lorea

Yum...just thinking about this makes me hungry! Thanks for the tips and links! Also, if I want to cut the slices into petit fours sized pieces, do I slice with a hot knife?

I know it's "classic," but what components are really really good? I've been searching for threads on opera cake, and people talk about it, but nobody ever says if it's a really great tasting cake. And if it is, how do I go about making every layer the best it can be? Any recipes for the perfect cake, creams? And any tips? I'd like to try my hand at it just for fun, but I wanted to ask you all first...since it's supposedly a "classic." I found a recipe in Friberg's book, but I thought there might be better recipes for the individual components. Is this something that is typically made in culinary school? Oh, and I bought some coffee extract in France...is this a cake that I can finally use this in? Thanks a lot in advance!

Yes, the dried mushrooms are much more aromatic than the fresh ones! Definitely a different experience. If you don' t like the chewiness, I find the pre-sliced dried mushrooms are less chewy than the whole ones, and they reconstitute VERY quickly (~5 minutes in hot water). I use these when I'm in a hurry, otherwise, I use the very expensive ones. There's usually a huge price difference between the cheap and expensive ones, but it's worth it! The expensive ones have an almost silky texture than the cheaper ones. Dried mushrooms are really good in stews and rice dishes. There's a really good dish where you steam glutinous rice, mushrooms, pork, shrimp, and Chinese sausages in lotus leaf or bamboo leaves. You can also use them in stir-fries, along with the soaking water. Or try it with fried rice....it completely changes the taste of the entire dish.

I think the choice of mixers really depends on what you want to use it for. The tilt head is great for mixing up batter, cookie doughs, mashed potatoes, etc.....but it's horrible for bread kneading. With a tilt head, the bowl gets locked tight into the screwing mechanism so it's almost impossible to take off. Also, the ones with a tilt head actually have a SMALLER capacity than the lift-bowl models because the head of the mixer is actually lower into the bowl....if you look at the attachments, they're all much shorter than the lift-bowl models. There's an additional few inches of unusable space at the top of the bowl. This makes for less capacity for batters, and this is horrible for doughs.

If you have money to spend, there are refrigerators that have this capability now. Makes it easy to update a shopping list!

Daikon is really good with soups....Chinese beef noodle soup, pork broth, etc. Fennel is also my vegetable that I need to work more on.

If you cook the blueberries with water long enough, the blueberries themselves have pectin in them, which will thicken your sauce/topping. If it's not enough for you, you can try adding some pectin (it comes dried in little packets in the baking/canning section of your grocery store), or you can add some gelatin to your mixture. When you refrigerate your cheesecake, it will firm up.

Wireless + laptop for me, propped up on one of those book stands/lecterns. I've gotten flour in the keys before, but I just blow it out with compressed air. It's the easiest way for me to stay organized!

Balut! I had no idea what you guys were talking about. My Vietnamese friend gave me that to eat (the chicken egg with an embryo inside it), and it was delicious!! I had no idea the embryo was so fully formed though...all the body parts were pretty much fully formed. I was a little grossed out right before I dug in because I had no idea it was so ...old, but once I started eating it, it was really really good. It's a little sad though, because he could have grown up to be a really big chicken. And yes, sorry...the stinky tofu is a Chinese dish. I realized the thread was for SE Asian foods after my post.

How about stinky/fermented tofu? Smells like garbage! But it's sooooo good deep-fried and topped with soy sauce and chili sauce...

I would heartily recommend SmartShopper. You can customize it for any of the fields you want, and you can use it for many other things (especially for grocery shopping!). Also, there's a desktop version so it's easy to copy and paste recipes into it. Now, I just my recipes onto an online forum, and I can use my web-enabled palm to access it anytime. (see my post in the Transfering Recipes to Computer, Best way? topic...http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=31630)

When you say your keep a pizza stone on the bottom rack of your oven, do you actually cook on it? (say, if you were baking up a pan of brownies, would you put the pan directly on the stone?) Or do you cook on the racks above it? Thanks!

claire797 - No, I actually baked the white cake, whereas you posted the recipe for the yellow cake. But the method is still the same. Since you seemed to like the yellow cake, I think that's the next cake I'll try. Sinclair - I meant a lighter frosting (not necessarily buttercream) that is more aerated and less sweet. Your melted white chocolate tip is really interesting....do you have more information regarding proportions? I haven't tried any 7 minute frostings - how is the taste/texture different? From some of the recipes I see, it looks pretty fluffy.

Just wanted to report that I made the white cake from the Cook's Illustrated book, The Best Recipe, and it is simply delicious. Wendy, it's the closest scratch cake I've tasted to a cake mix (which is what you're looking for, right?) - light, fine crumb, moist. I'm still looking for a better frosting though....something lighter, less sweet, and fluffier.

I didn't realize the white cake from the Best Recipe cookbook by America's Test Kitchen was that good....I guess it's time for me to try it! Does anybody have a favorite frosting to go with it? It doesn't necessarily have to hold up longer than a couple of days (because I'm going to eat it all)

Can you reheat them in the oven before they arrive? I normally bake mine at 325 on a sheet pan until they're nice and crusty. YUM! But nothing beats fresh croissant au buerre's from France. Speaking of croissants, does anybody have any "fabulous croissant" tips?

I own the Kitchenaid model that you're thinking about buying, and it's GREAT for coffee and french press. It's very easy to get a very consistent grind with no powder. I just wouldn't recommend it for espresso; by the time the grinds are fine enough for espresso, the beans are so overprocessed by the heat that you end up with burnt-tasting espresso. Also, cleanup is very easy - just toss it into your dishwasher and you get a fragrance-free grinder. Great if you want to use it to grind spices and nuts too.

Thanks so much for the advice! I'm always learning so much from this message board. Also, I'm mainly interested in restaurant-style plated desserts, as well as breads/croissants/pastries. And I'm definitely interested in moving towards weighing ingredients - but it's so hard to find books have weight measurements (except for my European books).

I'm a pretty good home baker (both sweets and breads) and I'm seriously considering going to culinary school. I'd like to go through an entire pastry book on my own before I apply though because it's a big decision (big job change for me!). My question is this - if I could choose between the following 3 books (I'm in the limiting goodcook.com club), which one would be best for learning classic French techniques? Lots of pictures would be a huge plus. - Professional Baking, 3rd Edition by Wayne Gisslen (I read in a previous thread that somebody didn't like this book, but I also heard good things too) - The Professional Pastry Chef, 4th edition by Bo Friberg - Sweet Miniatures by Flo Braker (not sure if this is a "teaching" book) Any assistance would be greatly appreciated!!

Thanks for the great tips on velveting! I have several Chinese cookbooks and I don't think anybody ever really described it. I have a couple of questions though: 1) Is velveting also normally done to beef? Is that why the beef is always so tender in restaurants? (Also, what cut of beef do they normally use for stir-fried dishes?) 2) Is there a safe way to pour the hot oil out of the wok and into the oil container? This sounds rather dangerous! Thanks!!