My Stint With A Course in Bakery Techniques- Day 1

I was so elated today morning, I had signed up for a 2 day bakery course in the Tamil Nadu Agri University. I woke up with great expectations but was really not sure how things would go about or what we would learn. Lil Angel was even more eager to see me go to ‘college’ and gave me a list of stuffs that I must learn and bake for her!

The classes were to start at 9 and I hurriedly packed my lunch and off I went. I reached there a few minutes earlier and I was so surprised to see a whole bunch of men eager to start the classes. We were 26 ‘students’ in our class.

The instructor arrived and we eagerly started taking notes for various types of breads and buns. She also explained the functions of each ingredient used in baking which I felt is very essential .It is better to know what the ingredient does so that we can get a good end product.We were also taught the different methods like oven method and even baking in a pressure cooker! Taking down notes, getting doubts clarified, sitting with our ‘ classmates’ … It was just like those good old college days!!

Then it was time to do the practicals. The thing I loved here was that we were asked to make all the types of breads by ourselves from the scratch. The instructor demonstrated the technique and  we had to do it individually. Though it looked simple when she did it, the process was a little hard to master. Getting the right consistency for the dough, the right shapes for the breads and rolls took time to get used to.

A refreshing cup of tea at 11am increased out energy and enthusiasm and after the small gap we started again. By 1pm we had prepared the breads and they were proofed for baking. Once the breads were inside the oven, we went for lunch. I could not help but recollect the college days where we used to share lunches and talk about this and that and have a gala time. It was so much fun!!

The rest of the day went in getting our doubts cleared and preparing cutlets for our burgers. I came home with a whole lot of goodies that I baked.Needless to say, Lil Angel was the happiest to see and relish my hard work.

Here is a glimpse of what we learnt today

1. Sandwich bread
2. Milk bread
3. Wheat bread / Ragi bread
4. Pav buns
5. Burger buns
6. Pizza base and pizza
7. Fruit bun
8. Coconut bun
9. Coconut balls
10. Garlic bread
11. Tomato sauce for pizza
12. Cutlet for burger.

The course fee is INR 1000/- and I feel this course is worth every cent.Tomorrow we will be getting our printed manual and the certificates.

Some clicks for you. Please don’t mind the quality of the snaps as they were taken in a hurry using my mobile phone.

Tomorrow I will also post the cookery class schedule for the next 3 months . Those in Coimbatore can attend these classes. The course fee in INR 1000/- and it is a 2 day course where we get to learn very interesting and useful stuffs like preparing homemade chocolates, spice powder and pickles, food processing etc….

.I will be back tomorrow to share with you the cakes, cookies, pies that we are going to learn.