The Duelist is upset and you might as well hear about it. I burned my thumb with isomalt sugar in class yesterday, my sucking thumb. (No no, I don't really suck it anymore but at times, like a fretful child, I can still imagine the comfort of a soft blanket and a balled-up fist to the face.)
Of course, the closer we get to the finish line, the more painful this journey to a culinary degree becomes. I know this is true. Right now, I feel all too Hans Solo in the carbonite mold, slabbed from head to toe, with no place to go until the rescue party gets here.
"No," I told the chef yesterday, "I do not expect to be able to blow this blob of heated sugar into a ball using copper tubing and a blood pressure pump before Thursday." She seemed to understand, didn't try to stop me as I scuttled out of the room, my thumb in flames, "just need a moment" hissing through my teeth.
We are just 3 days from finishing advanced patisserie (plated desserts), and the most scorching of products has been saved for the end. Do you know what a dollop of 320-degree sugar feels like on bare skin? Just ask my thumb. My purple thumb. The one I strike the space bar with, the hitchhiker thumb, the thumb's up thumb. The comforter.
Why (and this is whining at its surliest here) do I need to blow sugar into a fish that goes in the "Under the Sea" showpiece when I'm least feeling bold and courageous? When we're out on externship we will not be doing this kind of work. Panning cookies, yes. Scooping muffins. Piping white chocolate over chocolate-dipped strawberries. Making buttercream rosettes on troops of cupcakes. Do you imagine we'll make sugar showpieces with butterflies and ribbons? I think back to a certain chef from a well-known entertainment mega-giant company who told a pastry student, "our wedding cakes may run $4,000. You'll never get near one on externship."
Exactly. So take this boiling sugar from me. Blow it, pull it, melt it with a torch, do whatever you want. I'm all thumbs when it comes to this kind of work, and I need both of them, believe me.
Oh but isn't this a lovely picture above of a Napoleon with a bubble sugar garnish and a sugar spear?
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