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I'd eat it too. I don't worry too much about pies like that. Fruit pies either. All the components are cooked/baked and overnight shouldn't be a problem. What do you think people did before they had refrigerators?! I guess they just threw away all their leftovers...

i like the tempering process that is being discussed: fridge, then freezer, then fridge, then room temp. i've never frozen chocolates, but i'd like to hear what people find when they do freeze relatively liquid fillings. if there's more water available to freeze, does the filling expand more than more solid fillings? so do you get more cracking due to expansion? i can't remember what wybauw said, so i'll have to check the greweling book. let us know how it goes mary!

McDonalds: bacon-egg-and-cheese-biscuit but this has sadly gone downhill since i actually worked at mcdonalds and made the biscuits 'from scratch' (there was a dry mix and we added the liquids and actually mixed, rolled, cut and baked them). the bacon used to be bigger and thicker as well. a better substitute popped up when living in new york in the form (although not fast food, per se) of the bacon-egg-and-cheese-on-a-soft-kaiser-roll from whichever bodega was closest to home...$2.50 including coffee and you can get it delivered to your door as well. man, i miss new york. no drive throughs, but delivery everywhere.

K8, take a look at the "photos of bread" thread...Tejon made a really nice braided beehive. she shaped it over a pyrex bowl and took the bowl out after baking. you could invert this and it would be a great base for a basket. i don't see why you can't add decorations after the fact. you're winging this and the people you're making it for probably don't know much about decorative breads and such. you could always 'glue' things on with royal icing or egg wash or something after you bake the base.

Jennifer, Thanks for the wonderful blog! One thing I wanted to ask was regarding the cookbook from your bakery. I noticed I have it on the shelf (don't ask how I can not know whether I have a cookbook)...how accurate are the recipes? In other words, if I try the cannele recipe from the book, is it close to the one you use at work? I know that the ingredients are pretty simple, it is more finesse-ing the molds and baking, but just curious. I think it is time to buy some expensive molds! It was great having a peek into your busy-but-fun life.

restaurant supply stores have stainless steel cooling/roasting racks. normally they don't have any sort of coating on them, so they should be fine for roasting on. we roast on them in restaurants all the time. my mom even used on on top of open flame to do some meat skewers. didn't survive as well, but should be fine for indirect high heat roasting.

at least with regard to popovers (cousins to yorkshire pudding), i've always baked them for at least 45 minutes (closer to an hour) in a 400F convection oven. from what i understand this is common. similar to pate a choux, popover batter needs the time and temperature for the steam to allow for expansion and for the proteins to coagulate. then the extra time is for moisture evaporation. you want them to be drier than you think. people tend to underbake pate a choux and popovers. i used to bake about 300 of them and we'd keep the oven going all night during service. the first ones pulled were fine and we'd warm them up if necessary but they never deflated. edited to add: marlene, looking at the photo of your lovely roast and the accompanying yorkies, it definitely looks like the yorkies are underbaked. a little too light colored where there are cracks. but if you like them like that, why worry?! it's all about your meal

ooooh tejon, that's just beautiful! was it like a challah or brioche type enriched dough? it looks great and you must have proofed it perfectly as it kept its shape wonderfully. is the braid hollow? how did you form it?

sandy! i'm sad we didn't get a chance to meet. but at least you ate at my favorite taqueria! i have loved the shady el farolito ever since i was introduced to it when i was living in san francisco. since moving back to the bay area, i took my husband and now all he can think of is al pastor. so far, your trip sounds great!

thanks for that point mary! if you put them too close together the sides might not stay in temper as it will take them too long to cool down. thanks luis!

i donated an old winter coat, hat, scarf and gloves to my pastry department so that we could spend time in the freezer cleaning...you might consider bundling up if you plan on being in there!

i recently came across a purveyor www.terraspice.com who sells white cheddar powder

using 'dead' dough has the advantage of not rising before or (minimally) during baking. this allows you to create really detailed designs and not worry about them losing definition by the time they're finished. there are also decorative doughs that are very lightly risen (low yeast percentage) that might work for what you're looking for. i would recommend using something like a cracker dough (not usually leavened) or a breadstick dough (usually a little harder to work with) to make the edible treats.

there is also a point when the shells can be too thin. if you shake/spin/vibrate out too much of the excess chocolate, beware. there won't be enough chocolate inside the shell to have enough contraction to allow the chocolates to pop out of the mold. and it is good to have a thermometer while you're practicing and learning, but try to get used to how the chocolate looks and feels when it is in temper. if it feels warm to you (if you do the lip test) then it is too warm as our body temp is 98.6 and the max that dark chocolate should reach is around 93 degrees Fahrenheit. it should feel cool to the touch. oh, and take a look at this demo by John DePaula... as well as this demo by Trishiad. these demos should be a wealth of information.

s.o.s. is a pretty lame reason to be fired. and just how would it compromise the presentation of bar food? as much as i get pissed at foh staff, i wouldn't do it for something that petty. maybe there was a long standing grudge between this particular waiter and the chef. i'm actually glad the owners fired them. let them get away with it and you end up with an a$$hole chef who doesn't deserve to wear whites.

scary parallel...i went to tj's to buy the 99 cent ball-o-dough and they only had the whole wheat and herbed flavor. so i figure, i'll go home and make some dough...but i took a nap instead . maybe tomorrow! pizza looks great and i'm sure you're loving your brand new countertop and high heat oven. gnocchi tomorrow?

