to bring over to my friend Anna's house to eat while watching movies. This is ultimate comfort food: chocolate chip cookie dough on a cheesecake base, with chocolate chips baked into the graham cracker crust, and drizzled on top with chocolate as well. Honestly, what's not to love about them?


Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cheesecake Bars
From The Essential Chocolate Chip Cookbook

Crust
1 & 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs
5 Tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
2/3 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 325°. Butter a 9″-square baking pan. Line pan with parchment paper, leaving enough to extend over the sides. Butter the parchment paper.

Combine graham cracker crumbs and butter until crumbs are moistened. Stir in chocolate chips. Press crust mixture into bottom of pan and 1 inch up sides. Bake for 6 minutes. Set pan on wire rack to cool

Cookie Dough
5 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/3 cup packed light brown sugar
3 Tablespoons granulated sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Using an electric mixer , mix butter, brown sugar, sugar, salt, and vanilla extract at medium speed until smooth. Decrease mixer speed to low and add flour. Mix just until incorporated. Stir in chocolate chips. Set aside.

Filling
10 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Using an electric mixer, beat cream cheese and sugar just until smooth. Add egg and vanilla extract, beating just until blended.

Pour batter into baked crust. Drop cookie dough by teaspoonfuls over the top of the filling. Bake about 30 minutes, or until set. Transfer to wire rack.

For chocolate topping, melt 1/3 cup semisweet chocolate chips in a double boiler or in the microwave. Add about 1/2 tablespoon of butter if necessary to make chocolate smooth. Drizzle over top of bars. Cool bars in pan completely, about an hour.

Using the edges of the parchment paper, remove bars from pan. Cut into bars and serve.