Text: Nikolai Buroh

Welcome to the second part of the 7th of October event marathon!

As previously mentioned, Chiara, Patrick and Antine were at the Food.Blog.Meet in Berlin and I was given the honorable task to represent our blog in Hamburg. Sort of a home game.

It went into the Billstrasse, where the Burda publishing house had invited numerous Bloggers to the Burda Bake Days.

A meeting that, like all good things, consisted of three different events: the premiere in Hamburg, the next meeting in Munich on the 14.10. and the final meeting in Frankfurt. This meant there were three chances to network with other bloggers, but also maintain and build contacts with sponsors.

The Hamburg events was hosted in the offices of our fellow bloggers called Foodboom, who share our passion for beautiful pictures and great food. (And beautiful pictures of great food!)

Attending the event were Melitta and Sojade, presenting their newest products as well as Ian Baker, pastry chef from the Four Seasons Hotel in Munich, Petra Thierry from Stockfood and Anna Talla from Burda. There were many interesting opportunities to network and enough time to exchange experiences with other bloggers.

But first things first

Once we arrived, we came across many unknown faces but also some of which we recognised.

Saskia von Dee’s kitchen for example, who like us, won a prize at the Food Blog Awards in Berlin last year, came to me and gave me a warm, yet confused welcome, as she had seen our Instastories and thought we were all in Berlin. “Well, it’s nice being a larger group” is all I could reply. Bloggers are generally a very open and interested group of people and thats why it was easy to get into conversations with the other bloggers attending the event.

At 15:30 Aline Prigge (from „Lust auf Genuss“), who put her heart into moderating the event, announced the beginning of the Sojade workshop. The ingredients, as well as the main test subjects were already spread out, when we entered the room. Sojade had brought two different products: milk and yoghurt, that comes in two different flavors.

Of course I had to try them immediately.

My family hasn’t been drinking cow milk for years. Instead, I drink our coffee black and my wife drinks hers with a little soymilk. I have gotten used to the slightly floury texture that our pancakes have due to the soy.

In my opinion it is a great alternative, especially when baking and I think it is possible to substitute cow milk! Not only considering the health benefits!

The yoghurt came with a natural of lemon flavor. The version with the citrus fruit became a lot more interesting, once we got the information on the Quiterie, that works for the family business “Triballat Noyal“ from Breton, that owns the brand “Sojade”. Sojade uses real lemons for the flavoring! But to get the consumers to consider the flavor appetising has taken a long time! Our tongues have become pertubed, due to the industrial products, which made the initial “true” flavor of the yoghurt confusing. It took the company a year to develop the product.

One would think that this shouldn’t be too difficult, since an interested cook, baker or connoisseur should be aquainted with the flavor of “real” lemon, But no! Concerning prepackaged foods from the supermarket this task will continue to baffle you.

And the yoghurt really did have a special flavour. It reminded me of limoncello. A good one!

BUT AM I GETTING OFF TRACK? WE WANTED TO BAKE! RIGHT.

The cookie recipe is very simple, but it always amazes me, how ten people can bake the same thing and get 10 different results!

It was great fun!

After 15 min. in the refrigerator our dough was still so soft that it was impossible to cut or form biscuits out of it. Thanks to the hilarious and helpful comments from Anne, who is from "Kochen macht Glücklich!" we simply transferred our biscuits on the baking paper to the tray and then let them “dry" in the oven. After 20 minutes we were able to mold individual pieces. In the end, they didn't look as well-shaped as the buscuits from Kawaii Kitchen, but hopefully they tasted just as good.

Maybe it wasn’t due to us, but the wholemeal flour? I don't know, but here is Lea's slightly revised recipes anyway:

Preparation:

Beat butter and sugar until frothy and then add the remaining ingredients in order.

Cover the dough and place it into the fridge.

Preheat the oven to 200 ° C. (top/bottom heat)

After one hour, take the dough out of the fridge, form it into small balls, place them on a baking tray and gently press down on them.

After 15 min. check if they are black already! ;-) But seriously: considering all the different baking times we had during our baking day - you just have to keep an eye on the cookie and see how it behaves, depending on consistency and size.

Just give it a try!

And another tip: let it cool down and coat it with dark chocolate (e. g. from Callebaut). Or make the biscuits a little flatter and stick two on top of each other with chocolate. (Vegan Prinzenrolle!)

Ingredients:

125 g vegan butter (room temperature!)
100 g sugar (white)
100g ground almonds
200 g soy yoghurt (with or without lemon, depending on personal taste)
juice and zest of a lemon
200 g flour (classic type 405 instead of wholemeal)

The following activity was making vegan desserts with Ian Baker. We were especially curious about the pastry chef from the Four Seasons!

The webpage of the hotel in Munich states:

Gentleman and pastry chef Ian Baker is an enrichment for connoisseurs and "sweet" lovers. Still having the scent of his Mom's cakes and cookies in his nose, the at the time 16-year-old pursued his career as a pastry chef. He already completed his training working for a baking legend: David Avery created the wedding cake for Lady Diana and Prince Charles. Baker then continued working for the best chocolatiers and bakers in England. "Pâtisserie is the art of creating something through one's own imagination, passion and craftsmanship," Baker describes his profession.

And we weren't disappointed: A cool guy! Relaxed and professional. He reminded me very much of Jamie Oliver, only that Ians German was better! :-)

He had prepared the following task for us: Vegan Panna Cotta with a cream of cocoa sprinklers, a roasted almond, chocolate and oat flakes crunch mixture and beetroot foam from a siphon bottle.

We were reminded what to look out for with the Panna Cotta: A Panna Cotta belongs in a glass, is only slightly bound and it has to melt on your tongue! And if you're served one in a flipped mold, it's not gonna do any good. It’s going to be too firm!

Unfortunately, while we felt brilliantly entertained by the tipps and information coming from a dessert professional, we didn't realize that a lot was already prepared and we hardly had to do anything ourselves. This is why I can’t give any information on the quantities! Everything was prepared in small bags and bowls. He didn’t even mention it to us!

But at least we were allowed to arrange the dessert. Not everything, but we did get to pour in the vegan cream.

He preferred to make the raspberry foam himself as well as the caramel cream (he didn't have that much left any more) and the crispy mixture (we would have just nibbled at all of it anyway).

We learned a lot that day: For example, I know that the Kitchen Aid is chic but not very durable, that a siphon bottle, if used incorrectly, can mess up the entire kitchen and there is nothing better than making jam from pure fruit! And when you make it yourself you should always use natural pectin to bind it!