Week 3

Without question, I can say that my happiest moment from this week was taking my French macarons out of the oven and seeing that they turned out exactly how I hoped they would. I had tried to make macarons a while ago and they turned out horrible, which was why I had very little hope this time around. However, I think this project has taught me to be precise in my baking and pay attention to the little things, which definitely helped me this week since macarons are a very technical thing to bake. When I was baking as a hobby before senior projects, I'd often make dishes that weren't so technical, like brownies or cookies, so I wouldn't worry too much about paying attention to the seemingly minor details like straining powdered sugar and chocolate powder before mixing it in. As I've baked more complicated items though, disregarding those details became problematic. I've learned that being exact in my baking can be the difference between a successful dessert or a funky one. This lesson is what helped my macarons turn out airy, crispy, rich, and moist.

I think that this project in particular also helped me work towards my first goal, which was to learn more about the ways different ingredients affect the way a baked good comes out. For example, I learned that almond flour provides more structure and stability than all purpose flour, especially when working with a dough as light and gooey as macaron dough. Similarly, while baking a loaf of bread, it was interesting to see how much yeast can make a dough rise. I had made focaccia before, but that didn't require overnight proofing or as much yeast as this loaf of bread did, so I was surprised to wake up the morning after making the dough to see that it had almost quadrupled in size!

A question I'm left with after this week is how can I explore with different flavors in my bread? I think that the recipe I tried this week seems like a really good base, and tastes really well on its own, but I'd love to try to add other things to it. I'm just not sure if adding other things will mess with the consistency or the way the bread turns out.