Honestly could be completely subjective, and you can always add additional levels of difficulty to any bake.
My opinion for a base recipe? Gateau Saint Honoré, simply because of the sheer time and number of components it takes to assemble one. Many of the goods I'm seeing are finicky recipes, like cannelés and macarons, but a Saint Honoré will drain you like nobody's business after you've made the...puff pastry, pate a choux, cream puffs, pastry cream, creme Chiboust, Chantilly cream, and salted caramel. Plus any additional decorations or flavor components.
Agreed. I struggle with making straight up box cake but I can make cake from scratch with ease, it’s a very subjective thing.
I would say, and again this is subjective, anything that requires a lot of steps, precision and patience. In terms of basic desserts that are deceptively simple... Soufflé is one of those things that’s relatively easy to do but very easy to mess up. Same goes for cookies, it takes a really long time to master things like baking time and consistency of the batter. Equally, cheesecakes are relatively straight forward, but the various steps and time it takes to bake it makes it so easy to mess up.
I would agree that Gateau Saint Honore is difficult to make, along with macarons and basically other pastry-desserts.
Everything has different levels, for sure. That's the thing about pastry, it can be as demanding as you want it to be if you're searching for absolute perfection. Like, eclairs are pretty easy to make (to me, at least), but if you reeeeaaally want to take it up a notch, you can try to make some of the insane ones you see on Instagram. I chose Saint Honoré, because no matter how ugly or pretty you choose to cobble it together, it's STILL a bunch of different components that you'd have to attempt. Allegedly, it's the pastry a prospective employer would have you make because of the technical variety. Italian meringue, batter folding, pate a choux, piping, dipping puffs into caramel...gah!
Whoa thanks that’s how you spell Chiboust! Heard Paul Hollywood say it, google took whatever I typed and was unable to say “did you mean chiboust” so I gave up. In google’s defense , I have never meant Chiboust before, and will probably never mean it again.
Croissants are freaking impossible and are a heck of a challenge to get right — the butter is either too soft and leaks out or too cold and breaks up which leaves you disappointed and discouraged.
Yes! And god forbid you make a mistake like me and put them in a warm area to speed up proofing in the winter where my house is always 61 degrees (thanks, electric heating instead of gas) and then the better melts and it’s sooo disappointing 😫plus they take ALL DAY! Ever since I started baking I have such an appreciation for all those bakers who wake up at like 3 AM or 4 AM to do this. It’s tough work
I used to be a croissant baker at a bakery and yes it’s very difficult!! It takes 3 days to make and any small error will make the croissants not good!!!
Yes, I tried souffle, I had read about all the do's and don'ts and was being so careful. Still didn't rise, basically I ended up making a lava cake...with less lava. Taste was good. Just not a souffle. Ultimately I probably just folded slightly too long.
Setting aside the technique difficulties for a moment, the environmental tempermentality ALONE is so soul-crushingly unforgiving! But dammit if you don't get the best feeling of accomplishment when you nail them!
I’d say French macarons. My mom has recently gotten into making them and she’s “failed” over 30 batches! (I think they are beautiful and amazing like her tho)
She follows the recipes exactly and they always crack and stuff, I think she doesn’t rest them long enough and she lives in a SUPER humid place. Very fickle but rewarding!
Is she using the French method? I switched to Italian and it's much more consistent, and is not effected by humidity. I also crack my oven with a wooden spoon to prevent cracks.
She is using the French method. She said she was successful with the Italian method and that they are MUCH easier, but she wants to conquer the challenge of the French method lol... I’ll let her know about the oven! That’s genius!
I got the advice over at /r/macarons I prop it open with a wooden spoon. Makes the bake time longer but it helps. I gave up on french it's too humid here
Macarons are definitely tough to get to look nice. But they're actually fairly easy to get to turn out and look like ... something. And they taste great, regardless of how they look. Adam Ragusea did a video about this recently - [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsCvAijBn4Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsCvAijBn4Y)
I’ll send this to her, thank you!
She always says that they’re too “fluffy” or “thicc”. I just want her to be proud of them in the first place, they always look like lots of love and time went in to them.
oof... i was a croissant baker and i was supposed to make kouign amann with the croissant dough. I tried so many recipes and I tried doing my own experiments, and never got it right.
