Jessica Little Fu

It is rare for me to really be impressed with a baked good or dessert these days.  I was spoiled by years of having an ex-Michelin star pastry chef creating nightly desserts for my group at work (and a succession of equally talented pastry chefs before/after that) and by having a couple years of doing extensive fine dining.  That is all in my past, but more recently, I've spent my last three summers in New York City, where I've made eating top notch pastries and baked goods a priority.  So most things I encounter in everyday life in San Francisco just don't really wow me.  Sure, there are some that stand out (e.g. yes, Arsicault), but most, even if good, I'm not like "ZOMG" about.

So I had no expectations when I recently attended a tea and dessert event featuring a popup vendor I'd never heard of: Jessica Little Fu.  Let me tell you: um, you should pay attention to this pastry chef.

Jessica Little Fu is a pastry chef and baking instructor, and hails from a background working at the Michelin starred restaurants State Bird Provisions and The Progress (and later, Stonehill Matcha).  She now sells at popups, and special orders from her website.  I know little else about her, besides that, well, she's crazy talented.  

"Today, I can be found at occasional pop ups around the bay area, working on passion projects and teaching what I have learned to baking enthusiasts. My pastries showcase California seasonal produce and often have a touch of Chinese pastry nostalgia."

She's sorta low profile, just doing her thing it seems.  Her work features a lot of Asian flavor profiles, but modern unique creations, with high level of mastery of technique.  She incorporates a lot creams, fruits, cakes, and flavored whipped creams.  Mmm, all things I love.

Our event had 6 items: 1 sheet cake, 2 types of pie, 2 kinds of panna cotta, and one individual sized cake/mousse.  I read through the menu with my eyes getting wider and wider.  I wanted them all.  As a first pass, I selected my top two choices, but when it was clear that there was plenty, and that most people were loading up platters and taking some home, I returned to get more.  In the end, I had 5 of the 6 items, and all were ... flawless?  To say I was impressed is an understatement.

Black Sesame Banana Cream Pie.

"A pie filled with layers of silky black sesame mousseline, malted milk sweet cream and bananas encased in a flaky pie crust with a thin layer of milk chocolate."

The one I went straight for, my first pick to try, was the black sesame banana cream pie.  I love banana cream pie.  I adore black sesame.  This sounded, well, perfect.  I loved that it came pre-sliced into 8 very large slices.  I also loved that other event attendees didn't seem inclined to try to cut them in pieces, so taking a full slice seemed appropriate.

Black Sesame Banana Cream Pie: Close up.

"Flaky butter pie shell brushed with milk chocolate and filled with black sesame mousseline, bananas and malted milk whipped cream."

The pie was a stunning 3 layers of bananas and black sesame mousseline, plus a very generous layer of the malted milk whipped cream, all sprinkled with some black sesame seeds.  I was impressed with the structural integrity as I took a slice.

The crust was everything I want in a crust: super crispy, super flaky, high butter, fantastic.  I suspect the light layer of milk chocolate lining it helped keep it crisp against the filling.  The crust alone had me impressed.

But this pie kept on giving.  It was loaded with bananas, fresh, ripe, not too mushy.  Very strong banana focus, as you can see visually as well.  The bananas were enrobed in the glorious black sesame mousseline.  It was creamy, rich, and sophisticatedly nutty.  As someone who grew up eating a lot of bananas with peanut butter as a snack, this immediately worked for me, and just felt like a grown up spin on a flavor profile that sparked comfort and nostalgia.  And then, the very generous layer of whipped cream on top, which was not just any old whipped cream, but, malted milk whipped cream.  It had just that extra touch of depth and again, sophistication, that felt both familiar and a bit upscale all at once.

Put it all together and you have a very unique and complex spin on what is otherwise a fairly basic nostalgic comfort food pie (banana cream) and childhood snack (nut butter on bananas), melded together into a showstopper.  There is literally nothing I'd suggest be done differently with this, the flavors, textures, and technique just all were top notch.  4.5/5, tied for first place for me in favorites.

Passion Fruit Mochi Mousse Cake.

"Mochi, passion fruit mousse, strawberry sauce, whipped cream and vanilla chiffon."

My second pick when honing in on selecting just two to try to start was the mochi mousse cake.  It was certainly the most unique looking, and I was fascinated by what it might be like inside as well.  The mochi blanket embracing it was so soft and pliable, and really quite pleasant to eat, just a subtle rice taste.

Passion Fruit Mochi Mousse Cake: Inside.

And then, within.  The base was a very light vanilla chiffon.  It was an uninteresting component of the desert, and I'd prefer some other kind of base, but there was nothing wrong with it, and its plainness did offset the intensity of the other elements.

The majority of this was a stunner, a sensational passion fruit mousse.  It was fluffy and creamy, fruity and tropical, slightly sweet and slightly tart, and studded with sooo many passion fruit seeds for lots of crunch.  It never seemed too heavy nor too sweet, and had just the right level of intensity, all from real passionfruit, no fake taste to it.  I adored the mousse.

The whipped cream was a minor component on top, and was nice to balance the mousse a little, but the mousse was so good I barely felt it needed it.  The strawberry sauce turned out to be just that dot on top, none within, so it added a sweet additional fruity burst, but then was gone. 

Overall, such a unique item, and it did all work together well, but I almost think I would have enjoyed it more if it was just mochi filled with passion fruit mousse.  Still, I devoured it, and would get another in a heartbeat. Strong 4/5, the passion fruit mousse though was an easy 5/5.  My second favorite item.

