chefpeon

Ooooh....tough call, since I always like to be totally honest with clients, and not sneak anything past them. But, like you said, she's overwhelmed. In all likelihood, you could probably tweak it and she won't even notice....I mean, brides usually take the first bite of cake with the groom, then spend the rest of the time mingling and such. But I always lean toward honesty, because when you do, you always know you're in the right. In her overwhelmed state, you could state your case like this: "Hey, I know you're totally stressed....I don't want you to have to worry about the cake on top of everything else you're worrying about. I'm having problems with your buttercream recipe because of stability factors, but I know a couple tweaks that will totally solve the problem....it won't affect the taste. I just wanted to ok it with you." And she'll probably say, "Yeah, sure OK....thanks for telling me." I'll betcha.

Well, I was gonna say use the beets......but.....I guess not. I refuse to make red velvet if I can't use the beet juice. All that artificial red color just wigs me out. But, since you're not wigged out..... I'm pretty sure the recipe calls for 2 oz of liquid, since that is the kind that is most readily available to everyone. Remember, the red color is just there for color and nothing else, so if you use less, it won't affect the overall quality of your cake. If you use paste you won't need nearly two ounces......maybe a teaspoon or so? Personally if I were going to use an artificial red, I'd use the powder. It's fairly concentrated, and really quite tasteless. You might need about 2 tsp of that. I'm just guessing though. Gel color isn't nearly as concentrated as paste, but it's more concentrated than liquid, so the amount would probably be somewhere in the middle of the paste and the liquid. Hope this helps!

Here's some easy ideas: Make chocolate chip cookie dough. Leave out the chips. Bake the cookies. Then ice the tops with the ganache when they're cool. KIDS LOVE FROSTING! Use the ganache to make chocolate milk. You can also use it to make your own Mochas if you're into espresso drinks. You can also use ganache as a brownie icing. Scoop the ganache when it's firm and roll the little balls in M&M's or nuts or sprinkles....KIDS LOVE SPRINKLES! (So do I )

How right you are, alanamoana! I never let the dishwasher touch my small tools and stuff I want back AT MY STATION in the same shape as when I used it! However, he/she can wash my bowls, muffin tins and anything else that belongs to the establishment. However, our dishwasher doesn't come in til 3 pm. I start at 5 am.....so yeah, most of of the time I am doing my own dishes, because I need them back before, uh, 3 pm. So of course, I end up doing the hot sides' dishes too, 'cause THEY'RE IN MY WAY, and I can't run the automatic washer unless it's FULL. Yeah yeah yeah......I'm a glorified dishwasher....thanks for reminding me.....

I am sure it will reassure you to know that those skills do get better with time. I felt EXACTLY like you do when I first got into the biz.......and you know, sometimes I still feel that way now. Here are two things that help me "stay out of the weeds": 1) Becoming somewhat "psychic". I'm sure anyone that has done this as long as I have knows what I'm talking about. Maybe it's not so much "psychic" as the skill of "anticipating". You learn to look at factors that affect your workload that maybe you didn't pay attention to before. For me, it was looking at weather reports (yes, weather reports! In some places the weather determines what kind of customer flow you will get that day!), upcoming holidays, local events (we have a lot of "festivals" where I live), who you work with and how much they support you (ie, if your co-worker starts coughing and sneezing and saying they feel like crap, anticipate that they may not be at work the next day). You'll know what to "anticipate" when you've been at a certain place for a while. You'll see the "danger" signs. 2) Learning to have more than one thing going at a time. It was really hard for me to do that at first. I'm pretty good at it now. I am usually working on a minimum of three tasks at a time. For instance, let's say I have to make a big mocha cookie dough, macaroons, and muffin mix. I have to melt a huge amount of chocolate for the mocha dough, so I throw that in bowls in the oven (yes, the oven) to melt while I start scaling out stuff for the macaroons. I get the butter and sugar melting for the macaroons while I'm scaling out the rest of the stuff for the macaroons. While I'm waiting for the butter and sugar to melt and the chocolate to melt, I start slicing apples for the muffin mix......and so on. I make sure I consolidate trips to the walk-in.....like if I'm putting butter away, I also grab the apples out. With time you learn to make every step, every moment count...all your movements become choreographed and efficient. You'll know when you hit your "rhythm".....and boy does it make me irritated when somebody "trips me up". These two skills are really important I think. I get better at it every day. Also with time, and repeated tasks, you get faster at them because you've done it so darn much. I always gain speed when I memorize recipes because I don't have to keep referring back to something. Now, mind you, I don't actually TRY to memorize recipes, it just comes when you do it over and over and over....... Also, pastry itself is the most time consuming station in the kitchen. It's one of the things that distinguishes us from the "hot siders". If you feel that you are too slow and are concerned about it, that is a good thing.....you're aware that you need to polish skills (as we all do, even with experience under our belts), and never stop thinking that you can learn more. You'll pick up your most valuable skills from experienced co-workers......learn from them too. As long as you have the attitude that you want to succeed, you will.......!

