Back to school

Have been back at school for around 10 days now - the Easter break was lovely and it was a shock to the system to get back into school routine. We were eased back into the lab last week as we were working on chocolate "pieces", larger and more ambitious chocolate decorations/centrepieces seeing as it was Easter. The chocolate work required wasn't actually that hard (revision of crystallisation of chocolate and a few tips on how to fill chocolate into moulds) but what took the most time was devising, creating and then building a nice-looking centrepiece. We got our creative juices flowing making Easter egg decorations initially, I wasn't feeling particularly inspired on the day of building but my egg turned out pretty well and quite cute which made up for its lack of height! Chef had asked us to think of an idea for our large chocolate piece a few weeks ago, seeing as the European clay court season had just started, I plumped for Roland-Garros 2009. I even had a sketch of what I wanted to make but my eventual piece looked nothing like my picture, surprise! My final chocolate piece was a little simple but not bad, am undecided on the trapezium frame (supposed to symbolise the lines on a tennis court) as the white chocolate makes it look a little sloppy. However, JD reminded me last night that 2 months ago, I would never have dreamed that I would be making chocolate centrepieces so in the words of Fatboy Slim.....(I've) come a long way, baby :)