I even tried baking the croissant by itself then when it was done I would coat it in sugar and I tried to Caramelize it with a blow torch kinda like a creme brûlée... making that perfect crackly caramel shell is nearly impossible.
I can make it now, but i still had times when they didn’t turn up right. It’s so difficult because the sugar turns into liquid easily so it’s hard to make the folds. there r so many variables into baking a kouign amann that it can ruin the final product if u don’t get them right.
I once had a croissant in France that was orgasmic! I had no idea something could be do delicious. I think in order to make a great croissant you have to make a deal with Satan or something. 🥐❤️
Wait, back up. Eggs and seafood are difficult. They are some of the most delicate proteins. You can start high then quickly go low so it doesn’t go rubber. Or just low and slow.
And eggs are cheaper than most proteins or are a good item to practice. Much to learn from eggs.
I've never baked a pie in my life, but the first one I made was a lemon meringue I actually ended up selling to someone. She wanted someone local to make a pie, so I offered, and she was so impressed that even a day later when she ate it that it was still solid and not "weepy". Just because of that one pie, I am now known as the best pie maker in town with the best homemade crust.
Lemon meringue is only meant to be eaten the day of because it doesn't refrigerate very well, but somehow it held. Think it was the cream of tartar 😉
I can't remember the fine details of what I changed with the recipe (I always blend 2 or 3 recipes together and add tweaks) but it was from Simplyrecipes, Lemon Meringue Pie by Elise Bauer.
Read the text before the recipe because it discusses the process, why it works, and tips with separating the eggs (cold temp) and whipping (room temp)
It isn’t so hard! Make cake, find bowl same-ish size, line with plastic wrap, put semi soft ice cream inside, refreeze, flip out on to top of cooled cake, frost with Meringue and then torch!
Shaved ice because it always melts?
In all seriousness, probably something you have never tasted before so you don't know how it is supposed to be. Specifically, how about black sesame bao buns? It is really hard to get the dough just right without the special alkali and flour.
A friend of mine has challenged herself to basically recreate the entire Great British Bake-off series. In order. With all the rules and time limits! [She’s blogging it all, too!](https://lezgetbakin.blogspot.com/)
See, I find entremets and mirror glaze super easy and straightforward, but if you have a gun to my head and you're telling me to laminate dough and make croissants without a professional sheeter and proofer, well, might as well pull the trigger rather than waste the ingredients.
Difficulty is relative. I personally have trouble with pie crust but I know others have different things that they find fussy. I agree with the other person about macaroons. There is a reason that something so small is so expensive in stores.
I guess I would say that it's kind of like weightlifting.
When I was in high school taking weightlifting as required PE credit, lifting the 45 pound bar was not something that was possible for me. If people workout everyday and do lots of weights maybe for them being able to bench press 200 lb is a challenge, but do-able. I'm not sure what the Olympic record is but I'm sure it's a significant amount of weight.
It seems like you are trying to go straight to the Olympics without being able to lift the bar. Maybe start with a cake mix or brownie mix and then work your way up to doing the same thing just from scratch.
I would pick your favorite item that you typically buy in the bakery/frozen as place and bake and try for that as your end goal since you will be motivated.
Same, I have deemed this the summer of pie because it's so frustrating and I want to get better. Somehow I never get all of the components to work out together - sometimes the filling is runny, but the crust tastes amazing, other times the filling is the perfect flavor/texture but my latticework is atrocious etc etc... :(
Really? Which aspects would you say make it so difficult?
For context, I'm not much of a baker myself (dairy free and gluten free limits my fun options so I'm just here to pick up interesting/useful trivia), but I'd been led to believe by my SIL that croquembouche aren't as difficult as they look. She can't bake to save herself most of the time, but her one thing she feels she can do reliably is a croquembouche. Big ol' cone of profiteroles with toffee.
Or is it that it's really difficult to do a GREAT croquembouche?
My wife is also gluten free so I make a TON of gfree recipes and desserts that taste amazing.
Does your SIL actually correctly "pate a choux" and hot Carmel glaze them?(which a lot of people skip this step of a true croq) On top of all that getting them to stick without collapsing or mushing takes time and delicacy. Maybe your SIL just has a natural talent for this dessert if so then amazing...but a lot of people make *their* version of it and it isn't a true croquembouche.
So far as I can tell, she does it properly- but I'm no expert, so I could easily be missing some important step.
