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K8memphis

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Everything posted by K8memphis

  1. How close does one get if they're into feta cheese and spinach on <whispers the word> pizza? ← There is much to admire about the Greeks, both culturally and culinarily. This does not include their pizza-making skills. Shun the feta pizza; hew instead to the blessed spanakopita. As to spinach... perhaps. If it has been sauteed with a lot of garlic, and all the moisture has been cooked out. Then it can be quite good on a white pie, maybe with some sausage. ← Yes exactly!! But sir, feta be white!! Elated to have my mortal pizza arse spared.
  2. How close does one get if they're into feta cheese and spinach on <whispers the word> pizza?
  3. I think that's exactly right -- and it's the reason that listing our preferences for favorite sandwiches or good bread isn't ultimately going to be helpful to the OP's shop. ← But that's why you do 80/20. 80% the familiar and 20% new. Fresh bread and scratch mayos and dressings make a great sandwich even better. Plus they said they were doing their own meats too. There's a lot to be said for doing something simple really really really well. A real simple menu that is killer. They will come.
  4. Somebody needs a happy pill. Clearly it is harder than most difficult to get a shop open and keep it open for sure. I am evidence of that. I stayed open under two months in my most recent venture that still smarts like hell. Although I have had a successful cake speakeasy for 30+ years. But I'm fixing to open again legally. (Talk about addictions) It is really hard and gut wrenching and no amount of negative advice is without sound reasoning. But still.
  5. To me, the only way to be able to justify baking your own bread is to sell another line of goods because I whole heartedly agree that regular bakeries and especially bread bakeries can't hardly make it and most often don't make it. Tossing some protein on there with some lettuce et al is the way to go. Then folks are coming for a meal, not just some carbs. The marketing aspect is huge huger and hugest like I said upthread. Especially since 9/11 shoppers in general have narowed thier field of vision and are pin point shoppers. We get on the internet, we check the bells and whistles on the product we want and we shop for price and we don't buy if we don't find exactly what we're looking for. So there's more people looking to get lunch than to get a specific loaf of bread. Simple as that. Stand alone bakeries are dinosaurs. Plus then there's the merchandising. I mean as if marketing isn't bad enough-- Someone upthread said that they really dug the odd little metal buckets that the store arranged their product in. Yeah. It's all a ton of psychology. I mean you gotta tell 'em why they need that damn loaf of bread and make it look irresistable. It's crazy. I work in a church bookstore. I've had this amazing nativity scene in a blazing dispay in the window for weeks, it's 360 exposure right by the register so it gets traffic that way too. Not a nibble. I move it just inside the doorway and it sold in two hours. I have jewelry that's been in stock for a year. I put it on a different display, "Oh you've got something new!" they oooh & awe. It's equally fascinating and maddening. But back to bread--I have a different take on it--it's just not that hard to do at least some of it yourself. But almost impossible to make a living at bread baking alone.
  6. Ouch. Well good though that everything helped. I can't think of anything sans sugar ie. candy aka geedunk and pogey bait that would go with peppermint.
  7. capers, olives, anchovies, and oregano. I like it! The oregano isn't part of the sauce, but an add-on, so it would technically count as a fourth topping, wouldn't it? ← 4th? More like 3.5 Close though.
  8. I think marketing always matters more. ← If he's from a 10K town in Texas how much marketing can there be?! ← Not only was healthy tourist trade mentioned, competition was too. C'mon, if nobody knows the place is there it doesn't matter about quality. You're not in retail are you.
  9. Full article here. Basically it states that candy canes might be good for you. Don't tell my rat friends at Princeton. Intriguing huh? I just don't know if I could handle pepperminty tomatoes or avocado or something? Peppermint cauliflower or brocolli? <gag> [in a related story--We haven't tried this yet as evidenced by intermittent nibblings heard above our heads but the next time we repair the holes in our house we will apply peppermint oil to hopefully keep the freaking squirrels away.] Anybody try peppermint oil for soothing their tummies? Wonder how you would ingest it? That's not got any sugar in it? I mean the easy ways are in chocolate or candy. How else can you ingest peppermint oil? I mean on what kind of food? That wouldn't suck.
  10. I think marketing always matters more.
  11. Hey K8! Thanks for the shout-out. ← Absolutely, Cake-Buddy. I have been blessed to be in your class. Hey I just heard that Jennifer will be doing a floral gum paste class in New York this fall. Here's her email, cakebabe1@aol.com. It will be a two day gumpaste floral class. Both dynamite teachers!
  12. My favorite sandwich purchase ever was the heirloom tomato with the fresh mozzarella on this lovely corn meal dusted softish roll with pesto. I mean where have you ever seen a tomato sandwich on a menu? That was killer. Few and far between if at all. Of course that'd be a seasonal special. Then Chef-boy has one that is a grilled cheese with the cheese itself grilled and crispy in a non-stick pan and a dash of honey on thin sliced challah bread. Colby cheese I think. I haven't had one in over five years but the memory lingers. I'd like a sandwich place to make it easy for me to get a soup take out plus some of thier homemade bread slices for toasting to dip in the soup. I think the mixture of the familiar plus some of the new is the way to go. Rotate specials in and out of the menu. Sweet potato fries. I think making your own dressings (you gonna have salad? may as well huh) and mayo and aioli and stuff is important.
  13. This just reminds me of the story of the day old day olds. Once upon a time I worked for this donut place for about 2 days or two hours or something, way too long to say the least. They fried their doughnuts in the afternoon--don't even ask me. 'Special formula' they said. Then the ones they deemed 'day old' that would no longer be sold as 'fresh' were then dutifully put last in line of all the previous day olds of which there were legion. If you can follow that. The whole freaking place was day old. But to get to the most current day old you had to wait a few days. Far beyond truly pathetic.
