Our Pro Pastry Diploma Program starts out with foundational skills that every student needs in order to learn advanced techniques. We begin with knife skills, kitchen etiquette and food safety, and the basics of working in a professional kitchen. From there we will begin learning how to bake various types of fundamental pastries, starting with quick breads, cookies, and custards. From there, we’ll apply those techniques into creating pies, tarts, eclairs, and cakes. We will then learn how to make some of those items into gluten-free and vegan variations by making our own flour blend and using alternative ingredients.

Wk1: Pantry Preserves & Milk Crafting

• Using proper grip, motion, and technique to execute accurate knife cuts consistently
• Working efficiently in a kitchen, with emphasis on cleanliness, organization, and speed
• Understanding dairy in baking and cheese making
• Reading recipes for ingredient amounts, scale, and technique
• Scaling common ingredients accurately and efficiently
• Converting ingredient quantities between different units of measure

Wk2: Quick Breads & Yeasted Breads

• Product identification for chemically leavened breads
• Various mixing methods for batter quick breads: creaming, blending, and two-stage mixing
• Understanding the difference between a conventional and convection oven and how to operate the two
• Multiple ways to cut in fat into rubbed doughs like scones and biscuits
• Understanding the various types of yeasts and how to work with them
• Follow the 12 stages of bread making to properly knead, proof, shape, and bake breads leavened with yeast

Wk3: Cookies & Custards

• How to properly cream butter and sugar
• Begin to practice how to multitask in a kitchen
• Make and bake various types of cookies: dropped, pipped, stuffed, rolled, and cut
• Understanding heat’s effect on protein in eggs
• How to yield successful results when applying those techniques to creating baked and stove top custards
• Make and churn ice cream bases

Wk4: Pies, Tarts & Gluten-Free / Vegan Baking

• Various types of flaky and short crusts
• How to par and blind bake tart shells
• When and how to par cook pie fruit filling
• Assemble various completed components to create a finished item
• Knife skills and fruit arrangements
• Understanding the effects of replacing common key ingredients in a recipe and how to make a pastry or baked good that is vegan and gluten-free

Wk5: Pate a Choux & Basic Cakes

• Types of cakes methods: foam and creaming
• Make components of a cake: cake base, fillings, syrups, and buttercreams
• Various piping techniques
• How to assemble, ice, and decorate a layered cake
• Properly make and bake Pate a Choux
• Make and apply fillings, glazes, and meringues to create finished pastries

Wk6: Review & Exam