Just stabbing in the dark: I think it might come from the fact that if you just put a price on a cake based on ingredients and labor, people might not understand why it costs so much. "What are you talking about, cake can't cost $500+!!!". But if you put it in terms of per person eating a slice, then people are more likely to pay a little more without questioning it. Like you go to the local patisserie and a croissant costs $1.75-$2.50 and nobody blinks an eye. Calculate that out to 150 guests and that's a lot of money for croissants! While the price per slice is pretty common across the board, cake decorators will also have sliding scales based on filling choice, cake flavor choice, icing type and exterior decor. So I think there is enough room for people to make a choice that they like without breaking the bank. And it is enough labor to deal with a crazy bridezilla that the extra cost is warranted. I don't think it is an unfair practice or misleading. But one still has to be a smart consumer.

if half-and-half is cheaper at costco...then wouldn't whole milk be cheaper there than your local market? i don't know that i would use half-and-half to make yogurt. the flavor profile is different, isn't it? and yogurt 'cheese' is just drained yogurt. you can get fairly thick yogurt 'cheese' even from skim yogurt.

pizza! and some sort of quiche or other tart-like thing with some sort of pie dough or pate brisee? edited to add: i'm guessing what's for dinner

Thanks John! I only wish you were here to photograph...you're a great photographer! I'm going to try and do a small piping demo this weekend. Hopefully my husband can help. It's a bit hard to dip and snap photos at the same time and I imagine it is more difficult while piping .

it would be great if you could post a picture of one or two of them to help us identify the molds. often, the molds with latches, etc. would have been used for steamed puddings (English style desserts). some other ones were made for paté en croute or other preserved meat type things in a pastry shell. and some were probably for ice cream and the like. pictures help.

Mark, a lot of those self healing mats have inch markings (office supply stores and fabric/craft stores)...and you can cut on them since that's what they're designed for! I didn't use hot water, as this ganache was pretty soft and I didn't want it to seal back together after I cut. That can be the down side. But, if you have a sturdy ganache, then that's the way to go. I just wiped the blade with a paper towel after each cut.

I think it is what is called a "petty knife" by the Japanese. It is in between a paring knife and a smaller sized chef's knife...sort of my general utility knife. I like it because it is small and has a thin blade. Here's a picture of it and a ruler for scale. Next to it is the piece of plastic that I cut to one inch wide to use as my cutting guide:

I only wish Kerry! I have thin pieces of acrylic that I cut into one inch wide strips. I use them like a ruler/straight edge and cut using them as my guide. A very thin bladed sharp knife and it works a charm. I'm still jonesing for a guitar though. I think I'll have to have a business plan worked out before I can dare spend the money! Thanks!

So I dipped some chocolates at home and took some pictures. Please excuse my lack of skill as a photographer! Here is my home dipping set up. On the bottom left is my slab of ganache which I already coated on the bottom with chocolate (bottoming like this is called putting a 'foot' on your ganache). Above and in the middle is my tempered chocolate sitting on a heating pad in another bowl so that the heat is evenly distributed around my bowl. Notice that the bowl is tipped forward so that I have an almost level surface of chocolate with the edge of my bowl. To the right is my clean piece of parchment sitting on the back of a half sheet pan. I place my finished chocolates here and I put it on the back of the sheet pan so that I don't have to wrangle with the lip of the pan which sometimes makes it difficult to place the chocolates. I realized only later that I should have been working in the reverse order since I am left handed...but it all worked out for a small home job. In this picture, you can see that I've dropped my piece of ganache in my tempered chocolate bottom side up. You can see the foot here. So after this point, I put the tines of my dipping fork against the bottom (foot) of the ganache piece and gently flip it over so that the entire thing is coated in chocolate. I tilt it a touch sideways and shake my hand ever so slightly to remove excess chocolate from the top of the bonbon. (edited to add: I don't know what happened to the color in this picture!) Now, I touch the bonbon to the surface of the chocolate and lift it up a couple of times. Using the surface tension of the chocolate in the bowl helps to remove excess chocolate from the sides and bottom of your bonbon. Do not rap your dipping utensil against the edge of the bowl as the vibration from doing this will surely knock your bonbon off your fork. Notice you can't see the tines beyond the far edge of the bonbon. This is correct. If your bonbon is on the fork and the tines stick out the other side, you'll have a harder time releasing the bonbon onto the paper. Here's a picture with from left to right: correct, incorrect, incorrect technique. The far right shows a foot at the back of the bonbon. This happens when you slide the chocolate in the same direction that you're using to remove the fork. Rather than do this, you should place the chocolate on the paper and ever so slightly slide it away from the fork as you pull the fork from underneath the bonbon. That way, the bonbon sits on top of any excess chocolate. The middle piece shows an exaggerated drag of the dipping fork on the paper. This will leave little sharp points on the edge of your bonbon. We discussed releasing and then very slightly moving your fork along the bottom edge of the bonbon to eliminate these points and to avoid the dreaded drag. Finally, the piece on the left shows a correctly deposited bonbon with no foot and no points. It is easier to release the bonbon from the fork at a very small angle. The greater the angle, the greater the likelihood that chocolate from the top of the bonbon will spill over the edge and create a foot as it settles down. Any vibration after depositing the chocolates on the paper will also cause this to happen, so don't move the chocolates after they've been dipped until they have a chance to set up a bit. This (blurry) picture shows my fork making a design on the top of the bonbon. I'll dip a few chocolates and as it is about to set up, I place my fork on top and lift it up slowly moving it away from the chocolate. This will create two clean lines. There are different shaped forks for different designs. You can use texture sheets and leave them on for a shiny polished look. You can even use your finger to create designs while the chocolate is still liquid. and finally... The finished chocolates. About 120 pieces from a small batch of ganache. Hope this was a little bit helpful.