Sugar Works

Please don't eat the sugar. The idea is to play with it.

In the photo are four examples of sugar that's been pulled, piped, poured or made into a sugar paste known as pastillage.

If you've never heard of pastillage, think of it as a happy medium like working with Play-Doh. You've seen pastillage if you've ever popped an Altoid mint. Though it starts out in paste form that can be molded in many ways, pastillage dries to a hard result, which makes it a swell choice for display pieces.

The great Careme championed pastillage because he figured out that this original form of flavored candy could be used (if glued together) to make architectural showpieces known as pieces montees, some of which ended up on Napoleon’s table. Today pastillage is mostly made of powdered sugar and can include gelatin, an acid such as vinegar, water and cornstarch.

Make a batch, keeping it covered as you work so it doesn't dry out, and try your hand at flowers, 3D pieces, anything you like. For glue, whip up some royal icing (also keeping it covered so it doesn't dry up). 

Pastillage looks grand in its pristine white form, but you can paint it or airbrush it after the pieces have fully dried.

You'll find countless recipes online for how to make pastillage. For best results, make the pastillage at least a day before you plan to use it. After you've formed it into a big ball of paste, coat it with a little shortening, wrap it in plastic wrap, then a piece of wet paper towel, then more plastic wrap. Keep it stored in the fridge. When ready to use, knead it a bit to soften it up, then lightly dust your work surface with cornstarch (flour is too drying) for rolling it out. 

What can you do with pastillage? How about a peacock and an antique hair comb for an Art Deco feel on a cake? Go ahead, play around.

Under the Sea (of Sugar)

To explain what this is you're looking at: In my last post, I whined about burning my thumb trying to blow sugar for the final piece in the advanced patisserie class. I expressed doubt that like trig, calculus and algebra, blowing sugar would ever be useful in life.

I'm fortunate that two other classmates were less dismissive of the concept. They helped pull off the "Under the Sea" assignment of presenting four different sugar techniques. What you see here is a bit of a tossed salad, but we were working against extremely humid conditions, and pieces either melted or shattered, depending on sugary temperament. In other words, it was stick it together and go like aces before the blame thing cracked.

If you look to the right in the photo, you'll see a mermaid sitting on a piece of orange sugar coral. Here's how you get the coral: Heat up a pot of isomalt sugar with a touch of water in it, then pour this over a large container of ice cubes. As the sugar cools, it drizzles down through the ice for a rather cool effect. The mermaid, the work of a crafty friend, is made of pulled sugar pieces. How do you get pulled sugar? Same approach - heat up the isomalt and water to about 329 degrees, have a heat lamp standing by and a Silpat (fancy rubber sheet). Pour out the sugar onto the sheet, and when it is malleable under the heat lamp, start pulling it like taffy. This creates shine and an ability to mold the sugar - but did I mention wearing three pairs of gloves? This is ghastly hot work.

Also in our showpiece, there are two blown fish and a jellyfish (not blown by me, but I did overcome my revulsion to it), also wavy frondy things and some bubble sugar not quite visible in the back of the ring. Doing the bubble sugar is a snap. Just pour some isomalt (no heating!) onto a Silpat, cover with another Silpat and place in the oven at about 350 degrees. Wait the length of a cup of tea, and you'll get a melted, bubbly effect that is visually seaworthy.

The blue ring and the base this creation is sitting on are made of "cast" sugar, that is, heat it up, pour into a cake ring (or one ring inside of another to get the cylinder effect) and within an hour, remove the rings.

You glue pieces together by using the heated sugar like hot glue. Works, sticks, gets a little messy but keep going.

Should I say how we got the colors? The white coral was done with white food coloring - yes, white food coloring. The other elements were done in the same way - just heat the isomalt and the water about halfway to 329, say around 265ish. Add color at that stage, then continue boiling the sugar until you've reached the top temp. If you don't pull the sugar, the mixture will remain colored but clear enough to see through. By pulling the sugar, you achieve shine, oxygenate the crystalline structure and end up with an opaque piece in your thrice gloved hands.

Check out Pastry Chef Central if you want to buy isomalt. Don't try anything I just said above at home unless you're clever, creative and fear nothing at high temperature. A burn is a burn is a burn.

Burning Shame

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?