JeanneCake

My mother used to use the sheet pan whenever she made a Texas Sheet Cake - it was a thin cake but it filled the pan.

Find me a hotel, I'll be your helper. I've had enough of the kitchen I'm in. But I'm not moving for another three weeks. Of hell. I won't have to worry about what it's like later, I'm living it now.

I wondered about that phrase too - I'd seen it in a Maeve Binchy novel so your question prompted me to search google for a british slang "dictionary" where I learned that "po-faced" means Glum, melancholy, long-faced

Maybe this is a job for SugarVeil icing? It's a type of royal icing that can be picked up and "played with" so to speak, when dry. It might be what you need for such an intricate design. Would it be possible to do the artwork in smaller areas and fit them together on the larger cake? Or if you're going to do it on a slab anyway, use one of those projectors to display the image onto a tile of fondant or gum paste and you could work at it over several days; then you don't have to move the embroidery, just the fondant tile.

For this situation, I've used the rice krispie cake from Colette's birthday book. I've made race cars, mostly, and a few castles. They're different from a typical layered cake, and sometimes that's ok; sometimes not. It depends on the child, whether they are always having something "different" and they want what everyone else has on their birthday.

Depending on whether I buy them at the local grocery store ($4.98/# - they'll come down soon) or the high priced gourmet grocery ($6.98/#) the prices will start to fall in a week or so. I have a bag chilling in the fridge right now! Yes, you're the only one getting sneezy. We just smile a lot at our house after eating cherries. How can you be in a bad mood after that kind of windfall!

For photograph/styling, our own Ling and Patrick S and then, for cookbooks, my favorite photographer is Ron Manville. He does the shots for Grace Ormonde's Wedding Style Magazine and he did Sherry Yard's book.

So.. he couldn't give you a pair of gloves so you could hold it yourself?!!

Hello... I am in a bit of a quandry. I used to buy supplies (stands, cutters) from a shop in Melbourne called Cake Deco. At some point in the last few months they stopped shipping internationally, so I am not able to buy directly from them. But I need to buy an acrylic stand that I can only get from them for a wedding on June 23. Here in the US, the shipping firm UPS operates retail stores called Mailbox Etc that ships on behalf of individuals. Does something like this exist in Melbourne? Could you give me the name - I can contact them and see if I can arrange to have CakeDeco ship to them, and then have the package sent by the third party to me here in the US (Massachusetts, actually). Unfortunately, time is of the essence, so any ideas, suggestions and recommendations you could make are a big help!!

mmm - frozen banana - milk chocolate .... and then roll them in some chopped toffee! (swoon)!

So... you are delivering a wedding cake, or another sort of celebration cake or pastries or something - what are you wearing: Chef coat and checks? A uniform (like a polo shirt) with the company name on it? Street clothes? Whatever you wore to work that day (kitchen clothes but not a chef coat)? If you are on the receiving end of the wedding cake (you're the function manager or maybe you're watching the delivery person walk through the kitchen to get to the banquet room) does it make a difference what the delivery person is wearing?

This happened to me last week with batches of IMBC. I made four or five batches in a row, and one of them had nowhere near the volume of the other batches. All I could think of was that I'd broken a yolk and just didn't get all of it out - it was 30 oz of whites and I don't know how much of the yolk I didn't get out. The whites were billow-y and meringue-like but only came up halfway instead of almost to the bottom of the whip (where it attaches, which I guess should really be called the top) they way they usually do. So maybe it is a percentage of fat (from the yolk) that makes a difference. As a side note, I'm reading Roland Mesnier's "memoirs" from his White House years and he tells the story of making a souffle for a state dinner and has to do it three times because the whites aren't whipping up the way they are supposed to. In desperation, he uses the last batch with maybe some extra sugar or something, and it comes out fine. Everyone wants seconds! What gets me is the eggs where the white is tinged with blood - it doesn't happen to me very often, but sometimes I get an egg that is very red and other times, it's just a faint tinge of color.

