JeanneCake

Here in the Northeast, Indian Pudding is traditional, as are hermits and fig newtons. You'll get a lot of great ideas from Maida Heatter's Book of Great American Desserts. I've used it so often, I'm on my third copy. The sour cream oreo cookie cake is fantastic; the almond pound cake is to die for (it's also an adventure to make, it is not a quick to put together thing); the brownie collection is wonderful and how could I forget the California Fruit Bars?! It's sort of like a thin blondie with assorted dried fruits like apricots, figs, golden raisins, dates, plums, etc (or minus the fruit and only pecans, she calls them CA pecan bars) and anytime I've made it, people INHALE them (they also survive well and I send them to friends in the military because they ship well and last a long time). The bulls eye cheesecake is pretty cool too. I think you can still get a copy of the book from Jessica's Biscuit, an online bookseller that specializes in cookbooks. www.ecookbooks.com

I used to make my own, but now I buy it. Most distributors have some version of ready-to-use fondant available (Swiss Chalet, Albert Uster, Satin Fine Foods, Pettinice, aka Bakels, Sweet Inspirations); you might want to get some of each and see how they handle for you. I've tried most of them, and in order of preference, I like 1: Albert Uster 2: Pettinice 3: SatinIce. I don't like the Felchlin brand (Swiss Chalet). I've never tried the Sweet Inspirations brands, but they've come out with lots of colors (primary and pastels) and some flavors that look interesting. While I don't like the taste of the SatinIce brand, their primary colors are strong and great for coloring a larger piece of fondant. I use their black and don't bother coloring my own black fondant any more. For chocolate fondant, I use Pettinice only (I tried SatinIce and found it very soft and it tore easily and was frustrating to work with). The dark choc Albert Uster brand is too stiff and way way too hard to work with so until they reformulate, I'm staying with the Pettinice Choc fondant! You will find it easier to work on a stainless steel table, and use a bouquet garni bag filled with cornstarch to lightly dust the table. Use an 18" heavy-duty rolling pin, a shorter or more lightweight one will make rolling big pieces harder. But for small (decorative) pieces, the little white rolling pin is great. You can roll fondant out on a silicone mat (it will pick up the impression of the fiberglass fibers) or a non-stick mat; I just use the table and as long as I move the fondant piece every two or three rolls, I don't have a problem with sticking.

I think you're on to something with the temp of the meringue and butter. What kind of mixer are you using at home? If you are using a 525 watt KA, add the sugar syrup at speed 8 and then after a min or so, turn it down to speed 6. When you can comfortably put the inside of your wrist against the bottom part of the bowl , you're ready to add the butter. (you don't have to beat ithe butter separately first, either.) As devin said, if your meringue is on the warm side, the butter can be cooler than usual. If the meringue is room temp, softer butter is the way to go.

can you be a little more specific about what is "unstable" about the buttercream you make at home? How does it differ from what you make at school? I was lucky enough last summer to have my distributor make a mistake and send me four cases of Plugra - at the regular butter price! . I worried that it would make my buttercreams too rich, but it was fine. I didn't notice a huge difference in it; it seemed to go on a little more smoothly, but that could have been my imagination... I don't know the exact temp of the butter when I add it, but it is cool (not cold), and soft (but not smooshy).

My in-laws spend the summer on the coast of Maine and scattered through the city of Rockport are lobsters in various disguises (paint - none of them are the traditional red or mottled natural shell color) and poses to celebrate and promote the Lobster Festival. I haven't been there in a few years to know if they are still there, but they were fun to look for!

Do you have a copy of the Cake Bible? The cheesecake recipe in there is very close to what you're describing. I don't use it commercially because it is so soft, but when I want something for at home, that's what I'll make! You can bake it with a crumb crust on the bottom or apply a crust after you unmold it. I love it with lemon or passion curd poured over it as a topping. There's also another cheesecake recipe in Maida Heatter's Book of Great American Desserts - it's baked for 8 hours at 200 or 250. I found the texture to be nice and soft but the brandy flavor was too much for me.