I would ask the same thing also.......is there some reason you can't use a "buttercream-ish" type icing?

The AB recipe is quite soft off the mixer, but it's not soft enough to prevent you from scooping it. I do the exact same thing as JFinLA, except I don't freeze.

Ooooh.....chefette.....I had my hopes up there for a while.....but alanamoana brought me down again..... Good catch! However it's STILL far cheaper than the initial link I posted to Kitchen Universe. Given the huge range in prices on those things, I do believe someone's in the business of ripping us poor PC's off. I can actually see maybe paying $200 for one.....but $499? Outrageous. If I ever had the great fortune to get one, I'd NEVER let the dishwasher TOUCH IT!!!

Yeah, I know those Guitar Cutters are major expensive, but I sort of thought it MIGHT be justified with the precision metal "strings" that are threaded on it.....even so, ridiculously pricey. I thought the rolling pin strip cutter was even more ridiculous, just because, although it's a great idea.....it's just so.......low-tech. I do like those wheel cutters that Chromedome mentioned, but I've used them more for light scoring than actual cutting......it's hard to apply even pressure over a wide area to get a complete cut. That's if you're doing brownies or some such......thin doughs though, it works pretty well. Nice reasonable price too! Man.....$119 for a croissant cutter....gimme a break!!! Why is it that the equipment that truly makes our jobs easier is marketed to people like me who hardly make enough to afford it????

Have you ever noticed that people with "to die for kitchens" rarely ever cook? At least the people I know don't. I have this next door neighbor, Phil, who has the AWESOMEST kitchen....including a commercial gas cooktop/oven. But he doesn't even KNOW HOW TO COOK. He comes to my deli for takeout......all the time.......

Hey, the one at Pastry Chef Central is a much better deal...."ONLY" $219 AND it's adjustable! The other one isn't adjustable at all! I'm still not buyin' it though. I wouldn't use it often enough to make it worthwhile. But maybe if I had it I would make strips more often.......oh God....here I go.......

Well, duh....that's what I use NOW. I'm talking time savings here. I STILL think that's too much, even though it might pay for itself over maybe.......10 years.

So I was shopping around online this morning, and I came across this cool rolling pin type pastry strip cutter......I was thinkin' "Hey, I could really use that..." and then I looked at the price..... FOR THAT?????? It can't be right.....can it??

To make it easy on yourself just do this: After you've mixed your dough, scoop it into balls THEN refrigerate! No sense scooping the dough AFTER it's rock hard. Scoop it while it's still nice and soft.

First of all, we were discussing whether the Wilton recipe was classic french bc.....it's not. That's what we were referring to. Any time you speak to a PC and you say French Buttercream, they're not going to think "Wilton".....they're going to think, "Yolks, sugar syrup, butter......" Terminology is important. Especially when we deal with clients. They say they want a particular thing, and we make it for them. Then they come back and say, "That's not what I ordered." The reason for that? Because what I thought they ordered and what they thought they ordered were two different things. It's been a thorn in my side since I've been doing this. When a client says, "I want X" I can no longer assume they know what they are talking about, and I have to say, I believe X is this, is this what you mean also? So I can see a bride asking for French Buttercream, having read the Wilton book, and I can see myself doing "yolks, sugar syrup, butter......" and then her having a cow because that's not what she wanted......... So we're anal retentive.......there's a good reason forhat.

Questions: Are you looking for an icing that will eventually set? For instance, after the kids decorate them, is the icing supposed to crust over so they can take them home without ruining them? By looking at your rough recipe, I am guessing this is a fluffy whipped icing? Or are you adding milk to water it down so it's somewhat runny? I'm fairly certain that the addition of the extra milk is what is giving you that "broken" look. From looking at your list of ingredients (you didn't list the amounts), I would assume that that recipe is for an icing that is whipped......ie. combine milk, powdered sugar, vanilla, mix til smooth, then add shortening and whip. You end up with a fluffy icing. Are you familiar with emulsions? An emulsion will break if there is too much liquid added, and I'm sure the percentage of milk to shortening you are using is the cause of your breakage. Icings I use to decorate cookies are generally in the royal icing family. Sometimes I use melted chocolate, and sometimes a fondant type of icing (powdered sugar, corn syrup, heavy cream). I understand that these are little kids that are using the frosting......how are they applying it? With hands? Little pre-made piping bags? Are they dipping them? More info please! I can help better that way.....

