Do you remember my attempt at winning the most beautiful cookbook of all the time?
I didn’t win, that’s a fact, but getting this peculiar book has been on the top of my to-buy-list since this day.
Anyway, I had a good time creating Divine Cannelle and have been very flattered to see it ending up among the five finalists.

But after weeks and weeks of deep-thinking, I decided I should go for the book; whatever the price tag shows up.
The (expensive) book is called PH10 in honour of the ten-year long work of one of the greatest pâtisserie chef: Pierre Herme.

In this book, Pierre Hermé reveals the recipes for all his magnificent creations such as the famous Ispahan (flavours: rose, letchi and raspberry) or the celebrated Mogador (flavours: milk chocolate, passion fruit, pineapple, spices).

Actually “ouvrir PH10 c’est un peu comme etre soudain en possession d’un vieux grimoire revelant la formule magique du bonheur” [opening PH10 is like being in possession of an ancient grimoire that gives us the jinx for happiness].
And indeed this is true; when you immerse yourself in that 600 pages book you realise how much work and love as been put into it. 300 recipes, 200 (lovely) pictures.
I love the professional layout and the useful “composition” of the pastry.

Besides that, I can only admire Pierre Herme: his ability, his creativity and his deep love for the beautiful.
I love the way he created “collections” of pastries; I mean you can find your favourite pastry in various forms: entremets, chocolates, small cake, tarts, ice creams, macarons, confiseries…

I think he really brings out the glorious nature of patisserie.

The first recipe I tried from this book was the Macarons Plenitude as I didn’t have much time to make a complexe entremets and because I had all the ingredients in my cupboards.

These macarons are delicious. The slightly salted ganache really enhance the delicate chocolate flavour.
From top:
- chocolate macaron
- eclats de chocolat à la fleur de sel [finely chopped fleur de sel-flavoured chocolate]
- chocolate and caramel ganache
- caramel macaron

How to make them?

First you’ve got to make the fleur de sel (a slightly coarse salt with a delicate taste) chocolate “eclats”.
So what you do is basically – temper the chocolate (70% solid cocoa = Guarana) and make a thin layer of chocolate on which you sprinkle some fleur de sel.

Then comes the ganache; which is maybe my favourite part of the game. This delicious ganache is composed of a:
- toffee-ish caramel made by adding salted butter (here Pierre Hermé suggests La Viette Demi-Sel butter) and cream.
- melted chocolates (56% solid cocoa = Caraque, 40% solid cocoa = Jivara).
This ganache is so luscious I used the leftover to make one of the most delightful truffles I’ve ever managed to produce.

Finally, you’ve got to make the macaron biscuits.
These are made by mixing a meringue italienne [Italian meringue] and a “tant-pour-tant” (a mix of equal quantities of almond powder and icing sugar) + fresh egg whites.
Adding melted chocolate (for the chocolate macarons).
Actually my mix was still too liquid (but neatly better that the last time I tried to make macarons) but I think it was because my syrup was hot enough (it must reach 117 C) and I didn’t have a good thermometer to check that.
I will go to my, now, favourite shop in Cannes where it will be a doodle to find such a thermometer.
My other problem is that I baked the second batch for too long which resulted in crispy-rather-than-chewy-but-still-delicious macarons. So I will suggest respecting the cooking times next time!

Posted by fanny who loves to forget labeling posts