And I've been making biscuit, layering with jam and pouring fondant over. I hate doing these with a passion and am always looking for a better way to build this mousetrap. Are you baking the frangipane the way you do for rainbow cookies?

For color, and for the winter when strawberries are not so wonderful, don't forget about mandarin oranges. Readily available all year, looks colorful (especially with a kiwi and a raspberry or blueberry). Brush glaze over all for shine. You're doing great! Congrats!!

I wear the white industrial ones at work, and sure enough, I can manage to get chocolate, cake batter, you name it - everywhere the apron doesn't cover. I can't win!

"Full of lovely stuff" indeed! That's just too cool for words. Just don't let anyone at the Food Network see it - or we'll see a whole new set of Cake Challenge shows...

can you cut it upside down (flip it so the topping is on the plate and you are cutting down through the cake, and can put some body english into the final cut through the praline) Then you can scoop it all up when you put the piece right side up?)

caramelized so now we know with those nuts, all bets are off. what kind of nut? whole walnuts? pecans? chopped peanuts as in brittle? Are they on the surface? Inside? On the sides? If they're only on the sides, you are mostly in the clear.

I'm guessing you tried Meadow Sweets at Candied Flowers and you haven't heard back from them? They're usually pretty good about staying in touch. I got a new Pfeil and Holing catalog and they are selling edible flowers that are crystallized - I haven't ordered them so I have no idea whether they look good or not (Meadowsweets flowers are beautiful) but you could try them here at crystallized flowers Hope it helps....

Spiderman 2! ← Yes! Congratulations

I'm paraphrasing but here goes: "Call Barbara." "why" "tell her not to open the caviar"

I also agree on the cutting frozen/hot wet blade method if you're using the 9x13 pan to bake in. If you're set on having round ones, I'd use the Flexipans or a similar silicone pan. I used to use my mini-muffin pans for this, but it was such a hassle to unmold, I stopped. If you use a no-bake recipe, fill the silicone and freeze, then pop them out onto a cookie round or tart shell if I want to have a dripping topping... otherwise bake as usual, freeze and go.

And if you want to guild the lily for something like meringue sticks, finely grate 2 oz of bitter chocolate (unsweetened choc) or chop it finely and put it in a food processor with the flour/confectioner's sugar and whirl it until the choc is finely chopped. Then add it at the last stage, folding to make sure it doesn't all sink to the bottom. This won't really work for mushrooms, but just in case you were thinking of how to experiment ... I pipe sticks about 3" long with a star tip, let them sit out for an hour or so, then bake about 40 mins or so at 200. Leave them in the oven overnight if the chef isn't coming in (otherwise, he turns up the ovens when he comes in and doesn't always check them first!) Sometimes I even half-dip them in chocolate....

I have an order for a Lady Baltimore cake for a 25th anniversary on Saturday. I baked the cake today and am very tempted to make a Swiss Meringue as the 7-min frosting and filling (not atdding the butter) rather than the traditional recipe I've found. (To fill in the details, a Lady Baltimore cake is a white cake, with a 7-minute frosting filling that contains raisins, pecans and sometimes maraschino cherries. The outside is just plain 7-min frosting.) What I don't know is whether or not I can let this stand overnight in a humid walk-in without having it deflate, weep or otherwise cause problems. Just about everything I do is either italian meringue b'crm or ganache or mousse or something like that. It also suddenly dawned on me that these Lady Baltimore cakes I've been reading about are single cakes, not torted into three cake layers/two filling layers which is what I usually do. With proper support (I use the bubble tea straws for support) it should be ok. It's a three tier cake, 12/9/6. But now I'm wondering if this is going to work at all. Anyone ever done this type of cake before?

Periodically, I get something called "Frozen Desserts" - maybe that's what you remember seeing? It's been a while since the last issue - and it's either PA&D or PastryNet, can't remember which one publishes it...