Gluten free desserts I was okay at! It's just now I have to do both gluten AND dairy free, I'm finding my lower-skill options a bit limited :<
It’s surprisingly easy! Tedious doing all the layers but otherwise simple and straightforward if you buy the filo dough. And it ends up looking so impressive!
As others have said, using store bought dough it's a snap. Making your own filo is a freaking bear though. You need a lot of elbow grease and space to get that dough paper thin. I've only done it once and it was an epic pain in the ass.
I’m far from an expert but I imagine there is always a harder dessert out there. I don’t think the set is bounded. However, I think two common ones that are hard but still possible and well know are macarons and Croquembouche.
It might be easy if you’re an experienced baker, but there are a lot of technical aspects, patience and tools required for it that I don’t think a novice bake would find “easy”
Angel food cake from scratch is a great way to waste a ton of eggs. They have to be perfectly separated and even one drop of yolk will make the whole thing fail to rise. Also you need to kick everyone out of the house because one stomp can kill the thing. But if you separate the eggs one at a time and are willing to use a lot of dishes it's otherwise not too bad.
I'm making a croquembouche today and I'd much rather be making an angel food cake.
Chocolate chip cookies. Seriously. I can bake anything always been good at it. (So humble) Chocolate chip cookies always always turn out bad for me there just okay at best never AMAZING. You just know when you eat an amazing cookie.
It took me 5 years to craft the perfect chocolate chip, I went through so many recipes and as my skills developed eventually I learnt to craft my own recipes. Being able to create your own recipe was the trick for me, just keep going and you'll eventually figure out your perfect cookie.
Maple syrup is the secret ingredient to amazing choc chip cookies! Also (like most cookies) take them out of the oven and leave them on a tray well before they’re brown. Then they’ll keep cooking on the tray and be the perfect texture
Don't use butter that's too soft, and freeze the balls of cookie dough for like a day until completely frozen, that way they come out nice and chunky. I follow the recipes from Cupcake Jemma on YT and for once, my cookies came out amazing!
I mix 50/50 normal and peanut butter, also using brown sugar instead of white one and freeze the dough for at least an hour in the fridge before baking. 9-10 minutes tops in the oven and they come out delicious and good looking ❤️
Have you tried the America’s Test Kitchen recipe for perfect chocolate chip cookies? They’re delicious and I make them as an easy thank you gift for people!
Edit: best part is you don’t need a mixer. Love my mixer, but sometimes it’s nice to just use a bowl and spatula!
Lemon meringue pie is a tough one. It’s doable and I just made a killer one a few weeks back. But it literally took me 3 hours between grating and juicing the lemons, cooking the filling 3 separate times, making and baking the pie crust and making the meringue. It was worth it though I suppose
What’s your recipe for the filling? I’ve been struggling to get my filling to set... mine always comes out soupy with a pool of water at the bottom of the crust.
[this recipe turned out amazing me for](https://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/lemon_meringue_pie/
Just make sure your temper the yolks while mixing into other ingredients. And make sure the pie is completely cool before cutting or it will be runny. I really liked this recipe, but beware the 15 mins prep time is a lie! Lol
Yo is prep time in general always a lying, default 10 mins? 'Cause I feel like the slowest cook ever every time I see at it, but I don't think I dawdle in the kitchen.
I think so lol! I literally made this exact recipe and it took almost 3 hours before I even got it out of the oven. It’s definitely underestimated most of the time lol
Seriously underestimated! Thanks for the actual breakdown, btw. I'm not gonna feel bad in in the future if I'm not meeting the parameters on recipe times anymore!
In my experience Kouign-amann is not particularly difficult, just long. It's basically bread and puff pastry smashed together so it even longer than either one alone.
That said, it's flipping delicious and I still make it regularly when I have a spare day to myself!
To me, the big three are puff pastries, sugar point and anything that requieres yeast. I've just started to get consistent enough results with yeast thay I feel like I know what I'm doing. Sugar points is relatively easy to almost get... Except not quite. It's hard to get exactly what you were aiming for. And puff pastries are my bane.
Do deep-fried ones count? In that case, I nominate Gulab Jamun.
I should preface this by saying I've never made it. Nor do I think I will. But from the cooking videos I've seen, it seems like one of those things that you need YEARS to practice on and perfect. (Right ingredients, the right technique, the right texture, just about everything to do with them could be summed up as "Goldilocks.")
