Summer journal entry (CREATIVE)

This summer I channeled my creativity through baking, multiple times over this vacation I found myself baking different desserts for my family, and our friends. The two most memorable baking stories I have from this summer have something important in common, the reactions to the food were really positive and encouraged me to pursue baking. Seeing their joy or excitement over the food I made was super rewarding. The first story is from the beginning of August. One of my parents’ closest friends were hosting a dinner and since they know I enjoy baking, asked me to make dessert. Prior to that point I hadn’t been able to bake because our oven was broken so I really enjoyed being able to use their kitchen and spend hours baking. For some this might seem like a task but being in the kitchen has always been in a way therapeutic for me. In the morning I began by prepping a bunch of my components like my pastry cream, maracuya curd, my dough, and getting everything ready to bring over to their house. Once we got there around 3 PM I began by forming my tarts, then baking the eclairs, profiteroles, mini lemon pies, the tarts and my coconut macaroons. This took all afternoon but when people began to arrive I was able to start working on my favorite part, the assembly. I made a meringue to decorate and make extra little meringue cookies. After dinner everything was brought out and shared. In this first story I knew what my strengths were and chose deserts I had already made a few times. This relates to the first learning outcome as I was able to identify my skill for baking and my strengths within that skill. As a result of this dinner I started thinking about new desserts I could try to make as the response I got was so encouraging, this is when the idea of croissants came to mind. Croissants are usually considered pretty challenging and were kind of intimidating. The first time I tried making them I used a simple recipe, didn’t do enough research beforehand and did not have the proper ingredients or oven. I made these in one day and made many mistakes. I used the wrong butter, my recipe wasn’t very good and since it was my first time I was lost when trying the laminating process. I also didn’t proof them correctly because my oven temperature was too high so butter leaked out of them and they didn’t rise. Although they didn’t meet my expectations, I didn’t feel discouraged because they still tasted good and allowed me to identify the mistakes made and learn how to improve. After this I researched, watched videos and read more articles to get as many tips as possible. The second time I made them I was in Heredia staying with our “grandparents” from CR in the mountains. This time I was much more prepared and we got all the right ingredients. This was a two day process. I began by making my dough at night and letting it finish rising overnight in the fridge, then the next day I made the butter block and began laminating. To make croissants you basically fold a flattened out square of butter in between dough and then create the layers by folding and rolling it out. I did this three times, each time waiting for the dough to chill for about an hour in the fridge in between each fold. Once I got my dough I rolled it out into a large 14 by 17 rectangle and began forming my croissants and pain aux chocolat. Then I let them proof for two hours, baked them and served them. This time the process went much smoother and they turned out much better which was super rewarding. Although they were much closer to the croissants you would get at a bakery I still identified some mistakes which just made me excited to keep mastering the art of making them. A few days later I also got to make almond croissants out of the remaining stale ones which were a big hit. Being in the kitchen either cooking or baking is one of the things I enjoy the most and bring me the most peace, it’s a sort of distraction and break from everything else. So even though this was a long process it brought me a lot of joy. To continue the connection with the first learning outcome, getting all these positive reactions helped me further recognize my baking abilities but also sparked my desire to become better, try more challenging desserts and work on making something that was very different from what I usually bake. That brings me to the second learning outcome as making croissants for the first time was my new challenge and it’s what allowed me to develop this new skill which hopefully will just continue to improve. All the mistakes and complications I had making them the first time allowed me to be much more successful the second time. This experience relates to the IB learner profile trait of inquirers because through this process I learnt so much and gained the new skill of knowing how to make croissants. I independently did my own research and fulfilled my curiosity of knowing how the process works and if I would be able to make them.