JeanneCake

All this reminds me of the Chocolate Cheesecake Brownie in Maida Heatter's Book of Great American Desserts. This dessert is always a big hit and a nice change of pace from the usual stuff. It is a chocolate brownie with coconut and pecans topped with a chocolate cheesecake mixture also with coconut in it. Having said that.... What if you created or used your favorite brownie recipe using the chopped cookies instead of the nuts - pour it in the pan, then pour over it your cheesecake mixture. Maybe even marble the two by spooning it over the brownie mixture in gobs. In the original, both layers are not too thick, but you know you're eating a brownie and you know it has the most delicious chocolate cheesecake on top of that. The book has it in a square brownie pan, but I make it in a round, removeable bottom cheesecake pan and use some cocoa on the top.

What happened to the woman who won the Food Network Star contest? I don't have a lot of opportunity to watch FN (I try to see Ace of Cakes because it's funny and that's what I do, but usually I'm asleep because I start work so early in the AM) I seem to remember she got a good timeslot on Sundays but while Guy F has parlayed his "win" to go on to other shows, that hasn't happed with this winner. Or any other ones? And as for Sandra Lee.... well, I don't enjoy her show and I've seen it a few times. But I did happen to be awake when the FN did a "chefography" on her. I have to give her credit for persistance and sheer grit - to have been the "mom" to younger siblings while her mother was ill (she took over the family household as a young teenager) and then when her younger siblings went to live with their father, she was alone at 16 (her father wasn't in the picture, I gathered). I didn't know she was the person who invented the pouffy valence thing (I had one or two in my first apartment, I will admit. They were perfect for my budget and looked great.) and made her $ there. That to me explains all the tablescape stuff - she's creative and able to take inexpensive things and pull it together. And all that stuff she cooks is what she was making at 13 for her siblings so now I know what that's all about. It doesn't make me want to watch the show, or cook anything she's showing, but after watching that, I have respect for her and what she's been able to make of her life after a difficult start.

You may find that you need more "stuff" to make realistic looking gum paste flowers - the gum paste, color, a ball tool (to roll the edges of the petals and make them curve and curl realistically), a foam mat to roll the petals with the tool, cutters will make the job easier but you can fashion your own stencil to cut the petals from. Then wires, and perhaps green floral tape to make the buds with.... Weigh the cost of buying all this "stuff" to make some flowers with buying the real flowers and see what works out for you. It's less stressful to buy the flowers, but if you want to make them, start well in advance (like, now. And I'm not trying to be funny - you will want time to experiment and perfect your technique and it can take a lot of dedicated time to perfect a skill like this. I can make my own flowers and some of them are really nice, but Mother Nature does the best job, and Cal-Java, Avalon and a bunch of others also do a better job on the more complicated flowers so I will let them have the honor!) It will be a lovely gift from you to your friend; you should have fun doing it!

I buy the Felchlin from Swiss Chalet Fine Foods - they have three locations. The main one is in Miami, then there's a warehouse in NJ and I think somewhere in Texas? Not sure about that one. I think the website for more info is Swiss Chalet If you go for the Felchlin ultra gloss, you want the disks, they melt a lot easier (it's also available in a bucket). You can either pour it over the petit fours, or dip them (like chocolates.) I dip mine, and like to do it while they are still frozen if possible to minimize the crumbs. But you'll have to strain the chocolate occasionally to get rid of the crumbs and keep the bowl on a heating pad or return it to simmering water as it begins to thicken and to melt more. Sometimes you have to dip them twice, it depends on whether you like to see the layers within or not. The coverage will depend on the viscosity of the chocolate. With fondant, I always dipped twice and hated how it crusted; for me it's so much easier to use the coating chocolate. I bet you could use any other brand of coating chocolate. I've only used Van Leer dark so my guess is Van Leer in white would work equally as well.

