mkfradin

To follow up to others' comments/suggestions: --I do use parchment, but when I use the press, I hold the parchment down around the nozzle so it doesn't lift up. --I do stop squeezing before I lift (years of cake decorating, "squeeze, release, lift" are ingrained in my brain) --I've read that the dough should be warm and soft (a la Sinclair--thanks for the microwave tip, btw), but elsewhere, that it should be cool. I'm thinking for my purposes, a warm soft dough would yield a crisper cookie than a cooler dough (which would have less flour or binding than a dough that would have to be warm to be sqeezed, am I making sense??) Also, I read yesterday, after posting, that some freeze their sheets before piping to make the cookies stick better. Anyone do this??? I'm off to the kitchen to stir up some cookies. thanks for the help. Marjorie

I was actually thinking of doing that originally when the "too much sugar" thought entered my head. Also, I'm planning on using our cider that we serve hot, which is simmered with citrus and spices for a while; the citrus takes some of the sweetness out of the cider, while the simmering concentrates the flavor. Since I am experimenting, I'll try it with all cider tomorrow and let you know the results. Marjorie P.S. You are FAST!!!

I've been wanting to make buttery, crisp, crunchy and melt-in-your mouth spritz cookies in all different shapes for the holidays. Unfortunately, all of the recipes I've been trying have failed me in one way or another. Either the cookie is insipid, too bready, or just too blah, or the cookie tastes wonderful but cannot be piped out of the cookie press (it's too firm to stick to the parchment on the sheet). I don't have a problem using a pastry bag to pipe some shapes, but others, such as Christmas wreathes and trees, must be piped from the press. Does anyone have a tried and true, failsafe recipe that they'd be able to share? I would consider it quite a holiday gift! Thanks! Marjorie

Neil (or anyone else with an idea or an opinion!)-- If I'm using apple cider as a flavoring for the marshmallows, will I have to reduce the sugar content, and if so, by how much? How would this affect the structure of the marshmallow?? I noticed that for the tangerine marshmallows, you did not change the sugar or corn syrup, but apple cider doesn't have the acidity of tangerine and I don't know if the final product would be too sweet or not. I'm planning on using 1/2 c. of cider in which to dissolve the gelatin. I want to pour a layer of cooled but liquid caramel over the finished marshmallow and sprinkle peanuts over it for a taffy apple confection. Marjorie

Call me when you relocate to Chicago!!! ; ) Marjorie

Beautiful log, Annie! I love the idea of getting around the roll by slicing up sheet cakes; makes production lots easier and storage easier as well. Do you use an italian meringue buttercream in and/or on your logs? Good luck with all the holiday work this season; just think of how much easier next year will be with two good hands!!! Marjorie

Is there any way to make these guys in advance and freeze? I'm not a big fan of buttercream for a cake roll filling, and I love whipped cream, but when we froze the unfilled cake rolls for Passover last spring, they disintegrated. I'm starting to worry about what we'll do for Xmas. What do you guys use for filling and how do you make in advance (assembled or in components)? I like the prices!!!! I'm learning to charge more, but it's still hard to demand what we all deserve to be paid in the face of lower priced bakeries nearby (using inferior ingredients, but what does that matter, say the clients anyway). Marjorie

Oh my God, you guys are outrageous. i'm sitting here alone in my office, moaning, just reading the suggestions. Microwaved mushy bananas and fresh croissants got me going pretty quickly. My waistline does not thank you, but I do. Marjorie

Nutella is back at Costco and I'm thrilled to have my favorite dinner (Nutella on a spoon) available at a lower cost. However, I'm sure there are other things to do with such a wonderful ingredient. So far, we've just mixed it with our buttercream and layered it on a yellow cake (great, but a little too diluted for my taste). Are there any other Nutella fans out there? Are there any taste sensations that I'm missing by eating my Nutella straight? Any help is appreciated!!! Marjorie

Having been the employee and the employer in my life, in my experience, it's much easier being fired than firing someone. I'm sure there are people in this world who really get into making others feel bad and giving them the boot, but I'm not one. I actually get physical symptoms before laying someone off, and if there is any way around it, I will find it. I have had to dismiss two or three people for their inability to work up to my standards, which admittedly are high. I truly believe that none of them would have thrived in our store, no matter how much time and training they received, and by letting them go, I helped put them on the path to finding more suitable employment (or so I tell myself). With two of them, I had misgivings early on, but kept both for at least two additional months, trying to teach and demonstrate how the job should be done. Eventually, you need to cut your losses. If there was someone who screwed up once in a while, got sick once in a while, was late once in a while, and was in a bad mood once in a while, who cared about the product, the store, and the job, and was more or less dependable, I would hold onto them as long as I could. I have someone like this, and while she isn't perfect, she has improved and grown with the store and demonstrated responsibility and a willingness to learn. I mess up too, and I can't hold people to a higher standard than I am capable of. I also can't afford to fire people with less seniority if they are better employees than my old timers. Good people who care about what they do are really hard to find. Plus, if you have the flu and a fever, you have no business working in a kitchen. My backup for my employees when they get sick is myself, and I don't like having my schedule disrupted, but I suck it up, because they are there for me when I need them. Firing people sucks, but i do it only when keeping them around is suckier. Marjorie

