Precision Pastry Arts and Frozen Dessert Production

This course explores stimulating applications of both classic and contemporary pastry techniques to pastry shop and a la carte restaurant production. The program focuses on three main topics: the use of freezing temperatures through a survey of the possible applications in which cold temperatures and the balance of ingredients play a fundamental role; handling fresh and seasonal fruits in pastry production; the increasing use of ingredients such as thickening and gelling agents in order to create products with unexpectedly smooth textures, a wide variety of gels and contemporary mousses, and pastry applications of molecular gastronomy. Through this experience students will have the possibility to understand the role of specific ingredients in the production of ices in order to serve frozen desserts with a perfect balance between texture and temperature. The course will disclose all the secrets of pastry arts classics like semifreddo, bomba gelato, parfait and bon bons. Special emphasis will be placed on the uses of liquid nitrogen for different purposes other than freezing, stimulating effects of carbonation on food flavor perception, and the application of frozen food processing with the Pacojet food processor. The course offers a full-immersion in the pastry lab production with an important focus on techniques that can be available in a professional environment and allow pastry chefs to develop their creativity in order to reach new unexpected results.