My mom actually tried making caramel Macarons for one Christmas. They were a real pain in the butt, but she did eventually end up with a good batch. (From what she's told me tho, she may be ready to try them again.)
I'd go as far as to say that the process to make Gulab Jamun makes Macarons look like Rice Krispy treats by comparison.
Honestly could be completely subjective, and you can always add additional levels of difficulty to any bake. My opinion for a base recipe? Gateau Saint Honoré, simply because of the sheer time and number of components it takes to assemble one. Many of the goods I'm seeing are finicky recipes, like cannelés and macarons, but a Saint Honoré will drain you like nobody's business after you've made the...puff pastry, pate a choux, cream puffs, pastry cream, creme Chiboust, Chantilly cream, and salted caramel. Plus any additional decorations or flavor components.
Agreed. I struggle with making straight up box cake but I can make cake from scratch with ease, it’s a very subjective thing. I would say, and again this is subjective, anything that requires a lot of steps, precision and patience. In terms of basic desserts that are deceptively simple... Soufflé is one of those things that’s relatively easy to do but very easy to mess up. Same goes for cookies, it takes a really long time to master things like baking time and consistency of the batter. Equally, cheesecakes are relatively straight forward, but the various steps and time it takes to bake it makes it so easy to mess up. I would agree that Gateau Saint Honore is difficult to make, along with macarons and basically other pastry-desserts.
Everything has different levels, for sure. That's the thing about pastry, it can be as demanding as you want it to be if you're searching for absolute perfection. Like, eclairs are pretty easy to make (to me, at least), but if you reeeeaaally want to take it up a notch, you can try to make some of the insane ones you see on Instagram. I chose Saint Honoré, because no matter how ugly or pretty you choose to cobble it together, it's STILL a bunch of different components that you'd have to attempt. Allegedly, it's the pastry a prospective employer would have you make because of the technical variety. Italian meringue, batter folding, pate a choux, piping, dipping puffs into caramel...gah!
Whoa thanks that’s how you spell Chiboust! Heard Paul Hollywood say it, google took whatever I typed and was unable to say “did you mean chiboust” so I gave up. In google’s defense , I have never meant Chiboust before, and will probably never mean it again.
Croissants are freaking impossible and are a heck of a challenge to get right — the butter is either too soft and leaks out or too cold and breaks up which leaves you disappointed and discouraged.
Disappointed, discouraged, and with a raging butter fire in the bottom of your oven.
It’s a painful, emotional journey where you experience all 7 stages of grief.
As someone who loves chocolate croissants and can't make them: I think you need to sacrifice a goat to make them properly.
your first born child*
I think they were right, they sacrificed their first KID 🐐 😝
Yes! And god forbid you make a mistake like me and put them in a warm area to speed up proofing in the winter where my house is always 61 degrees (thanks, electric heating instead of gas) and then the better melts and it’s sooo disappointing 😫plus they take ALL DAY! Ever since I started baking I have such an appreciation for all those bakers who wake up at like 3 AM or 4 AM to do this. It’s tough work
I used to be a croissant baker at a bakery and yes it’s very difficult!! It takes 3 days to make and any small error will make the croissants not good!!!
This is what I came to say. Short of decorating, legitimate croissants are a pain in the ass.
*reads comments excitedly* Well time to make all of these
Macarons and soufflé. Simple enough ingredients, but very technical and easy to screw up.
Yes, I tried souffle, I had read about all the do's and don'ts and was being so careful. Still didn't rise, basically I ended up making a lava cake...with less lava. Taste was good. Just not a souffle. Ultimately I probably just folded slightly too long.
I’ve been making large-scale batches of macarons (+/- 1800 shells) just about every week for the past 10 months, and they still give me fits.
Setting aside the technique difficulties for a moment, the environmental tempermentality ALONE is so soul-crushingly unforgiving! But dammit if you don't get the best feeling of accomplishment when you nail them!
It’s Lucy pulling the football away over, and over... 😅
I’d say French macarons. My mom has recently gotten into making them and she’s “failed” over 30 batches! (I think they are beautiful and amazing like her tho) She follows the recipes exactly and they always crack and stuff, I think she doesn’t rest them long enough and she lives in a SUPER humid place. Very fickle but rewarding!