And then when you tell them that you don't have a public bathroom (because you're tired of people walking in and out like it's McDonald's, using up all your toilet paper, not flushing, dripping soap all over the floor, and generally leaving a mess that you wouldn't want to have to deal with even if you were related to the people who made it), they start with the four letter words and tell you how much money they spend in your store when you could swear you've never seen them before in your life. Sorry to vent. Can you guess what happened today??

Printed out and hung on the wall of my kitchen. I couldn't have said it better. Thanks marjorie

I am reading this with interest, because my croissants are coming out a little more bready than I would like. By this I mean the grain is tighter and not as holey or stringy as others I've seen and tasted. I'm wondering if the stretching and pulling method is applicable at all to laminated doughs, and if so, how I would apply it. If not, how do I achieve a more open texture? The only thing I can think of is mixing the dough less initially, making the dough wetter, and maybe doing less turns. Currently, I'm mixing for about 30-45 seconds in my Hobart, which brings the dough away from the sides of the bowl. I do 4 double turns before shaping. Chef Reinhart, thanks in advance for your help. I discovered your books last summer, and they literally changed my life (your pain Poilane rocks). I also grew up on Murray's corned beef sandwiches and Mama's pizza, which made your books even more enjoyable. Marjorie

Temperature for cheesecake: I have it in the back of my mind that the center of a done cheesecake will test at 165 F with an instant read thermometer. I don't know where this bit of knowledge came from, but I've been using this temp. as a benchmark for my cheesecakes, and it seems to be working. A caveat: i think the thermometer is supposed to be not touching the pan, and I just stick my roasting thermometer in the middle of the cheesecake and I'm sure it touches the bottom of the pan, so I generally cook a little longer just in case. For the record, I bake at a really, really low temp (225 in a convection oven) b/c i was having lots of trouble with curdling last year. I leave the cheesecake in the oven for another hour or so after baking and don't use a water bath. (sometimes I'll push the steam button if I feel like it, but one of my ovens cooks really moist, so I just usually bake in there). The hole left by the thermometer? Not a problem. After we unmold the cheesecake, we sandwich it between two thin layers of Wendy's Chocolate Fudge Cake, pour a lot of ganache over it, and let the raves come it. Marjorie

I'm willing to bet that part of it was staged and they encouraged to her be a little inept for the sake of watchability. Oh God, I don't know...... Today I spent part of the day in my kitchen with a recent graduate of a very fine culinary school (2 year pastry program). Notwithstanding the fact that I had given this person checklists with every single step to do (i.e. "fit 20 quart mixer with whip"), the person attempted to make meringue with a paddle mixer. This is in addition to numerous other things that I won't go into now....... I also bake with someone who's heart is on the line, and have had to sit down with her to explain that you just can't take 30 percent of the water out of a formula and expect it to work--and you definitely shouldn't experiment with this when you're baking 200 pieces. Although the film editors can be creative with the raw footage, I'm guessing that a lot of it is real (of course, not having seen it--it's past my bedtime!). If you think about it, there are plenty of "not so bright" folks in this world that we see every day, and not just on reality TV shows.

How about shoofly pie or whoopie pies? Apple dumplings? I'm trying to remember more from a visit to Lancaster County PA two years ago, but I think I went into a sugar coma two hours into the trip. I bet the Lancaster County web site could offer you some guidance, though. Good luck!!

To the Frog Commissary carrot cake fans-- When you guys do the cake, do you do it with the sweet filling in the middle? I remember eating the cake at the Commissary and later making it to complaints that the filling was just too rich and too sweet (is there such a thing?) Admittedly, this feedback came from my husband, who also told me that my brownies were too chocolatey. WHat do your tasters say??? Just to add more confusion, I did a carrot cake taste-off last winter with three carrot cakes--the commissary one (without the filling but with the frosting), Nick Malgieri's carrot cake, and the one from cook's illustrated, where you use the food processor. Nick's won hands down (uses ginger, which gives it a little something special), along with RLB's white chocolate cream cheese buttercream. We use NIck's in the bakery, but use it with the commissary frosting, and there have been no complaints. In a few weeks, I'll try a taste-off with our customers and let you know what they say. Marjorie