This is such a lovely blog, Ilana. Thank you for sharing so much of your life with us; I'm loving it! I am so thoroughly enjoying your writing and photos! Thank you, thank you!

you can color regular pouring fondant; or I use Felchlin ultra gloss chocolate coating (I like how it covers and tastes better than fondant) and you can color that (pastels look better! )

You need to see it to believe it.... Two Eggs are Better than One ETA additional information: This is a newspaper article about a woman in the UK who cracked an egg only to find another, whole-in-the-shell egg within. The "outer" egg was about 3" in size and gave no external clues about what was inside. I'd had lots of double-yolked eggs, but I've never had anything like this!

No, it's just different. Roland Mesnier uses this method for the creme brulees in his books and I can attest to the fact that his Champagne Creme Brulee with sugared grapes is a big hit!

That's exactly how I feel too - I hate cleaning out those corners but that's what I want - straight, square, true corners. I don't want these fake corners in the daddio pan..... whine whine whine I don't even want to wash these to try them out.

I bought a set of odd-sized square pans (15, 13, 11) from Pfeil and Holing - and they come from Fat Daddio. They seem heavy enough. But the inside corners are "mitered" - meaning they slope and aren't square. I'm so used to my trusty Magic Line pans that I am wondering if I should send these back and just do a special order from Parrish's. I also noticed that P&F has a line of unusual shapes that I get from Australia (such as comma, petal, hexagon, octagon, triangle, cut-corner rectangle, etc) and now I wonder if those are coming from Fat Daddio too. Has anyone baked in these square pans? What do you think? How do those corners come out? Got any of those odd shapes? Do you like how these pans perform?

There are a few things I make in 3" round cake rings that need to be tamped down to get rid of air bubbles (which would look unsightly when the dessert is unmolded) or my individual flourless cakes that need to be pushed down after baking to fill out and make the sides smooth (rather than concave which sometimes happens). Years ago a friend used a cylinder of wood that she had made (this was in CA) but I need to find a tool like this because I'm tired of using the spray caps, which are just about the right side but not quite. Most of the pastry tamper tools are meant for tart dough and are 2" wide. Anyone got any ideas about where to find one? If I had to get something like this made, what kind of wood should I ask for, and where would I go (a butcher block place?).

I made Morello Cherry hearts (like gfron1 I didn't like how they were a little misshapen as a result of using the cutter and plus it was a lot of waste); strawberry and blood orange this weekend. The blood orange were great; I replaced an equal measure of blood orange puree for the strawberry, but felt it could use a little more oomph but they were by far the favorite. The strawberry ones were very soft, in fact, a day after they are almost mushy and I'm picking up some grainy texture in a few of them. I didn't beat these quite so long as the other two, though. I fill a half-sheet pan with this formula and sometimes it doesn't fully fill the pan - one edge might be a little thinner than the other if you don't beat for the right amount of time at the end. I think I killed my trusty 6 qt KA with these, though. Mind you, this workhorse is in use on an almost daily basis and I do beat the living daylights out of it so maybe it wasn't the marshmallows

I like the idea of fig, pear and goat cheese but I I know that's not one of the original choices For that matter I like raspberry and goat cheese too. I would like chocolate, hazelnut, apricot and coffee or chocolate, cherry, apricot and hazelnut

I guess it depends on how the client feels I love the ball and chain idea... make a broken link in the chain and have the ball positioned at some distance away dragging part of the chain You could put dollar signs all over it to either represent the amount of money it cost, or what they would save by being out of the marriage; or look at their wedding cake (get a description if possible) and just do half of it. I mean literally make a stacked cake and cut it in half (all that stuff about two becoming one...now the one becomes two....) There's a wedding cake somewhere online with iced letter cookies spelling out JUST MARRIED on two of the tiers. Spell out JUST DIVORCED in bright colors. Make a replica of a marriage certificate and "tear" it in two. Make a whimsy bride and groom sugar "figurine" and depending on which one your client is, have one spouse pushing the other over the side of the cake....

The Jan/Feb 2008 issue of Food Arts mentions this technique (as well as the Ideas in Food chefs) in an article about hydrocolloids written by David Arnold of the French Culinary Institute; it gives an overview as well as comparing and contrasting the use of low acyl gellan gum, high acyl gellan gum, methocelF150, gelatin, and xanthan gum among others. Now I feel like I'm ready to experiment with this too!

