The weekend has arrived. I will help my brother at his pastry shop for the two days. Since I had a break last week due to recovery from my wisdom tooth extraction, it has been the first time in two weeks.
Today, let’s introduce two strange tools I recently found at his baking factory.
A metal hammer
The first tool that surprised me was a metal hammer. When I saw it for the first time, it was naturally placed on a table for making pastries. I didn’t understand why a pastry shop needed such a carpentry tool.
I learned that it was for making custard, which is cream made from milk and egg yolks. That confused me more. Why does a hard hammer need to make soft cream?
The answer was to make an ice bath to cool the hot custard. The pastry chef adds heat to milk with egg yolks, but it needs to be cooled rapidly after solidifying. To chill it, my brother crushed ice with the hammer and made an ice bath.
That was why a metal hammer was needed to make custard. It was entirely unexpected for me.
A hair dryer
The second strange tool was a hair dryer. I first guessed that it was to dry something, but that was wrong.
It was to melt buttercream, which preserves longer than fresh cream, even at room temperature. Due to that characteristic, it is often used in cookies and cakes with a long shelf life.
However, since it solidifies soon, if we want to sprinkle crushed nuts or cookies for decoration, we need to melt the surface of the buttercream.
That was why they used a hair dryer. It is applied to warm the surface of the buttercream, allowing it to melt. It made sense.
Conclusion
Anyway, I will enjoy learning to bake.
Thank you for reading this article. I hope to see you in the next one.