If you are adding cornstarch or flour to a cheesecake batter, I've found that mixing it either of them with the sugar the recipe calls works best. (Then you add the sugar at whatever time the recipe states.) If your batter was lumpy, it's probably chunks of cream cheese as JayBassin says, rather than the flour particles (if you push the lumps against the bowl of the mixer, that would tell you).

On last week's Sugar Rush show, one of the features was a sugar showpiece with an ocean theme from a chef at a hotel in Florida. The chef took a tablespoon of royal icing and pushed it into a pot of boiling sugar (already colored) - he said it was the same type of sugar used to pour into the molds he was using. I don't think they showed him pouring it out, but you had to do that quickly, and it would foam and "dry" into edible coral. I don't know that it is good to eat, but it would qualify as edible. The pot was small as I remember - probably about a quart?

Wow, McDuff, thanks! Love the coeur a la creme idea, but sadly, I don't have heart forms... just lots of round pans and rings

The local chamber of music has asked me to participate in their "taste of" event; the evening is called "Marcel Proust's Salon" and will feature readings from Remembrance of all Things Past and as luck has it, I've never read this. Other caterers are providing savoury dishes and I'm it for dessert. When they first approached me, they said it was a Valentine's theme and I was going to go with panna cotta with a raspberry sauce. But now I'm rethinking it. While I think madeleines would be lovely and appropriate, I don't have madeleine pans and, as this is a donation and they are expecting about 100-200 people, I don't want to spend $ buying pans just for this. Can you think of anything else that would fit this theme? It's a cocktail party, people will wander from table to table helping themselves - the concert lasts about 90 mins and people will mingle afterward (starts at 4 so when they end, it's just in time for dinner). I had a lot of fun with the small champagne creme brulee tartlets I did the last time I had one of these events and am thinking to do it again.... I don't know what the other caterers are bringing, just that I am the only dessert vendor. Any ideas?

Parrish's/Magic Line will do custom work, but I have no idea how expensive it would be. Can't hurt to ask.... Or maybe the Chicago Metallic company would. I have a hundred or so of the 3x2 pans; for individual cakes it's a pain but there's no waste; but for cheesecakes, I use rings. I cut circles out of sheet cakes when I had to do individual cakes for a wedding order last year.

If you over beat it, that will thin it out..... I use a whisk to combine the sugar and cornstarch, but I use a spatula to stir during cooking

The butter in the buttercream will absorb into the wood, but since it isn't edible, it won't be a problem. You could try to cover the wings, etc with foil - maybe that new plastic sheeting stuff that you press together to seal would be good, I've never used it, but it seems that you could simply put the wing between the plastic, seal it, and then trim it. I don't think the buttercream will slide off the wood, it might slide off the plastic or foil, though. Do you have time to test this (wrap something in foil and see how long the bcrm lasts at rm temp)? How are you attaching the wings to the cake? Are you building the fuselage around a long piece of wood shaped like the wing? Or is it two pieces? I don't think covering wood with buttercream will be a problem, I suspect it would be harder to secure the pieces and not mess up the buttercream while handling it.

Does it have to be covered? Chefette did a demo some months ago of planes in pastillage, and while you'd be playing with time to get it to dry (especially in all the humidity), maybe doing it in pastillage might be easier than covering the wood sections with bcrm. If not, I'd add some veg shortening for stability - it's not going to be eaten so the taste won't have to be a concern. (or if you have a copy of the Cake Bible, there's a recipe for a practice buttercream that's all veg shortening in there). People serving the cake will know what parts are inedible, right? Take pictures and let us know how it worked out!

it is thinner; I add butter to mine, but I don't like this glaze as much as I like ganache. I use it primarily for coating my flourless chocolate cake, and the choc/water glaze (being thinner than ganache) doesn't cover/coat as well as I'd like so I end up using two coats. So I might as well just use ganache.