I wanted to ressurrect this topic because I thought I had the problem beat and then it came back, and now I know definitively what the cause is but not what to do. I ran out of cake flour a day or two ago and couldn't get any more on short notice so I went to the supermarket and got a few boxes of Swans Down. As you guys probably know, the flour is wrapped in plastic (i.e. airtight), and my yellow cake was perfect. I purposely broke my own rules and overfilled my pan and it was still perfect, so the recipe's good, it's the stupid chicago humidity that's killing me. Has anyone had trouble with cake flour just sucking up the water from the air? It isn't happening with any of my other flours, and they're stored in the same place. My only thought on this is to keep te flour in an airtight container, which in this case would either be cambros, or to put it in 10 pound or so units in plastic bags where they'd be airtight till they're used. I would welcome suggestions,war stories, horror stories, etc. I guess I feel better at least knowning what the problem is, but I hate the thought of buying my flour at the supermarket every summer!!! Marjorie

Thanks for the suggestions and comments. There have been a few big changes. Most importantly is the weather. Our kitchen is incredibly well air conditioned (thanks to our local fire inspector who made me vent my electric appliances and necessitated massive amounts of makeup air which is treated), so it's not the heat, but it's been very very humid and I think the ingredients are absorbing moisture from the air, which is weighting down the cake. Moreover, our eggs were running quite large for a few weeks, and we weren't being as careful weighing them as we should have. Once we started weighing the eggs and trying to omit small amounts (5% or less) of liquid from the batter, it seemed to help. In addition, we have been putting less batter in the pans, so there is less weight for the batter in the bottom to push up as it attempts to rise. Does this make sense to anyone? Whatever the case may be, I made a large batch today, using probably about half the amount per pan as I am used to. The sheet cakes were magnificent, which relieved me immensely. The layer cakes didn't bake up as high as I would have liked, because of the amount of batter (they were quite light and soft, just not high enough). I am weighing meticulously, both the ingredients and the amounts of batter I'm pouring into the pans. I'm used to just eyeballing them at `1/2 full, and with the thin layer I'm putting in the bottom, it seems way too stingy. So does it sound like I'm on the right track?

I spent weeks developing my favorite yellow cake recipe to raves, and have been baking it for 2 mos. in my bakery w/o any trouble. Recently, though, my sheet cakes have not been turning out well at all, and now the problem seems to be spreading to my 9" rounds and to other cakes as well! Yikes! The problem cakes have a very soft, light and very holey top part, but the bottom part is rubbery, dense, and without any grain to speak of at all. I am at my wits' end trying to figure out what's going on here. I've tried fiddling with my oven temp., the amount of baking powder (reducing it since I'm using a sheet pan), the amount of batter in the pan, mostly to no avail. Keeping the amount of batter in the pan seems to help marginally, but I'm wondering now if it's that the batter is not properly emulsified, and all the butter is sinking to the bottom. Is this possible? What leads me to think it's a mixing or baking technique rather than a flaw in the recipe is that another yellow-type butter cake that I made today had the very same thing wrong with it. Or maybe it's a weather thing? It's pretty humid here. Any suggestions would be very much appreciated. I'm giving you guys my yellow cake recipe, which I was going to post as my very favorite. However, if these problems continue, I will have to say goodbye to it. Yellow Birthday Cake (2 9" round pans) 350 oven 4 eggs ½ c. whole milk 1 T. vanilla 225g./ 8 oz. cake flour 300 g./ 10 ½ oz. sugar 2 tsp. baking powder ¼ tsp. salt ½ c. salted butter, softened 1/3 c. vegetable oil Combine eggs, milk and vanilla. Set aside. Combine flour, sugar, powder and salt till mixed. Add butter and blend on 1 with paddle till butter is broken into pieces the size of small peas. Add oil and mix on 1 till blended. Add 2/3 egg mixture and mix on 1 till combined. Mix on 2 for 1 min. Scrape down sides and add remaining eggs. Mix on 2 for 30 seconds. Pour into prepared pans and bake till done.

Thank you, everyone, for your intelligent and insightful advice and comments. It sounds like many of you grasped the dynamic in our kitchen right away. The situation is a little more complicated than I really want to lay out here (as I'm sure it always is), and I think we need to discuss some things and get them straightened out before I make any final decisions. One thing I totally spaced on when writing last night (can you tell I have a lot on my mind?) is that this is NOT a home baker or inexperienced student. This is someone who is graduating from culinary school in a matter of weeks with a pastry certificate. (It's the product that's like what a home baker would make, but in our kitchen, it's all production, and we rely on a lot of classic techniques, both European and American, to turn out our "homey" baked goods.) In any event, she's very pleasant to have around most of the time, willing to try new things, reasonably bright, and seems to work hard at certain things. It's not all bad, and when it's good, it's really good. That's why I'm so conflicted. Karen S.--Believe it or not, I was thrown into a courtroom long before I felt I was ready (within two weeks of starting, in fact) and yes, I made mistakes. I was absolutely mortified by them, always made things right, learned from them and went on. Within a matter of a few months, I was arguing motions comfortably in front of judges and winning against much more experienced attorneys. Swimming with the sharks is the best way to learn, in my opinion. The trick is to learn from your mistakes and not make them again, and build on your knowledge so you don't make related mistakes. If you don't cut the butter into the flour the right way for the crumb coffee cake, shouldn't you take more care cutting the butter into the flour for the scones, or the pie dough? What it comes down to, though, is me--I assumed that because I hired someone bright and from culinary school, she could look at a formula and turn it out like me, and it just hasn't happened that way. We will work on education in the kitchen for the next few weeks and see how things spin out. I will keep you all posted. Thanks again for your time, suggestions and comments. I truly appreciate them. Marjorie

