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Refine

a lifestyle blog

Life

SF Cooking Week 7: Pastry Doughs II

February 18, 2019 · By Jill

This week was kind of a breeze so I’m not really sure if it felt super short or super long. There were no specific techniques to study and master or complicated bakes to manage. To finish up our study of pastry doughs, we basically spent the first half of the week cranking out cookies. We made peanut butter, chocolate chip,…

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Life

SF Cooking Week 6: Pastry Doughs I

February 11, 2019 · By Jill

An assortment of sweet and savory tarts made by pastry students at SF Cooking School.

There could be an epic love story written about the way I feel about dough. Whether it’s pie dough, cookie dough, bread dough, or croissant dough – I love them all. I’m constantly amazed at how just a few identical ingredients can be combined in different ways to create completely different products. Nearly anyone can make a passable pie dough,…

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Life

SF Cooking Week 5: Cakes II

February 4, 2019 · By Jill

Watercolor buttercream cake with delicate wafer paper flowers and gold leaf

What a week this was! From cake decorating at the start to our very first exam at the finish, this week was hectic, fun, and a little bit stressful. The first exam is always the hardest in any situation because you don’t know what to expect from the structure and just how deep your knowledge needs to be. Of course…

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Life

SF Cooking Week 4: Cakes I

January 28, 2019 · By Jill

Boston cream pie made by pastry students at San Francisco Cooking School

This was a crazy busy week for me, which means 1. I had very little time to be taking notes and snapping photos of what we did each day and 2. I’m exhausted. Although it was only a four day school week, I was a TA for a breadmaking class one evening, worked catering a private event another evening, and went back…

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Life

SF Cooking Week 3: Intro to Chocolate

January 21, 2019 · By Jill

You know how parents say that the days are long, but the years are short? I kind of feel the opposite. Each day at school flies by, but the weeks feel so long because of how much is packed into them. By the time I look back on what happened on Monday, it feels like it was about a month…

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Life

SF Cooking: Week 2

January 14, 2019 · By Jill

Torched kisses made with Italian meringue during pastry school at San Francisco Cooking School

Week two at SFCS has wrapped up and it was a great one. This week was mostly dedicated to discussing and experimenting with eggs, but we spent some time early in the week focusing on fats and dairy products too. Making our own cultured butter was one of the easiest tasks of the week, but as a butter enthusiast, of…

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Life

SF Cooking: Week 1

January 7, 2019 · By Jill

Testing the effects of different types of flour on the same muffin recipe during the SF Cooking School pastry program.

Week one of pastry school at SF Cooking is done and the overwhelming feelings are excitement and exhaustion. It was never a fear of mine that I wouldn’t like the program once I started, but I’m happy to say that I am having so. much. fun. I can hardly believe I get to do this every day. We talk in…

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Life

Up Next: Cooking School

December 31, 2018 · By Jill

In case you missed this little announcement, I’m going to cooking school! More specifically, I will be starting the Pastry & Baking Arts program at SF Cooking School on January 2, 2019. Baking has been my most consistent hobby since I was a kid, and it’s surreal to think that I’m taking the first step to turn that hobby into…

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Dessert

Chocolate Mascarpone Truffle Torte

October 23, 2018 · By Jill

Food blogger Jill McIntosh of Refine shares her recipe for a Chocolate Mascarpone Truffle Torte

The process to create this recipe was my very favorite kind. A couple months ago in DC, I had dinner at the newly opened San Lorenzo restaurant. I live for good Italian food and San Lorenzo serves up some of the very best authentic Tuscan cuisine that you’ll find without boarding a plane. To cap off my meal, they brought out…

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Dessert

A Versatile Almond Tart

June 25, 2018 · By Jill

Lifestyle blogger Jill McIntosh of Refine shares her recipe for a frangipane tart

As the archives of this blog could tell you, I love anything almond. It’s my very favorite flavor to use in baked goods and I regularly have to convince myself to branch out and do something different. Frangipane is the queen of almond desserts so it was about time for me to post a recipe for a classic frangipane tart….

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  • Probably the stop on the #curiositycrawl I was most looking forward to 😬 but what can I say? I’m a pastry student for a reason 🤷🏼‍♀️ The kouign amann @bpatisserie is easily the best I’ve had - it’s perfectly crunchy on the outside and so rich and buttery on the inside. Did you know I love butter? #propastry #sfcooking  #pastryaddict
  • We baked a lot of cookies, we ate a lot of cookies, and we gave a lot of cookies away. For what was probably our most easygoing week so far, we spent last week baking hundreds of cookies and packing up these cute little boxes full of baked goods to send out to people. The full story is on the blog! #sfcooking #propastry #jillsbakingadventures #cookiemonsters
  • Our @sfcooking class got to tour the production kitchen @craftsmanwolves today and taste test too many beautiful and delicious pastries for our own good. I’m obsessed with how much thought and creativity goes into every single aspect of their food and brand. If you stop into either of their locations, definitely try the strawberry cheesecake (or one of everything) 👊🏻 #sfcooking #propastry #staycurious
  • There were pies and tarts and cookies as far as the eye can see 😳 Week six of @sfcooking was the start of practicing pastry doughs, which made it the best week ever - as told in today’s blog post. I also want to take a quick second to document how incredibly lucky I feel walking into school every day. I absolutely love being in class. It’s insane to me that I get to do the thing I love most every day and I’ve never felt so at home as I do in that kitchen. This journey through cooking school is one of the most meaningful things I’ve ever done and the gravity is not lost on me each day. That feeling is what keeps me focused and motivated to give 💯 to everything I do and I never want to lose it #motivationmonday #sorrynotsorry #jillsbakingadventures #sfcooking #propastry
  • Opening this in the mail felt like receiving a lifetime achievement award 🥇 I love @williamssonoma and not just as a place to shop essentials since I love to cook. As a 10 year old I had a little red Williams-Sonoma apron to wear when I baked (or played waitress), it was the store I insisted on browsing through every time we went to the mall (and still do), and it’s always where I wanted gifts and gift cards from. @williamssonoma is a huge part of my memories in the kitchen growing up that brought me to this point today. So I will carry this little card as a badge of honor for little Jill 👩🏼‍🍳, not just for the discounts (but the discounts are pretty cool too). #jillsbakingadventures #mywilliamssonoma #sfcooking #professionalchefs

Recent Posts

  • SF Cooking Week 7: Pastry Doughs II
  • SF Cooking Week 6: Pastry Doughs I
  • SF Cooking Week 5: Cakes II
  • SF Cooking Week 4: Cakes I
  • SF Cooking Week 3: Intro to Chocolate

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