My mileage is definitely different. I don't get this reaction between the buttercream and the cake's surface. I think it would happen if you weren't leveling the top of the baked cake and put the buttercream on the baked top crust (Margaret Braun does this will all her cakes, btw. Her recipes bake with a crispier top crust and she likes that textural element.) I notice that the top crust is sometimes sticking to the top of plastic wrap after an overnight stay in the cooler or after a day or two in the freezer so maybe that's what you're seeing?

One way to add a flavor is to use a spiced syrup brushed on the cake. You could steep some cinnamon sticks in a sugar syrup along with other spices (maybe use a bouquet garni bag if you are using bulky spices like star anise) or just mix the spices with the sugar before you boil it. If you might be diluting the syrup before applying it to the cake, you can make the syrup spicier than if you use it straight. I would use an already good chocolate cake recipe and tweak it with spices than trying to re-engineer it; I'm sure if you posted the recipe people would be willing to offer suggestions but my initial inclination is to double the spice amounts you're currently using and see how that works. Also, see what happens to this cake after you chill it overnight. You might be pleasantly surprised!

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I'm intrigued as well. I googled "white chocolate consomme" and came up with a few sites that might give you more inspiration: The Power of a Passion blog and this NY Times article discusses gelatin drips to clarify NY Times article Sounds like fun!

You could do it yourself - or you can bring in the plumber to do it. Do it often and it isn't as gross as letting it go. The last kitchen I was in (I sublet) didn't do it for two years and when they finally did, I couldn't stand to be in the kitchen. My current kitchen is a much larger facility with a huge trap and the plumber comes in every 3 months.

Anytime I've used pasteurized whites, they collapse when I add the sugar syrup. I've figured out through my own trial and error that I can get away with about 1/3 of the total quantity of whites as pasteurized, more than that and they collapse. What kind are you using? It would be a whole lot cheaper than all these shell eggs I'm going through... Thanks!

We are doing the hosting, and I'm making (by popular request) the Havana Moon Chili (from epicurious). It's got olives, golden raisins, slivered almonds along with the usual suspects and people can't get enough of this (I also have to make rice, and one - there's always one! - in the crowd who wants spaghetti for under the chili.) It's different but boy is it good. Then so far we having coming: a cheese and fruit board; teriyaki wings, buffalo wings, someone is sure to bring a crudite platter and the kids will get Annie's Mac n Cheese. The caterers I share with made a crab/artichoke "bechamel" (I can't think of a better word for it, and I forgot what they were calling it) last week and it was fantastic. I think I might have to make some of that, too. Then for dessert, it's that oreo mud cake thing with chopped oreos, whipped cream and I don't know what else is in it, but everyone loves it! ETA: I'm told that this is called "dirt cake".

Kim, I would agree with Alana... make it tonight. If you don't frost the cupcakes, cover it with a barely damp paper towel (what I hate about cream cheese icing is the way it crusts over. I don't know that your filling will do that but just in case, the paper towel can't hurt until you use it.) And, one of my chef instructors had a trick to make cold buttercream workable quickly. It was broken up into smallish chunks and put in a mixer and then we'd put no more than one third the total volume in the microwave until soft (NOT melted) and added it to the mixer. If you go too far with it and it melts, the buttercream will have a "too buttery" consistency and lose a lot of the volume.

I've heard of "Deco" brand (from Swiss Chalet/Felchlin) which had on the label "european rolled icing" but not Euro brand fondant. I tried it many many years ago, and found it to be very stiff - it was more work to roll it than other brands. Sometimes it's not just price that makes it worthwhile to switch. Get some and see how it handles for you; if it works for you and you like it, it's worth it. I agree with Annie - Pettinice and Albert Uster are my preferred brands, and I use Satinice only when there's a loaded pastry bag held to my head.....

I made our wedding cake; still married after 18 years. But it was stressful to be doing it the day before the wedding with a lot of other details to attend to. There are a lot of superstitions around weddings, aren't there ! Ignore this one, and congratulations!