I started my own business--a bakery--a short time ago. This is my first business, and although I have had experience in the food service industry previously, I really don't have the kind of experience under my belt that a lot of you seem to have. There are some performance issues that have concerned me for a while, but I'm not sure if I'm being a control freak, impatient, not explaining things correctly, or just worrying about something that's completely normal. Because my bakery doesn't really focus on desserts that require technical expertise (we do homey American desserts like layer cakes, brownies, muffins, cookies--stuff the moms make for bake sales, only better), I didn't think I really needed a salaried pastry chef; that a culinary student or someone with a passion for baking, like me, could easily turn out what I needed. We began training in February, and began baking in earnest when we passed inspection in March. We opened on March 15. It seems like each week, there are still mistakes, some little and some big. I won't go through all of them, but what I'm feeling is that my pastry chef just doesn't really give a shit a lot of the time. When she tortes the cakes, they're uneven and a bitch to put together again, and there are usually chunks of butter in frostings and cookies b/c she doesn't scrape down the bowl. I try to address my concerns to her, but I'm wondering if these are things I should even be saying. Is it normal for product like this to be acceptable to someone in the business? Am I being naive for expecting someone to have the same passion for perfection as myself? Should I be able to give someone a new formula and expect them to be able to execute it properly without my supervision the first time? Like I said, I've never been a real employer before, and my HR concerns are so much harder than anything else, including the brutal hours and physical demands. I'm trying to be nice and diplomatic, but unfortunately don't have the greatest management style (I used to work at a law firm, so I picked up some bad habits, I guess). So what my question really boils down to is this: How many times does someone get to overmix the muffins or use the wrong kind of chocolate for the brownies before you have to cut them loose? Any suggestions, comments, or anecdotes would be very muich appreciated. PEople come into my store every day to give me unsolicited advice, but this is the stuff I really need to know. Thanks tons. Marjorie

You raised a number of really good questions, and I can offer my two cents worth, although I'm sure there are as many good ways to make croissants as there are good pastry chefs! I don't like to overwork the dough initially, b/c it is such a pain to roll it out! The softer and less elastic the dough, the easier it'll be on your shoulders. We have a sheeter now, but I'll never forget trying to roll out 12# of overchilled, overkneaded dough, kneeling on my bench to get all my weight on top of the dough! I'm not sure what the additional water in the dough would do, other than making it stickier. If your dough is really sticky, just use extra flour. Don't be afraid of it; you can always brush off the excess before doing your turns. I had a problem with butter leaking out till I spoke to one of my instructors, who informed me that I was proofing the croissants at too high of a temperature. I was placing them in my gas oven with the pilot, and the butter was melting. Don't proof at any higher than 78-80. I do this now by putting a pan of steaming water in my oven along with the croissants. Who needs an electric proofer!! One of the bonuses of leaking butter is the bottom of your pastry fries and gets all crisp and yummy. If this continues to happen, you can tell everyone that you invented something new. They will still taste great, and no one will know the difference. BTW, the same chef who helped me also told me my formula was bad, b/c it didn't use any butter in the detrempe. I made his recipe (in bulk--big mistake) and it wasn't nearly as good as mine, I thought. So keep trying, but do what works for you, not what you think you're supposed to do. Good luck!!! Marjorie

I'm a decorator (cake artist?) as well. In fact, decorating has pretty much driven my pastry path; the challenge was making it taste good. I still have problems using gum paste and wires and fondant b/c of the taste issues, but people love it and believe it or not, a lot of people were eating gum paste shards at a bridal show a few months ago and saying how good they tasted! I tried to upload my pics, but they were too large, so here's a link to my web site: http://www.geocities.com/mkfradin/ Sorry if it's not click through; I'm not great at the internet. For those of you in the Chicago area, I had a nice write up in the April edition of CHicago magazine (at the very back in the restaurant section) with a professional (!!) photograph of a daffodil basket cake. I love seeing everyone's work; it's so inspiring--but also pretty humbling! Marjorie

Oops. Sorry, didn't mean to post the whole thing, just a quote!