After years of thinking about doing a Lenôtre cooking class, I finally signed myself up for a course, paid the 132 euros, and leant how to make un Feuille d’Automne.

I’m sure most people go Lenôtre to learn how to make macarons and I would have done the same if all the classes hadn’t been fully booked. I wanted learn how to make one of their cakes as their savoury preparations are of little interest to me. You can see the courses they offer here. I chose la Feuille d’Automne because I love meringue and seeing as I’ve bought this cake before I figured it would be interesting to learn how to make it myself.

The Lenotre cooking classes are held at the cafe/shop on the Champs Elysees. The kitchen/class room was small but there were only 7 of us in the class (Frenchies, Yankees, and me) which was ideal. The chef Francois was very friendly and got straight down to business.

We started with the meringue which gets piped out into circles, then the succes which is just a meringue made with almond meal. I think I would be happy eating the succes on its own – delish! After they had cooled we coated them with melted chocolate using a paint brush from Bricorama. If that wasn’t strange enough we then rolled out some chocolate on a tray using a paint roller! Interesting idea… Next up was more chocolate with a very rich chocolate mousse.

After that it was a matter of layering it up. Meringue, chocolate mousse, succes, chocolate mousse, meringue, then more chocolate mousse. We then covered the whole thing with more chocolate and after a dusting of icing sugar it was done.

I’m not sure I’d want to spend 3 hours preparing this cake again but I leant some great techniques. I’m going to make my own version of this with a lot less chocolate – meringue/succes with raspberry mousse and cream.

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