The last couple of months I’ve been working on the dessert menu for a restaurant, La Coccinella within the VW complex Autostadt in Germany. The concept of the restaurant is in house made fresh pasta with delicious cakes baked fresh every day.  It’s been a change from the Christmas pâtisserie concept I’ve worked on for the last four years (although that’s coming up very soon).

I arrived two weeks ago with my Pâtisserie kit and my chef whites packed. The only thing we were going to produce was going to be dust cake as everything was still a building site. It was an around the clock work job with everyone on board to get everything working. A couple of days practice and the restaurant was open to the public. The cuisine team churn out tonnes of delicious fresh pasta everyday while in the pâtisserie sweet treats are made daily to tastilize everyones tastebuds. The pasta menu changes daily. And a new dessert menu will be helping you pile on the pounds every month

It was role reversal for me on my first visit to Marrakesh (it was also my first visit to North Africa) where I attended some cookery classes. Normally I’m the one teaching.

The cookery class took place at a Riad in the Medina which was almost impossible to find. An hour and half late and after going round in several circles we finally arrived at this stunning Riad. It was like walking onto a set for a glossy interiors magazine. Anyway after a glass of freshly pressed orange juice (one of the best things about Marrakesh was the abundance of freshly pressed orange juice) we got down to some serious business by making some morrocan biscuits.

“Cornes de gazelle” translated “Gazelle’s horns” were on the menu. These biscuits are probably the most popular of all the morrocan biscuits. They are simple a biscuit which is filled with almond paste. The dominant flavours are orange flower water and almonds.

Fairly simple to do: a basic pastry dough (similar to a filo pastry) is made and blanched ground almonds are blended with sugar and a bit of butter to make an almond paste.  The pastry is rolled out thinly and cut into squares. Then a sausage shaped bit of almond paste is placed into the middle and the pastry is folded over the top and pressed down to make a horn shape. A little egg is brushed on top and then they’re baked for about 10-15 minutes. There are some versions which are dusted with icing sugar but I prefer mine without. Unfortunately I lost my scribbled piece of paper where I noted my recipe but it’s similar to this one here.

The same mixture and pastry was used to make money bag shaped cookies. In addition to those were made some simple orange flower water cookies and chocolate cookies.

They had these great stamps which created a pattern after being stamped onto the biscuit.

Our teacher was lovely and very patient with all my questions, even put up with all my picture taking too. Speaking French was definetly an advantage.

Just a note: the biscuits keep for a good couple of weeks in an airtight container, that’s if you can stop yourself eating them all

Ask first © 2010 R Khooks, Rachel Khoo. All rights reserved.

Last week I started to dabble in with sourdough. I got a crash course in sourdough bread baking but was still a little dubious as my track record with looking after living things isn’t that great.  Maintaining a starter felt all too much like having to take care of a plant or a beer smelling tamagotchi. My last attempt of growing rosemary and thyme ended up in the bin. Luckily Clotilde from Chocolat & Zucchini has been doing a great job writing about sourdough with plenty of recipes.

Ask first © 2010 R Khooks, Rachel Khoo. All rights reserved.

Sourdough or a natural starter is a combination of fermented flour, water, wild yeasts and friendly bacteria which is used to leaven bread. It’s a tradition to name your starter, so I decided to baptise mine “Lucca” as I’m testing and researching sourdough bread recipes for some culinary workshops I’ll be doing in Tuscany near the town of Lucca.

I went about feeding my starter every day (organic white flour and filtered water). I accidently put it in the fridge and it froze but I managed to bring it back to life. It’s quite warm in Paris (Spring has finally kicked off) which is just the kind of temperature Lucca likes. A week of feeding and I thought it was about time to put Lucca to a test. I used the 1 2 3 sourdough recipe which is pretty fool proof. I went for a mix of wholewheat and white flour with a sprinkling of seeds. I made my sponge early in the morning, gave it 6 hours and then made the dough in the afternoon and left it to rise for a further 6 hours and by 10pm I had a fresh loaf. I must say I’m very impressed with the crust which is made by putting the dough in a oven proof dish with a lid to bake. The water evaporating from the bread creates steam and makes a very crunchy crust. Another plus with sourdough is the bread keeps really well. Even a week later toasted it still tastes great. More beer smelling tamagotchi tales to follow…

Ask first © 2010 R Khooks, Rachel Khoo. All rights reserved.

Check out Clotilde’s well documented basic sourdough recipe for further information.

On the 6th October 2009 a Pie Party was circled on my social calender. I headed down to La Cocotte to show everyone how to make them. Lemon meringue, Banoffee, Apple & Cheddar and Pumpkin pie, plus a delicious pie crust were head lining the event. Recipes were all easy as pie

Special thanks to Djoukaze for the photos.

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If you are on a picture and you want it to be removed, please send me an email.

Many thanks to the school of life for the photos.

Off with the chef whites, on with the fake eye lashes, kitten heels and my 1950s outfit. Chef Khoo no longer it was Miss Khoo who took over the Chacha in Paris for the tastiest event in town.

Monday, the 13th July 2009 I created a 3 course dinner and a Kennedy cocktail to tantalize the Parisian tastebuds. Topped off with a cupcake pimping session and some swinging sixties & fifties sounds spun by DJ Sylvania.

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Photography: Juan Diosdado.

After muffins, teatime and cupcakes it was time for something a little bit more intergalactical: Mooncakes! Well actually they’re not from out of space but a chinese pâtisserie. Mooncake madness took place at La Cocotte, Paris on the 8th April and 30th June 2009.

Check out Elleadore.com for some more pics.

Special thanks to Jim Rosemberg for the photos.

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Back to work Bento box at Jo Evens Showroom in Paris on the 5th October 2008. Wacky manga characters, blue rice, lots of veg…everyone got their hands sticky making their yummy bento boxes.

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Le dimanche 5 Octobre au Showroom JO EVENS à Paris “Spécial Fashion – L’atelier de boite à Bento”.

Télécharger la recette de l’atelier Bento box ici

Oh so British teatime at La Cocotte on the 29th June 2008. Everyone had a hand on making their own scones, a demonstration on the Art of drinking tea (and how to drink it correctly) and of course a proper teatime with china cups, jam, clotted cream and scones fresh out of the oven.

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Cupcake pimping sessions at La Cocotte. First one started on the 15th May 2008. So popular that there were not 1, not 2 but 3 sessions!

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