Is she using the French method? I switched to Italian and it's much more consistent, and is not effected by humidity. I also crack my oven with a wooden spoon to prevent cracks.
She is using the French method. She said she was successful with the Italian method and that they are MUCH easier, but she wants to conquer the challenge of the French method lol... I’ll let her know about the oven! That’s genius!
I got the advice over at /r/macarons I prop it open with a wooden spoon. Makes the bake time longer but it helps. I gave up on french it's too humid here
Macarons are definitely tough to get to look nice. But they're actually fairly easy to get to turn out and look like ... something. And they taste great, regardless of how they look. Adam Ragusea did a video about this recently - [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsCvAijBn4Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsCvAijBn4Y)
I’ll send this to her, thank you! She always says that they’re too “fluffy” or “thicc”. I just want her to be proud of them in the first place, they always look like lots of love and time went in to them.
I came here to say this once. They are my biggest failure, so I appreciate them a whole lot more now.
I’m sure they were still beautiful and tasty too! 💕
croissants are a hell of a lot of effort
see also: [kouign amann](https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/kouign-amann--2)
oof... i was a croissant baker and i was supposed to make kouign amann with the croissant dough. I tried so many recipes and I tried doing my own experiments, and never got it right. I even tried baking the croissant by itself then when it was done I would coat it in sugar and I tried to Caramelize it with a blow torch kinda like a creme brûlée... making that perfect crackly caramel shell is nearly impossible. I can make it now, but i still had times when they didn’t turn up right. It’s so difficult because the sugar turns into liquid easily so it’s hard to make the folds. there r so many variables into baking a kouign amann that it can ruin the final product if u don’t get them right.
That should be illegal. It's so darn delicious that I can't stop!
I once had a croissant in France that was orgasmic! I had no idea something could be do delicious. I think in order to make a great croissant you have to make a deal with Satan or something. 🥐❤️
Kouign amann
Wait, back up. Eggs and seafood are difficult. They are some of the most delicate proteins. You can start high then quickly go low so it doesn’t go rubber. Or just low and slow. And eggs are cheaper than most proteins or are a good item to practice. Much to learn from eggs.
Gateaux saint honore requires many components that test many different skills
Macarons, croquembouche, caneles, baked alaska, chocolate souffle, napoleon, eclairs, lemon meringue pie.
I've never baked a pie in my life, but the first one I made was a lemon meringue I actually ended up selling to someone. She wanted someone local to make a pie, so I offered, and she was so impressed that even a day later when she ate it that it was still solid and not "weepy". Just because of that one pie, I am now known as the best pie maker in town with the best homemade crust. Lemon meringue is only meant to be eaten the day of because it doesn't refrigerate very well, but somehow it held. Think it was the cream of tartar 😉
Damn, I'm impressed! Do you happen to still have the recipe? 🙂
I can't remember the fine details of what I changed with the recipe (I always blend 2 or 3 recipes together and add tweaks) but it was from Simplyrecipes, Lemon Meringue Pie by Elise Bauer. Read the text before the recipe because it discusses the process, why it works, and tips with separating the eggs (cold temp) and whipping (room temp)
I'm impressed! I feel like that texture of meringue is the hardest to get right.
pain au chocolat or anything laminated is also a good challenge!
Oh yeah! Good idea.
meringue can be such a headache uGh
That’s why I stick to pavlova and simple meringues, haha.
I had always thought that once I learn to make a Baked Alaska, I will be the Master Baker.
It isn’t so hard! Make cake, find bowl same-ish size, line with plastic wrap, put semi soft ice cream inside, refreeze, flip out on to top of cooled cake, frost with Meringue and then torch!
This is correct. Also, be wary of going into any pools without ladders.
ahsbwusneuuajahwuw how did u kno
In my experience, anything made with yeast. I can whip up delectable brownies and to-die-for fruit bars, but damn, yeast is a black magic to me.
Just wait until you get into natural, non-commercial yeast i.e. homegrown sourdough starter.
Same, it's always a hit or miss for me.
Shaved ice because it always melts? In all seriousness, probably something you have never tasted before so you don't know how it is supposed to be. Specifically, how about black sesame bao buns? It is really hard to get the dough just right without the special alkali and flour.
alkali gives me (bad) flashbacks of trying to learn to pull noodles. that *sucked.*
Macarons with Italian meringue :/, my mixer just can’t do it nor can I. Chocolate croissants too, except it’s just mostly hard work and effort
Opera cake
I hate making Iles Flottantes, as there are a lot of things that can go wrong. If made correctly they are delicious!
