Sometimes you have to get things wrong to make things right, which is a lesson students in the Vancouver Island University professional baking and pastry arts program are about to find out as they gather around eight just-out-of-the-oven loaves of bread. Each one was baked with different grains. The unique aroma fills the air and almost immediately it’s clear – something doesn’t smell right.
But that’s the point of instructor Martin Barnett’s cause-and-effect class. As program chairman, he introduced the teaching method into the curriculum this semester as a creative way to challenge students. What it means for them is that one day a week, nothing is going to turn out right.
“The point of the cause-and-effect class is to make changes to the recipes without students knowing what we changed. When you introduce a little too much baking soda, too much salt or forget an egg, unexpected things happen,” said Barnett.
He says instead of always pushing for perfection with each baking or pastry project, the students know that during the cause and effect class something will go wrong. More importantly, they are given time to track down exactly what happened.
Angelique Frederiksen graduated from VIU with her Red Seal baking certification. She is now an instructional assistant in the program and says it’s interesting to watch the students use their senses to deconstruct what was changed in a recipe.
“I can see that the cause and effect class is making things less stressful for our students, which is always a good thing. By taking that production pressure away you learn how to problem solve, which is just as important as the baking, when you are employed full-time in a busy kitchen,” said Frederiksen.
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