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@OlyveOyl And here it is! I followed the original recipe (with butter). I used an extra tablespoon of marmalade in the batter by mistake (the one that was meant for the glaze). The marmalade was a “vintage” homemade sour orange and Jamaican rum marmalade which gave the cake a dark color. The cake is on the smaller side (I used a standard loaf pan), and didn’t rise very much. The texture is lighter than a pound cake and it’s extremely delicious. 😄

I kinda followed @Rajala’s crunchy bottom he had with it. I used Callebaut gold chocolate, brown butter, spices and the nuts and coconut.

Bring ideas for anything you want to experiment with, need help with, want to try, etc. As for tools, I typically bring my own scrapers, offset spatulas, IR thermometer, apron, dipping fork (if I plan to dip anything), or any specialized equipment that you would need for anything you want to try that you don't think we'd be able to provide (which you can always ask if we will have it first). Also if there is a specific mold you want to play around with bring those as well. This is a great opportunity to pick the brains of a wealth of chocolate knowledge, get back to basics, and mostly a chance to meet like minded people and get to nerd out about chocolate for a weekend. It's one of my favorites times of the year

And leave it at just cold? No. I'm the only one that likes it cold smoked. So, I start all my salmon with cold smoke. (Right now it's 40F, breezy, and the smoke tube creates minimal heat). Once the tube burns out, I'll get to hot smoking. With alaskan salmon I usually inhale a piece (or3) after the cold smoke. I'm the only one that eats it and it's my "cooks treat" on smoking day. These are hatchery fish, still wild fish as they aren't farmed, and live their entire lives in fresh water in Montana. My initial experience with these is that the flesh is soft, nearly mushy to me, and borderline unpleasant, so I won't be trying these as cold smoked.

If you don't mind telling, what do you add to the coconut and walnuts to hold them together? Perhaps the same chocolate used for the shell, which appears to be a caramelized white or something similar?

So this will be my first time attending. Reading through, I am still not sure if/what else I should bring. Certainly don't mind if I need to. Kathleen and I are driving from Little Rock so have room if I need to bring anything. Can't wait to meet everyone. Kelly

Thanks! I like cardamom too, but yeah, people are iffy here with that. I didn’t like the carrot bits in the bottom layer, seemed tough when you would find one. But the coconut and walnut comes through enough in it. I think the caramel has plenty of flavor, so didn’t need to add to it.

Sounds like a great time. Thanks for all your planning. Looking forward to it!

As the nursery rhyme goes: Hot cross buns! Hot cross buns! One a penny, two a penny, Hot cross buns! If you have no daughters, Give them to your sons. One a penny, two a penny, Hot cross buns! These were based on a Thomas Keller recipe which I seem to have adapted at some point in the past, unfortunately to its detriment. The spice mix was all wrong, and the texture a bit dry and crumbly. I'm scratching my head as to how it made its way into my recipe folder.

That looks delicious. I omitted the cardamom (I love the spice but don't think Americans expect it in carrot cake). I have tried walnuts and pecans, but ended up preferring pecans. I too include a cream cheese "frosting" layer, with a lemon flavor. For the cookie layer I tried the carrot layer but didn't get an acceptable carrot taste, so have switched to one based on ground speculoos cookies. I do have difficulty incorporating the browned butter; even my big Robot Coupe immersion blender takes a long time to emulsify the mixture; as a result, I have reduced the quantity of butter a little. I'm not sure what the problem is (aside from the obvious too much fat vs. liquid).

Thanks for this warning. I think I'm unlikely to run across this particular fish, but if I do I'll know to leave it alone. I'm not bone tolerant in fish. Spoils the fun for me!

@YvetteMT. Do you ever cold smoke your salmon?

I can honestly say that I've never put a loaf of bread on my cooling racks! Onto the Traeger this morning with a smoke tube. Traeger is still off at this point, we like a little extra smoke on our salmon so the smoke tube first for a couple hours and then hot smoke. I'm going to forgo basting these with maple syrup this time since i don't know how sweet they'll be with the 3 to 1 dry brine. Maybe I'll do the belly strips only.

