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Watching the video, I can certainly see why you want to make something similar. You can see the difficulty of cutting the marshmallow--it has to be just the right texture for the wires to go through it (mostly) cleanly. The video's caption states that the layer is a biscuit. Just in case...somewhere on this forum @pastrygirl has posted a video showing how to replace a guitar wire. She helped me through my first (and so far only) guitar crisis.

I sent this to friends in Massachusetts who have six sheep.

Phoodle #1286 4/6 ⬜🟨🟨⬜⬜ 🟨🟨🟨⬜⬜ 🟨⬜🟩⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 https://phoodle.net obscure

Typical breakfast with canned baked beans.

It is this video. It sure looks like a baked biscuit at the start... https://www.instagram.com/reel/DGIU8oRuGaJ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

Pinot Noir. Strong, tasty.

Please report back on your experiments. It would be great to include a biscuit in a candy bar. Even better if it was easy to cut everything to the size you want. Understand the cost issue... my dream chocolate kitchen has a lot more equipment than my actual chocolate kitchen. 🙂

For some reason, I could not copy my result. I got it in 5.

From Six Seasons of Pasta: Garlic Butter p 27 Garlic Bread p 47 Pasta with turnips and turnip greens with anchovies and garlic butter p 200. The pasta was the main event, so I’ll start with that. I thought this was absolutely delicious! The salty, funky anchovies melded with the sweet, tender-crisp turnip slices perfectly. Everything was bathed in the garlic butter and brightened up with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice. So easy to toss together if the garlic butter is on hand. I will certainly make this again. Six Seasons sold me on compound butters so I was happy to add this little log of garlic butter to my freezer stash. I only made a half batch - one stick of butter. It’s got plenty of garlic, fresh parsley and oregano and a pinch of red chile flakes. I don’t make garlic bread often but once the garlic butter was made, I figured I’d try it out with a few slices and it was very good. Just a schmear of that garlic butter and a sprinkle of a Parm/Romano mix. Could become addictive. The oregano and chile are a nice touch.

Friends came over for dinner – these pictures are next day’s leftovers. We started with Mrs. C’s muhamara, served with pita chips. This was her best batch yet. Mole verde Oaxaqueno: First time making this, but it won’t be the last. Simmer cubed pork butt (and the bone) with white onion and garlic, adding a can of drained Navy beans towards the end. When the pork is tender, strain in a colander and reserve the broth. Meanwhile, roast tomatillos, garlic cloves, and Serrano chiles and blend to a smooth sauce with freshly-ground cumin, cloves, and black pepper. I rendered some of the trimmed pork fat into lard, and used that to fry the tomatillo sauce. Add pork broth and simmer, then add green beans and cubed chayote. Mix masa harina with pork broth and then whisk into the mole to thicken. Add the beans and meat, salt to taste, and simmer some more. The last step was making a puree from parsley, epazote, fennel leaves, and cilantro. This gets mixed in just before serving, adding a lovely green color and fresh aroma. The stew nearly filled a Dutch oven, but seven diners nearly finished it off. Served with arroz blanco: Jasmine rice fried with white onion, then steamed with extra pork broth and roasted Poblano chiles. Mrs. C also steamed broccoli and roasted sweet potato two ways: one with curry powder and brown sugar, the other (skins on) with butter and Old Bay. Served with more muhamara. Guests brought ginger snaps and amazingly rich and fudgy brownies with chocolate chips.

Phoodle #1286 4/6 ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜ ⬜🟩⬜🟩⬜ ⬜🟩⬜🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 https://phoodle.net

I usually end up using multiples (either stacked or staggered out) whenever I use them, so the weight isn't that big of a concern to me. On rare occasions, I especially like having the 8's for things that will get crushed easily (like soft white bread or really delicate fish). But most of the time I'm using all three of the starter set to sear things. Smaller items like fillets get the full stack. Ribeyes are bigger, so I use a couple spread out (that's an occasion where I wish I had two 13's -- or something higher). Two of each would probably be ideal. That way you could have two nice stacks of 8/13 oz on large items like big steaks and the whole set would store in a small footprint. But honestly, any configuration is probably just fine.

In case it's helpful for some folks, just came across this on KA's website - a breakdown of names and whether sourdough or cultured/commercial yeasts are used, per type. https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blog/2020/02/05/baking-with-preferments

Yep, agreed, it can be confusing. To me, a biga is a stiff starter using cultured yeast. A poolish, a liquid starter using cultured yeast. A pâte fermentée, also typically from dough using cultured yeast. Levain, sourdough. The wonderful thing is we can design things to do what we want, and how we want to do it. Rubaud was something of a monk. His "chef" was a stiff starter that he refreshed every 5 hours - day and night. I did that for a long time and finally just gave it up in the interest of a full-night's sleep. Instead of "levain" I should call it "chef," what Rubaud renewed. I mean starting over fully from scratch, a new mother as I mentioned. He felt his ongoing chef would drift per the quote above. Up until then I had maintained a starter from Chicago, something like 15 years old. It was liberating for me, to be honest, to let go of something like reverence for the starter. Here's Rubaud's process for a new chef. Note that these quantities are 1/4 of those he used - he felt there was a certain "mass effect" requiring the larger amounts for proper thermal mass, etc. He's probably right but there's no way I wanted to generate that much discard so I cut all to 1/4. Note he maintains a small amount of salt in his chef. This is to regulate activity.

