19th Annual U.S Pastry Competition
Silver Medal Winner, Anthony Smith
19th Annual U.S Pastry Competition
Silver Medal Winner, Anthony Smith
For the 2008 “Under the Sea” theme, Anthony created a magnificent
“Life on the Reef” showpiece with a blown glass manta ray,
a spiny fish, colorful coral and giant seashells, all enhoused in a carved chocolate reef.
One viewer commented on eGullet, “For Anthony Smith’s piece, the photo shows the entire piece but doesn’t convey well the exquisite piecework within it, both front and back. The manta ray on top, for example, was amazingly well done and detailed in a beautiful, artistic and technically difficult way. The displayed cake emerged from a large, meticulously-detailed clam…”
In addition to the spectacular showpiece, Anthony made a Duglat chocolate bonbon and a delicious “Mother of Pearl” cake.
One of the judging panel said, “this is a chocolate mousse cake with lemon cream strawberry gelée – separate layers i guess, between the chocolate mousse, a VELVETY dark chocolate cake and almond crunch sable. And so the almond crunch sable is the base and it looks it looks very – you’ve got actual bits of almond in it, nougatine maybe or like a Florentine. And it’s covered of course with this velvety dark chocolate ganache– very shiny. stays put. Just so smooth I mean it’s like you know if you touched did it would just ruin it, it’s like freshly fallen snow how perfect it is! So shall we taste? Absolutely — the lemon is actually very, surprisingly good with the chocolate. It’s not a combination you’d normally think of so easily. No, it’s really not but the acidity helps balance the sweetness. These layers are very distinct, I mean between the crust and the top, you’ve got seven layers in total, and they’re very thin! This is not a giant cake. I really like the actual cake part, it’s very moist… I wonder if it was actually soaked in a, or brushed with a liquor or a syrup. It tastes like there is some kind of liqueur in there.”