  14. How's about 'gifting' them to customers who are there at closing who are already purchasing something else. I mean going forward you run the risk of packing the place out at closing. But if that gets to be a problem, reset your closing time one hour earlier to the customer and keep the same closing time for the employees and you have the wiggle room you need. I would love to get sucha 'gift'.. Ok wait. I'm visualizing a coffee shop type place that serves meals. But this won't work for a pure retail set up. Well hey then that leads to another idea. Is there a restaurant you would want to bless with the goodies to hand out to their patrons? Is there any place you already work with?? Next door maybe? A coffee house or sweet little cafe you go by on the way home? But I mean you loose control of your stuff that way too. If the folks wait two days to eat it it's gonna reflect poorly. So maybe make a special label that states must be consumed within 12 hours or something. Just some random leftover ideas.
  15. Wait. There's a technique for tomatoes. You par boil them to remove the skins then you slice off the top and smush out all the water & seeds with your pointer finger, slice and arrange on the partially cooked crust. It's the perfect 'sauce'. Not wet not tough or gloppy--perfect. Talk about killer pizza. None of that gloopy tomato pastey stuff that acts like so much boiling hot sticky peanut butter on the roof of your first degreee burned mouth. I mean whoever started with the pineapple and ham on pizza left the door wide open for bar b q huh. Edited to say, maybe it's your pinkie (to squosh out the water & seeds)
  16. I'm really glad you tried this. Too cool. The words, "can't stand chips" has never spilled from my lips. The mind over matter thing is a great tool but it only lasts so long especially as evidenced by our own colleagues here on egullet and in this thread. Those who are not in denial. I mean it is the only solution I know of and it falls woefully short of my expectations. I did it for year. Plus other times. Plus people 'encourage' you. 'Hey it's my birthday, have some cake.' 'I'm a junkie, I'm sorry. I'm a recovering addict. Sure, just a little piece.' But like we know, little pieces lead to a little more plus... I know that saltines are said to turn to sugar right away inside us like fruit juices do. I don't know if chips do but I wouldn't be surprised. Often I'm wanting the salt to balance out the sweet. I mean the safe alternative of a celery stalk filled with some Laughing Cow French Onion Cheese spread and a few pecans sprinkled on top is no match for that last piece of apple pie burning a hole my brain that my husband is trying to hang onto for his dessert tonight. Me, having had mine for breakfast.
  17. I will tell what others received this year. My husband got a calphalon griddle pan. He about came unglued when he opend...are you ready for this...when he opened a salad spinner...and I got him an immersion blender for making me more soup. Got the Red-Headed Girl and Chef-boy some cupcake cuddlers like these. And I got the RHG some linzer cookie cutters and I made some tea-jellly with Southern Comfort so she has a filling for her linzers. And I gave her the really cool snowflake cookie cutter set with the extra little bitty cutters to make the different cut outs within the snowflake. She got a sifter and an iron skillet and a food processor. I got jewelry. gimme five! And the RHG gotta bottle of champagne for us all to toast our 30th.
  18. The ones in my neighborhood do. But no easy open cans for them, they rip the cans open with their teeth of course. No but really evertime I see the subject of this thread "Authentic Viking Food" as opposed to the counterfeit or fast food kind maybe? Just being silly.
  19. I honestly think a lot of us are in denial. I think a lot of us know very well too. It's hard to say it though. Especially when it's not readily, clearly illicit in some way. There's an entire thread Steve started about needed a sugar fix and what do we go for when we're jonesing. Not trying to out anybody.
  20. I think cookies, cake and pastry are a more powerful vehicles of sugar. Just in the easier storage factor and transportability. I think more of us eat more other sweets with flour rather than frozen ones on a stick. That's all. Yes, exactly, I wasn't very clear--that is just an aside--but an important one also in the weight loss/maintenance--go for better health, better control of health, by manipulating your food type nugget of information. It's important in this discussion because it demonstrates control or lack of control. When we snack on carbs, we feel satisfied. Then shortly thereafter we feel more hungry than previous to eating the carbs because carbs begat carbs. I don't know exactly where this fits into the addiction study. Just a related story. I had found a study and here's the link in egullet. The original study and link disappeared. And just for the record, the gist of this thread is not God's absolute 100%, peer stamp approved glistening truth to bring about world peace and cure hunger. It's just about a study or two or three, discussing the pulls and pangs and difficulties of eating to help you be more healthy. So we would be the peers reviewing/discussing this information amongst ourselves. Yes
  21. I am in the USA so I have no dishes to miss necessarily but I am far away from the Chicago area. And I mean you just can't get good Polish sausage around here. Like some from Misch's or Marusauk's. Oh geez just typing it makes my mouth water! Whenever we would visit my family in Hammond IN or Calumet City IL area my father-in-law who lived here in TN would have us bring back some Polish sausage. The real stuff. So I am very thankful to be here in the states--truly I lack for nothing--but I would so dig some sausage like crazy for Christmas. And some of Moms' freakin' pierogi's. It's nostalgiac anyway even if I'm in country. I miss the baked goods of the North too.
  22. Jennifer Dontz travels to conduct flower classes. Contact me if you want her information. Her cakes are in the big floral arrangment books that are in florist shops - I guess they are FTD or whoever it is that publishes those big giant books that go out across the country. I think they come out yearly. She's awesome. Well credentialed. There's B Keith Ryder Virginia. And here's a good link http://www.ices.org/links/sugarartinstruction.html
  23. The plastic wrap generally does not stick. There might be a tad of the top stuck but I am fixing to cut that off anyhow. Just to be clear: I use parchment in the pan to bake in. I sometimes use waxed paper in the pan to bake in but not on brownies--only cake. I use plastic wrap to flip the cooked cakes on-- doesn't stick.
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