I watched an instagram story where they used a guitar cutter on a biscuit. I just might need to try it and see what happens Water jet would be cool but my chef's knife is a lot cheaper

It is sometimes confusing, with the different terms that are used. Levain, Poolish, Biga, Pate Fermentee are just different preferments. So when Gerard renews his Levain, I'm not sure what he means by that. When I want a preferment for my next batch of sourdough bread, I start a new preferment, whether a levain, poolish, biga, etc. I've experimented with all of them over the years. The one I used more often was a "Biga". Both a yeast version and a sourdough version. The sourdough version was made using 60 to 80g of sourdough starter and added to 250g of flour and 250g of water. Once it had more than doubled it was added to the next batch of dough. These little scrapings of the jar preferments, I just refer to as mini bigas. I have still been maintaining my mother, feeding it every couple of weeks. I think that it has just become a habit that I've been feeding for 6 years and I don't want it to die. I usually leave a dough in the fridge for a longer cold fermentation from 24 hours to 4 days. But I have left them as long as 8 and 9 days and the only difference I find is that the sourdough flavour is a little stronger. This works for my son who loves a more sour taste. I like a milder sourdough flavour.

No, totally agreed. I don't mean added yeast, I mean that starter is always a dynamic system, an ecology that develops naturally over time, some blend of wild yeasts and bacterias (which we can manipulate via changes in ambient conditions). There will always be some drift because it's not static, just wondering if the method would tend to naturally move the overall balance one way or the other. I maintain three basic starters - a liquid rye, which is renewed with "ASG," Anstellgut, cold starter left in the fridge maybe 3-4 days; water at 40C; and Central Milling's "Medium Rye," which is equivalent to the German T 1150 rye at 1.15% ash. I find that gives a good, steady development when refreshing as whole grain rye can really cause the starter to scream. Occasionally I will do whole rye, to goose the starter if it's not been refreshed for too long. I also maintain a Lievito Madre (AP & Water), and a Hefewasser (water, some existing Hefewasser, and Munich liquid malt extract, used in brewing). Point of interest, the late great French baker Gerard Rubaud started a new mother every month or so, for this reason - he watched performance constantly and felt his starter drifted too much for him over a matter of weeks, so he always regularly started with a new starter about monthly. After learning that I stopped worrying if I had to let go of an old culture and start another. http://www.farine-mc.com/2009/11/meet-baker-gerard-rubaud.html

A sourdough starter should never have yeast added. When I started my "mother' back in 2019 it was started with organic rye and bottled water and when it was ready to maintain, I fed with organic rye and bottled water. Nothing else. Pure sourdough.

Very cool, thanks Ann. The only thing I'd be curious about is whether the scrapings at the bottom have a different population mix of yeasts v. bacterias, and if over time that would tend to move the population ecology to favor one or the other over time. Don't know why it would, but it would be interesting to learn more about this. Very nice to avoid waste, like you say, and your starters look robust and healthy!

For you, @chromedome 🙄 Oops, this belongs in non-food funnies.

I mentioned a few months ago that I was using a new method I found for maintaining a sourdough starter, using just the scrapings in the bottom of the jar. I've been using this method now consistently since February. The method is from Culinary Explorations. You start with about 22g of your sourdough starter and feed it with 55g of water and 55g of flour. Once it has more than doubled it is ready to go into your next batch of dough. You just need to leave a little of the starter in the bottom of the jar and feed the scrapings with the 55g of water and 55g of starter. After the first time, I never bothered measuring the scrapings. You just need to leave less than a tablespoon in the jar to feed. If you don't plan on baking anytime soon, just put the jar of scrapings in the fridge and pull out and feed with the 55/55 ratio 8 to 10 hours before you want to make your next batch of dough. So if you want to make your bread dough in the morning feed it at night and it is ready to go. Or feed it in the morning and make your dough later in the day. I found that since I am baking every two or three days, I just feed the scapings immediately and after they have more than doubled, I put the jar in the fridge until I want to bake. This works for me. Last night I made three doughs using three of the mini bigas. All three doughs went into the fridge for a cold fermentation. That left me three jars with scrapings to feed. I fed each jar and left them on the counter overnight. I just took pictures of them and they are now going into the fridge for a couple of days. If you look closely at the lids, you can see how they are expanding so you know that these little starters are active and strong. Made a nice popping sound when I realized the lid. Besides being really easy, what I really like about this method is that there is no waste at all.

I agree. That loaf is a beauty.

鲜虾鱿鱼炒面 (xiān xiā yóu yú chǎo miàn), shrimp and squid fried noodles.

I fixed this last night for dinner and it was quick and delicious. I used a couple pork loin chops. I have a feeling I'm going to be making this often. Thank you very much for the recipe.

I also think it's great that you reused those containers. I don't think it's tacky at all! I promise you the people who got the store bought cornbread loved their meals as much as those who didn't!