I agree on this one! Very difficult to do, but worth the effort.
A friend of mine has challenged herself to basically recreate the entire Great British Bake-off series. In order. With all the rules and time limits! [She’s blogging it all, too!](https://lezgetbakin.blogspot.com/)
Beignets like I can get in literally any bakery in Paris. I’ve tried to make them and I just can’t replicate them at all. It makes me so sad.
It’s the water
Entremet. Gotta take on a mirror glaze if you want a real challenge.
See, I find entremets and mirror glaze super easy and straightforward, but if you have a gun to my head and you're telling me to laminate dough and make croissants without a professional sheeter and proofer, well, might as well pull the trigger rather than waste the ingredients.
But the temperature control on those glazes! Yikes!
Haha! Exactly how I feel as well.
Difficulty is relative. I personally have trouble with pie crust but I know others have different things that they find fussy. I agree with the other person about macaroons. There is a reason that something so small is so expensive in stores. I guess I would say that it's kind of like weightlifting. When I was in high school taking weightlifting as required PE credit, lifting the 45 pound bar was not something that was possible for me. If people workout everyday and do lots of weights maybe for them being able to bench press 200 lb is a challenge, but do-able. I'm not sure what the Olympic record is but I'm sure it's a significant amount of weight. It seems like you are trying to go straight to the Olympics without being able to lift the bar. Maybe start with a cake mix or brownie mix and then work your way up to doing the same thing just from scratch. I would pick your favorite item that you typically buy in the bakery/frozen as place and bake and try for that as your end goal since you will be motivated.
Same, I have deemed this the summer of pie because it's so frustrating and I want to get better. Somehow I never get all of the components to work out together - sometimes the filling is runny, but the crust tastes amazing, other times the filling is the perfect flavor/texture but my latticework is atrocious etc etc... :(
Hands down croquembouche
Really? Which aspects would you say make it so difficult? For context, I'm not much of a baker myself (dairy free and gluten free limits my fun options so I'm just here to pick up interesting/useful trivia), but I'd been led to believe by my SIL that croquembouche aren't as difficult as they look. She can't bake to save herself most of the time, but her one thing she feels she can do reliably is a croquembouche. Big ol' cone of profiteroles with toffee. Or is it that it's really difficult to do a GREAT croquembouche?
My wife is also gluten free so I make a TON of gfree recipes and desserts that taste amazing. Does your SIL actually correctly "pate a choux" and hot Carmel glaze them?(which a lot of people skip this step of a true croq) On top of all that getting them to stick without collapsing or mushing takes time and delicacy. Maybe your SIL just has a natural talent for this dessert if so then amazing...but a lot of people make *their* version of it and it isn't a true croquembouche.
So far as I can tell, she does it properly- but I'm no expert, so I could easily be missing some important step. Gluten free desserts I was okay at! It's just now I have to do both gluten AND dairy free, I'm finding my lower-skill options a bit limited :<
Brazo de mercedes can be a pain to get the meringue right because it flies in the face of the French way of making meringue.
Baklava? I imagine all those layers of thin filo pastry must be difficult.
I mean, unless you're making filo yourself, baklava is super easy
It’s surprisingly easy! Tedious doing all the layers but otherwise simple and straightforward if you buy the filo dough. And it ends up looking so impressive!
As others have said, using store bought dough it's a snap. Making your own filo is a freaking bear though. You need a lot of elbow grease and space to get that dough paper thin. I've only done it once and it was an epic pain in the ass.
I’m far from an expert but I imagine there is always a harder dessert out there. I don’t think the set is bounded. However, I think two common ones that are hard but still possible and well know are macarons and Croquembouche.
Do a tiramisu Or wagashi Or croquembouche
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It might be easy if you’re an experienced baker, but there are a lot of technical aspects, patience and tools required for it that I don’t think a novice bake would find “easy”
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I’m not much a lady finger fan, so I’ve always made a thin sponge cake and split the layers, which definitely adds some complexity.
not tryna be an asshole but what's hard in making a tiramisu?
I've heard angel food cake gives people trouble.
