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If At First You Don’t Succeed, Bake, Bake Again

‘Tis a lesson you should heed,
Try, try again.
If at first you don’t succeed,
Try, try again.’     –William Edward Hickson, Try and Try Again

This post is for anyone who has ever had a hard time baking and felt discouraged to go on.

It happens to the best of us; it really, really does. Just watch any reality cooking show long enough and you’re bound to see a chef mistake salt for sugar or lose their temper when their soufflé falls. And yet they push on; they keep going. And so should you.

November 11th 052

Half of the times I make something, it doesn’t come out as planned. I write a recipe based on the certain techniques I know will always work, like creaming butter and sugar. Could anything be better? Well, looks can be deceiving. These looked good going in the oven…

November 11th 068

But I guessed.

And I bent a few rules.

And when that batch of cookies came out of the oven they were flatter than Kansas, and it was back to the drawing boards.

Whoops! I wanted to quit and say “That recipe just wasn’t ‘meant’ to come out”. But deep inside I knew just because I was knocked off that horse didn’t  mean I should give up. What I really needed was some inspiration.

November 11th 002

Hi, my name is Evan Thomas, and running this blog is what I do.

The best thing I could think to do was learn from my mistakes. I went back to the drawing boards, compared the recipes to other cookie recipes, and—when all else failed—consulted an expert.

Untitled

Because google can be pretty helpful sometimes.

After I figured out everything that could have possibly gone wrong, I found a way to make everything go right. I got back into the kitchen and tried again. And you know what? It worked.

November 11th 013

(recipe to come)

If at first you don’t succeed, bake, bake again.

Macaron Monday: Trying Is Something

Nov 1st 042

3 attempts at Macaron Monday later and I have no recipe to report.

But I refuse to say I failed , because I tried, and that was the whole point of Macaron Monday: To try something new. And I definitely tried. Each attempt was a learning experience in why I wasn’t doing something right.

Attempt #1

Oct 28th 021

The lesson here was pretty simple: Coconut flour cannot be used in place of almond flour to make macarons. It’s too fibrous and doesn’t spread during baking. What these did make was something close to donut hole, so I covered them in chocolate and all was well.

Attempt 2

Nov 1st 028

This was probably the closest I got to making macarons(also the picture at the top of this post comes from this try). What I did right was whipping my egg whites by hand, rather than a food processor. As I went to pour the egg whites into the other ingredients, however, I noticed a pool of unwhipped egg whites at the bottom. Also, I used wax paper instead of parchment paper, which the macarons stuck to and so I was only able to scrape two cookies off before throwing the rest out.

Attempt 3

Nov 7th 033

These were the tastiest by far, but they never rose and were clearly not cooked evenly. I was going to make a white chocolate-raspberry ganache for the filling, but it just seemed like a waste of ingredients since these were clearly not the macarons I wanted to make.

Nov 7th 030

I can make ice cream, brownies, even mound bars. So why didn’t these turn out OK? I hate to make excuses, and I hate to say I “can’t” do something. But truthfully I was not working with the right equipment to make these. Every time my egg whites weren’t whipped properly, either after 20 minutes of hand whipping or a minute in a food processor. Ideally I think you should use an automatic mixer but I don’t keep one around because those are so cumbersome and I usually make vegan baked goods. And I have no clue what the oven here is calibrated at but I doubt that’s correct either.

Will I try to make these again some day? Maybe. But not anytime soon and not in a dorm room. I need to learn my limitations and clean the batter off my bedspread in the meantime.

Meet The Wannabe Chef

Welcome to The Wannabe Chef.

Evan 01

The truth is that no one’s born a chef; we all come into this world the same way: Naked. We have no aprons, no whisks, and no poofy hats.

It took me 18 years of life to fall in love with cooking. Before then, I made brownies from boxes and microwaved popcorn, but I never really fell in love with the ingredients—just the food.

I remember the first real cookie recipe I made—oatmeal cookies with coconut, dark chocolate chips, and lots(and lots) of butter. When people told me they truly enjoyed what I created, it was like a high. I never stopped trying after that more and more to please others with my cooking.

October 15th 007

At 18 I found myself alone and in charge for the first time. Who cooks in college? Nobody cooks in college. But I cooked in college. Armed with just a frying pan and a 30-year old stove 3 stories below me, I was determined to make my own food whenever possible. It just tasted better. And when I could cook for others felt like a dream come true; I’ve never stopped being delighted in having others enjoy the food I make.

And then it hit me: I want to be a chef. At 19, it was just one of those moments where I was cooking and thought “If only I could do this for a living!” when I realized you can do this for a living. It’s called being a chef…

September 30th 004

I’ve never taken a formal cooking class in my life; I’m a college student taking courses for a concentration has nothing to do with food. And all I want to do in life is cook. I cook for fun; I cook to relax; I cook to eat; I cook to please. And I’m determined to make this work, because I’ve always believed you can do anything you put your mind to.

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So won’t you join me? I can promise you recipes, food talk, and ramblings about some of my favorite chefs. My road might be long, but it will be tasty, because I am the wannabe chef.