If there's a shortage, it's probably fairly localized, depending on what manufacturers distribute to what suppliers. Most of my sugars originate from plants in Idaho and Utah. I probably won't feel a powdered sugar pinch..... but I think it will affect coffee a lot, since Louisiana was one of the biggest coffee import ports in the US.

Add me in on the confused list too. I thought french buttercream involved egg yolks (or whole eggs) and a hot sugar syrup. On another thread about German Buttercream, it seemed that one was very pastry-cream-ish. Since this thread is the first I've come across a buttercream that involves milk and flour, I don't know what to call it, but I'm pretty sure it ain't french.

OH!!! You are SO RIGHT about the pre-shredded carrots being dry and weird! I too, have to use so many shredded carrots that it's cheaper to buy them in pre-shredded, than to run carrots through a teeny tiny feed tube on a freakin' CUISINART. There is no Robot-Coupe where I work! Guess what I found out by accident though! If I freeze the pre-shredded carrots, and then thaw them, they are way juicier! Try it! Oh, and I'll add this......I use my pre-shreds to make a Morning Glory Muffin batter, which is real similar to carrot cake. There is baking soda in my recipe (no walnuts), but I've never seen my carrot shreds turn green........

I must say, I've never heard of that type of buttercream. What function does the milk/flour mixture serve? That really puzzles me. To answer your question about shortening.......sure you can add it, and the fact that it has a higher melting point would certainly help with your "melting" problems, but wow......that would really mess with the taste. It most certainly would leave an unpleasant mouthfeel. And wouldn't the bride become upset if you tinkered with the recipe she requested? If it were me: I'd be dead honest with the bride and tell her I was having trouble with the stability of the buttercream. I'd tell her I was concerned about the cake holding up because of it. I would tell her I would need to use a more stable buttercream in order to guarantee the success of her cake. But that's me. A lot of brides don't understand "stability" issues. It's our job to educate them.

Well, that makes me feel better.....and maybe I should brush up on my French. Or not. In all the kitchens I've worked in, it's actually better to know Spanish.....

It figures......patissier is second from the bottom....... In most of the American kitchens I've worked in, the dude with the loudest mouth was at the top. We call it "Chef de Decibele".

Now that's a kitchen mantra I can REALLY get behind. As a matter of fact, I think I'm doing that already. In addition to keeping everything as simple as possible too. That's always something to consider for sure. In an exit interview, knowing that finding out the reason they are leaving may not be pleasant, I phrase the question like this: "I'm really sorry to lose you, but since you've made the decision to go, may I ask why? Your honest answer will really help me in future management decisions I make. Anything you say is held in the strictest confidence." I've usually gotten straight answers from them. I mean, they're leaving and they know they won't be dealing with any negativity from fellow employees or me because they won't be there anymore. They're usually pretty open about getting nagging issues off their chests, if there are any.

Since everyone's situation is so different regarding staffing and such, I think the best thing for you to do would be to ask the question "why are you leaving?" in an exit interview. If you see the same answer popping up time and time again (such as "I'm bored" or "I don't see possibility for advancement here") then you might re-evaluate what you could do differently as PC at your establishment. Since everyone always has their own reasons for leaving, you need to find out if the trend of losing people has to do with the work, the atmosphere, the management style, or maybe the fact that people are getting better offers elsewhere. It may be a money issue....it could be hours.....it could be a commute issue......it could be personal stuff.....or illness.....or....or....or. Since I have a lot of experience on both sides (management and employee) I know how hard it is to "toe the line"; to keep the best interests of both sides equal and fair. The key is to listen and evaluate. To manage means being a mediator in some cases. It can be really really hard. I always let my employees know that they can talk to me no matter what. If you let them know that you're their sounding board, you have a pre-emptive tool in knowing they may be positioning themselves to leave......and why they are thinking of doing so. I am always honest with them by letting them know I am in a position of doing my best for our employer too, and there's some things I can do for them and some things I can't. If I feel an employee has a legitimate gripe, I go to bat for them 100 percent. When employees SEE that you try your hardest to be honest and fair, you eventually win a good degree of loyalty. But that's my management style. Other people have other styles. I'd be curious to hear what they are too.

I did post the link in my demo. If you click on the word "Dietrich's" in my post, it will take you right to their page. On their page is a phone number. Call and order. That's what I did. Lemon juice and vinegar are interchangeable in this application. It's all matter of preference of the recipe writer/user. The key ingredient in both is their acidic properties.