Absolutely wonderful!

I layered mine with cream cheese ganache, and I tried a similar bottom, using dried multicolored carrots (which I think I’ll omit next time), but added coconut and toasted walnuts since that’s what I use in my cake. I changed up the spices a little and it really tasted like carrot cake. I still need to tweak the spices, but I really liked it.

We went to Elmhurst to visit an Indonesian grocery and had lunch at an Indo restaurant across the street.... Most of the menu is padang type food. Fried chicken "kremes". The kremes are the small crunchy pieces on top - it's kind of like a serundeng but only a little bit of it. came with a spicy sambal merah (red sambal) We also got some shrimp chips This is a beef "balado". I've always seen balado dishes using a combination of red chilies, but theirs is just sambal ijo (green sambal). This is the beef buried. It's small pieces that were simmered then fried (typical for balado dishes). It reminded me of the paru dish we had in Jakarta (beef lung that was deep fried until crunchy like a cracker). Kangkong (water spinach) belacan - with chilies, shallot and shrimp paste, served on a sizzle plate.

Cool rack system!

I get very positive reactions to the carrot caramel from @Rajala. I too have added a couple of tastes to bring it closer to what I think of as the typical American carrot cake (golden raisins, toasted pecans). Making the caramel takes a while, so I try to make as large a batch as I can and keep it for future carrot cake bonbons.

@liamsaunt more sole ! Excellent.

I have finally saved up enough and am looking into getting a precision cooktop now. I can't seem to find a good review of features online for a comparison of features, all I see are basic short videos. Does anyone have a good idea of the recipies feature on the original and new models. If I understand correctly: Recipies: Usb is the only way to transfer recipes and can only be done on commercial line Wifi feature they planned on adding was completely scrapped Recipies only work with 1 prob, pan sensor or the external, cannot switch between the 2 Both home and pro offer the same features on number of steps/how recipes work etc. Does the home version offer any benefits here? Custom image, recipe name/step/direction display or something that commercial doesn't have? Built-in recipes are static as there is no network connection, so no plans for downloadable recipes. Meaning home version you have to build your own steps for any recipe not provided out of box There are no extra/new features in how the recipes work functionality wise, like duration, delays, temp, ramp settings. Everything is the same between home and commercial I've been debating between the 2 and want to try the home if there are any useful new features, but it looks to me like the only real change is the touchscreen, slightly nicer looking ui, and removal of a second knob. But none of the videos I've seen really highlight the functionality or differences, they mostly just are about how nice a precision cooktop is and gloss over the controls so I can't get a good idea. And from my understanding of the precision cooktop market in general: Control freak is still the only induction precision with a builtin contact sensor and constant power. Vollwrath as a close second but it does not use a contact sensor and is less reliable at pan temp detection because of it. The impule cooktop which looks like it will be great but is 3x my budget And vaporware. There is an open source project I am interested in but its early phases and as a programmer, the hardware/manufacturing is the part that I cannot do. If the project makes it to launch, I'll buy one and contribute though So in short, control freak is still the king for an individual precision cooktop. And if I understand correctly, the commercial might actually be the better pick between the 2, as its slightly more sturdy, has separate physical knobs, and comes with a case for transport which would cost ~100usd to get for the home version. If anyone knows of a good video for control freak home/comercial showcasing the controls and custom recipes please let me know,, especially if you have a side by side showing the similarities and most importantly, differences in the controls/displays and how you interact with the machine. I can't get a good idea from the snippits I can find on how interacting with them would feel

