My Croquembouche Attempt

Let's face it, I'm not even sure that's how you spell Croquembouche...

Last year, for the finale of Masterchef Australia, my housemate Aimee and I decided to celebrate by having a Masterchef challenge of our own. Aimee's task was to make Arancini (risotto balls with yummy gooey cheese in the middle) and I was to make...(Buhm buhm buuuuuhm!) a Croquembouche.

Not only a Croquembouche, but a gluten-free one.
...good luck...

My Croquembouche 

I used a pretty stock-standard recipe for Profiteroles, substituting the flour for GF flour. Now, when I say 'stock-standard', I am lying just a little. Apparently Profiteroles aren't the easiest of things to make. It had three saucepans on the little difficulty guide thingy. Three! Out of three! But, armed with my excellent housemate and my subpar cooking skills, I started.

 The Choux pastry, profiteroles, just out of the oven. For future reference, gluten free flour doesn't rise nearly as nicely as normal flour. Most of my profiteroles turned into half-shells, ninja turtles style. Luckily, we remembered that several contestants met a similar predicament in Masterchef '09. So I did what they did. I stuck the two half-shells together to make a complete sphere (well, sphere-like ball) and slopped the custard inside.

The custard, by the way, is made out of a lot of egg yolk, so, ever the recycler, Aimee decided to use the whites for some tasty meringue, Masterchef style.

 

I went back to the Profiteroles and covered them with tasty, tasty chocolate, some dark, some white. 

 

And then, it was time to assemble. I really had no idea what to use as the base, but eventually got a piece of cardboard and rolled it into a cone shape. I didn't have anything to stick the profiteroles to the cone either, so I used sewing needles.

Note: This is a trap! While eating one of the tasty morsels, I skewered myself in the mouth with a sewing needle. Ouch-sticks!

 

 After about an hour of swears and laughter, I finished assembling the aesthetically delightful Croquembouche. Some level of success!!!

Aimee's Arancini...nom nom nom

 So, with our other housemate Sarah, and our guest judge Jane, Aimee and I plated up out Arancini and Croquembouche for the tasting.

 

An excellent night was had by all. The Arancini was tasty, the Croquembouche was rich and yummy, if a little ugly. We watched Callum and Adam battle for the title and were elated when Adam won (well, I was...Aimee was rooting for Callum) 

My Croquembouche

Aimee and Arancini

Guest Judge, Jane McKinnon

Love that Masterchef song...with the captioning...

 (Sarah's picture could not be located...but she was there too...

 Little did we know that while we were watching them, they were watching us! The final two saw the pictures of our adventures on facebook, and a few days later, we received this in the mail.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you know your cooking failure has been a success!

Stay tuned for Mastercehf Final 2011...the tradition lives on...