Lest it be said that I have failed to explore the suburbs of Toronto, with the companionship of my trusty Zipcar, Colin the Civic, I ventured out to Ma Maison in Etobicoke and ordered a Valencia. Pero, que pasa? I was disappointed by this pastry, which I chose for its looks. This order taught me a lesson about superficiality.My first contact with Valencia was the hollow, light pink, shimmering chocolate ball on top. Remembering a similar chocolate ball on my Cacao pastry, I eagerly bit into this one. Hmm, tasted somewhat old and stale (for chocolate). This was not a promising beginning, but perhaps Ma Maison outsourced its chocolate and the pastry itself would be better.
My first impression of this pastry was its density. So dense that huge pieces of it remained stuck to my fork after I licked off my fork. It is essentially an uncomplicated pastry. Chocolate ganache (not shiny, again, perhaps a sign of age or bad tempering?) enrobed a simple chocolate mousse sans base. At its core was an explosion of dark chocolate rice puffs and dark chocolate pieces. I characterize it as an explosion because literally, when I cut into the center of the pastry, dark chocolate pieces and rice puffs jumped out at me. I have tasted and appreciated the rice puff element in a piece of pastry but this version failed on at least two levels. First, the rice puffs were soggy so the essence of a rice puff - light, airy, crunchy - was lost. Second, as a result of the soggy rice puffs, they seemed thicker and only served to exacerbate the density and heaviness of the pastry.
I try so hard to like pastries, but this one was a flop. It was uncomplicated and the one area where it tried to be creative, i.e. the core of the pastry, was poorly executed. Let's hope the chocolatines and croissants from Ma Maison prove to be more successful tomorrow morning.