Yesterday we walked from our apartment to the Louvre. On the way, we went by this Jeff Koons sculpture called “Bouquet of Tulips.” We stopped for some ice cream in the Tuileries Gardens before tackling the museum. It was pretty terrible. The Louvre was so, so crowded. The lines were just insane. We had timed tickets, but the line for our slot was still hundreds of people long when we arrived. Luckily for us, a guard came over, checked our tickets, and then told the people at the back of the line (aka us, plus a few other people) that we could go in through side entrance rather than through the pyramid. So we walked over there and went right in, probably cutting about 45 minutes of waiting from our day. My sister, niece and nephew really wanted to go see the Mona Lisa, since they have never been to Paris before. They could not get close of course. But, my nephew is tall, so he just stuck his phone up and took a snap! He laughed and said he did it just to annoy me, then showed me the photo he took yesterday at the Orsay of the Van Gogh self portrait, which he deliberately took at an off kilter angle to make it doubly annoying 😂. He said he considered resting his phone on my head while he took it but thought violence would ensue. So behold my nephew’s painting snaps as his contribution to this report 😂😂😂 We spent the rest of our time in less crowded areas of the museum. The detailing is just amazing You could have a very large dinner party at the table in the Napoleon Apartments Speaking of dinner, last night we had dinner at the Brasserie du Louvre. Lighting was a bit challenging, so no menu photos. Cocktails Gougeres stuffed with truffle cheese Asparagus with egg mousse and hazelnuts Burrata with green gazpacho Sea bream crudo Sister and husband had the sole meurniere. This came with a salad Nephew and niece both got the tuna with zucchini And I had a spring vegetable risotto. Complimentary pre dessert of walnut and currant cookies Husband had the Saint Honore with raspberries. And a few got the caffe gourmand. Niece swapped out a latte for the espresso. Dinner was very good, but it was definitely a…leisurely experience. Over three hours! Luckily we had nothing else planned for the evening!

Stir-Fried Pork, Eggplant, and Onion with Garlic and Black Pepper - pork tenderloin get marinated in soy and fish sauce before stir-fried. Subsequently, you stir-fry diced eggplants, onions, garlic and black pepper before finishing everything in a sauce made with fish sauce, soy sauce, light brown sugar, chicken broth, lime juice and cornstarch. Finished with some cilantro and served over rice

Well, those tortilla shell bakers work pretty well. Lesson 1: I need larger tortillas for these to be useful! Lesson 2: corn tortillas (at least old ones) aren't nearly as flexible as flour tortillas (at least old ones). You can see in the photo above that the flour tortillas neatly molded into the baking shells. The corn tortillas stubbornly insisted on flattening out...and after baking,... still showed their resistance. These were crisp, but they hand't browned. The flour tortillas browned nicely. Aren't they cute? Lesson 3: for this kind of tortilla use -- that is, tortillas with no seasoning, oil, anything added -- the flavor of the basic tortilla is critical. I don't know whether mine were simply too old or were substandard in the first place. I liked the crunch but not the flavor of the flour tortillas. The corn tortillas were also crunchy but even less impressive. All of them, cooked and uncooked, are now in the garbage. If I were boondocking they'd be out in the bushes, but that isn't appropriate in this suburban settlement. The original plan had been to do some sort of taco salad, but as happens so often these days I couldn't be bothered with all those steps. Besides, these tortilla shells were more like taco hors d'oeuvres size than salad size! So I made a salad, which is easier, and cooked one of my darling's Superburgers. I cooked it on a broiling pan in the oven, hot as the oven would go. Not hot enough. These burgers, and probably any burgers for my money, need direct contact with a hot surface. Campfire. Barbecue grill. Papa's pan. Stovetop pan, with vents doing their best to prevent the smoke alarm from going off. This was more like meatloaf. I shared it with the dog. Still. Now I know more about how to use those tortilla pans!

蔬彩色水晶饺 (shū cǎi sè shuǐ jīng jiǎo), vegetable coloured crystal jiaozi (pork dumplings) and 嘎嘎脆春卷 (gā gā cuì chūn juǎn), mini crispy spring rolls.

Friday early dinner. After much thought about what fish dish to have I ended up making a simple salmon and dill quiche which we enjoyed. Asian salad with Nuoc Cham dressing as a side salad. Quiche included both fresh salmon and smoked salmon