Chestnut Oolong Cake.

"Three layers of vanilla chiffon, Phoenix Honey Orchid oolong tea pastry cream, chestnut whipped cream."

After securing my top two choices, I moved on to take a look at the large format cake.  The cake looked slightly more homemade than professional (obviously by a talented home baker, but it didn't scream out professional at first glance), and at first I thought this might be a different source than the other items.  But then I saw the description, and saw how it fit right in.

While the cake and oolong components, and the less polished look of it didn't quite draw me in, the mention of chestnut is all it took for me to slice off a small piece, to at least give it a try.

Chestnut Oolong Cake: Close up.

The cake had three very equal layers of chiffon, and what seemed to be the same filling (albeit studded with chestnuts) and frosting.  I had somewhat expected the inside to be the oolong tea pastry cream, and outside to be the chestnut whipped cream.

I often comment on how chiffon cake is my least favorite style of cake (I may adore Asian flavors and desserts from around the world, but, American style dense butter cake is still my preferred cake, chiffon, sponge, genoise ... eh).  However this was moist and light as air, and really did seem appropriate with the delicate flavors of the oolong pastry cream.  This was actually the first bite of anything I had (before the previous items), and I was immediately impressed.

Then, the pastry cream / whipped cream.  Light and fluffy.  There was a mild hint of tea that lingered on the finish, but it was very mild, as you'd expect from oolong.  The filling within the layers of cake was studded with little bits of chestnut.  At first I thought they were red bean actually, as the taste and size of the bits immediately connected in my brain as red bean, but actually, this was the chestnut.  It was more ... nutty? Legume-like? than I expected.  It was quite savory, and the pastry cream/whipped cream wasn't very sweetened either, so this really was not a sweet dessert.

Overall this was my least favorite of the items I tried, as I prefer things a bit sweeter, I prefer non-chiffon cake, and I'm not excited about oolong, but it was still a very good cake.  4/5 on execution really.

Hojicha Dulcey Cream Pie.

"Cocoa cookie crumb crust filled with hojicha dulcey chocolate cremeux and caramel whipped cream."

In my initial priority stack rank of items to try, I had this near the middle of the pack, after the cake.  I adore dulcey chocolate, but I'm not really a tea lover (I don't mind it, just, not my top choice of flavor to go for), and the cocoa cookie crumb crust seemed less interesting than the elements of the other desserts.  I still was curious to try it though, given how successful everything else was, so when there was still a bunch of slices of this left, I broke the mold of taking full slices and actually cut one in half, so I could just try it, but not take a full slice (which, totally mangled it, alas).

The cocoa cookie crust was actually pretty good.  Crispy, compressed, deep cocoa flavor, slightly bitter in a good way.  It was a nice thickness to really taste the cocoa, but not too thick to easily break through with a fork.  But as I expected, it just wasn't all that exciting to me on its own (but, I also hate Oreos, so, consider that fact).  When you combined it with the  caramel whipped cream on top though ... brilliant!  There was no denying the fact that it was caramel, so sweet, so intense.  I loved it, and it did indeed go well with that crust, in a way that elevated both elements when consumed together.  I would be happy with just this crust and topping as a pie!

But there was more.  The main body of the pie was actually the hojicha dulcey chocolate cremeux.  Oh, wow.  For all the lack of intensity in the oolong pastry cream in the cake, this one had in spades.  The tea flavor was strong, and really kept drawing me back in.  It was bitter but tempered by the dulcey which gave a hint of caramely sweetness (and of course, it was balanced out with the crust/whip as well if you ate it all together).  The consistency of it was remarkable too - soooo smooth.  It was quite thick, far thicker than the passion fruit mousse, the oolong pastry cream, or the black sesame mousseline, yet velvety smooth.  It really was exceptional, and I found myself wanting more and more of it.

I ended up liking this quite a bit, and would have easily consumed a full slice (perhaps saving half for the next day).  I actually preferred the crust/whip as one dessert, and this cremeux as its own thing, as I felt the flavors were allowed to shine a bit more that way, but, such a surprise hit for me.  Shockingly tied for first place. 4.5/5.

Elderflower Panna Cotta.

"St Germaine panna cotta with fresh berries and passion fruit."

And finally, the last item I grabbed, a panna cotta.  This may come as a surprise that it was the last thing on my priority list, given that my blog has a label dedicated to pudding AND one exclusively for panna cotta, and I do love it, but, I actually just thought it was the least likely to impress compared to the more elaborate items.  Plus, the St. Germaine didn't draw me in.

It came topped with a few berries (raspberries, blueberries) and fresh passionfruit.  

The panna cotta was, as you may have guessed by now, executed flawlessly.  Well set.  Thick.  Rich.  Smooth.  Fresh cream taste, mildly sweet.  The vibrant fruit on top, particularly the passion fruit, offset the slight plainness of the base panna cotta.  As for the St. Germaine, I'll admit I didn't taste it.  But it really was a fantastic panna cotta nonetheless.  If I had one note it is that I would have preferred some additional flavoring, be it the St. Germaine or something like buttermilk, but still, this was very, very good.

This really was textbook execution of panna cotta, you can tell the pastry chef is a master of her craft from this simple dish alone.  4/5.  My third pick, only because the others were more interesting, but, yeah, flawless.