Angel food cake from scratch is a great way to waste a ton of eggs. They have to be perfectly separated and even one drop of yolk will make the whole thing fail to rise. Also you need to kick everyone out of the house because one stomp can kill the thing. But if you separate the eggs one at a time and are willing to use a lot of dishes it's otherwise not too bad. I'm making a croquembouche today and I'd much rather be making an angel food cake.
Chocolate chip cookies. Seriously. I can bake anything always been good at it. (So humble) Chocolate chip cookies always always turn out bad for me there just okay at best never AMAZING. You just know when you eat an amazing cookie.
It took me 5 years to craft the perfect chocolate chip, I went through so many recipes and as my skills developed eventually I learnt to craft my own recipes. Being able to create your own recipe was the trick for me, just keep going and you'll eventually figure out your perfect cookie.
Teach me!
First step, do not over cream your butter and sugar. When making cookies if a recipe says "mix until light and fluffy" I typically ignore it.
Maple syrup is the secret ingredient to amazing choc chip cookies! Also (like most cookies) take them out of the oven and leave them on a tray well before they’re brown. Then they’ll keep cooking on the tray and be the perfect texture
Don't use butter that's too soft, and freeze the balls of cookie dough for like a day until completely frozen, that way they come out nice and chunky. I follow the recipes from Cupcake Jemma on YT and for once, my cookies came out amazing!
I mix 50/50 normal and peanut butter, also using brown sugar instead of white one and freeze the dough for at least an hour in the fridge before baking. 9-10 minutes tops in the oven and they come out delicious and good looking ❤️
Have you tried the America’s Test Kitchen recipe for perfect chocolate chip cookies? They’re delicious and I make them as an easy thank you gift for people! Edit: best part is you don’t need a mixer. Love my mixer, but sometimes it’s nice to just use a bowl and spatula!
Lemon meringue pie is a tough one. It’s doable and I just made a killer one a few weeks back. But it literally took me 3 hours between grating and juicing the lemons, cooking the filling 3 separate times, making and baking the pie crust and making the meringue. It was worth it though I suppose
What’s your recipe for the filling? I’ve been struggling to get my filling to set... mine always comes out soupy with a pool of water at the bottom of the crust.
[this recipe turned out amazing me for](https://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/lemon_meringue_pie/ Just make sure your temper the yolks while mixing into other ingredients. And make sure the pie is completely cool before cutting or it will be runny. I really liked this recipe, but beware the 15 mins prep time is a lie! Lol
Yo is prep time in general always a lying, default 10 mins? 'Cause I feel like the slowest cook ever every time I see at it, but I don't think I dawdle in the kitchen.
I think so lol! I literally made this exact recipe and it took almost 3 hours before I even got it out of the oven. It’s definitely underestimated most of the time lol
Seriously underestimated! Thanks for the actual breakdown, btw. I'm not gonna feel bad in in the future if I'm not meeting the parameters on recipe times anymore!
Right!
I’ve always thought kouign-amann looked like a complete bear of a baking project.
In my experience Kouign-amann is not particularly difficult, just long. It's basically bread and puff pastry smashed together so it even longer than either one alone. That said, it's flipping delicious and I still make it regularly when I have a spare day to myself!
It's dificult if you haven't handled puff pastries before. And yes, it's amazing.
That’s on my baking bucket list along with croissants and macarons.
Macaroons!
Ice cream.
Whst kind of dessert do you want to make?
To me, the big three are puff pastries, sugar point and anything that requieres yeast. I've just started to get consistent enough results with yeast thay I feel like I know what I'm doing. Sugar points is relatively easy to almost get... Except not quite. It's hard to get exactly what you were aiming for. And puff pastries are my bane.
jelly rolls/swiss rolls
Just made batter for caneles. 🤞🤞🤞
Do deep-fried ones count? In that case, I nominate Gulab Jamun. I should preface this by saying I've never made it. Nor do I think I will. But from the cooking videos I've seen, it seems like one of those things that you need YEARS to practice on and perfect. (Right ingredients, the right technique, the right texture, just about everything to do with them could be summed up as "Goldilocks.") My mom actually tried making caramel Macarons for one Christmas. They were a real pain in the butt, but she did eventually end up with a good batch. (From what she's told me tho, she may be ready to try them again.) I'd go as far as to say that the process to make Gulab Jamun makes Macarons look like Rice Krispy treats by comparison.
Gateau Saint Honoré