In making this over the years, I've learned for this recipe, the butter should be cool (not cold) and just barely malleable, not soft. The softer the butter is, the thinner the final buttercream. You do have to let it come to a full rolling boil, and I usually let it boil for about a minute just to be sure. I use pasteurized yolks and I found that when I beat the living daylights out of them (a long time), so they are nice and thick, I get a firmer buttercream (but this could also be a function of the pasteurized yolks, because when I use them for curds, the curd is thinner than with shell eggs).

I agree. His website shows his talent and creativity. On the competition shows, he seems more interested in playing up the "I used to be a welder" angle than in showing off his skill as a cake stylist - maybe that's what he's been asked to do by the Food Network, but it isn't doing him any good. During one part of the sport show, he looked almost incredulous when someone reminded him about the 75% cake part, as if he'd forgotten the rules. Keogan Gerhardt said something along those lines (unprofessional behavior) during the Elvis show - when the two judges didn't take kindly to the blow torch in the meringue buttercream he tried to say that it's the sort of thing he (Keogan) could relate to as a pastry chef, but it had no place in the competition. The good natured ribbing between he and Colette was cute, and lightened things up a little, but I think he took it too far. The end result for this talented professional is that his design fell apart on the table. I wish they spent more (camera) time on the cakes. Like when Colette had toothpicks in the wavy fondant borders, or the chocolate head of the matador was being shaped, or when the bicycle cake was being built - that would have been more interesting to me than the bickering! The emcee didn't do much to help by asking questions and trying to get in the way when it was obvious someone was trying to concentrate. That was annoying.

I had to explain to the mom of my son's friend today that no, my child is not deranged, he really did hear someone on the Food Network say that he would stick this screwdriver into someone's neck. (He saw it yesterday afternoon or whenever it was on). I couldn't agree more that this Duff guy is tiresome, although CakeDiva could give him a run for that money. Just because you have a hammer doesn't mean everything is a nail. And after the blow torch IN the mixer bowl (a friend of mine was one of the judges on the Elvis cake thing, and he did this at that competition), I have to wonder about what else he does in his shop that isn't on camera!!! But I know I'm going to have to tell my son to stop repeating the chef and the screwdriver story. I think the cake challenge stuff is pretty contrived and very subjective, and while I love seeing what the cake stylists come up with, I'd much rather they just point the cameras on the bakers and stop with the commentary and questions while they're trying to work. The whole drama about moving the finished piece is so not real life.

I finally got to see the entire show today..... I thought the matador was incredible work. The magic castle bike ride was nice, but I missed the close up of it; I didn't get to see whether what/how the castle was part of the design. What did you all think? There was a very very brief scene that showed Colette with a tier of the cake that had blue fondant on the bottom of the cake - the top of the cake looked dark, as if the fondant had been applied only to the bottom part of the cake. I'm trying to figure out what it could have been since I thought she covered the entire cake tiers with marbled blue fondant and then marked the wavy lines. Anyone recall that part and have any ideas on what she might have been doing?

When I was visiting a friend's bakery, she used one of those 3-fold display boards you can get at a craft store to put behind what she was spraying (same set up as you with the lined sheetpan, hers was on the bench). It was a while ago, I don't think she taped parchment paper on the board, but that would keep it cleaner longer.

Congratulations! Wishing you all the best - motherhood is a blast. Although a perfect fresh peach is close.

Took me a while to reply, I was laughing too hard... makes you wonder if they couldn't find anyone else who wanted to participate.... It would be really over the top if the episode airs on April Fool's Day!!!

amoretti might make a creme brulee compound (I don't know, I'm just guessing since they have quite a range) that you could use. It seems to me the thrill of creme brulee is the cold custard against the burnt sugar - how to capture that in a cookie is definitely a challenge! It would be like a cream puff dipped in caramel so maybe you have to find a rich custard-y cookie and dip it into caramel and let the caramel harden?

does it have to be rice? Can you find/make some white chocolate "jimmies" (aka sprinkles) and mix it with just barely firm or just barely enough white choc ganache to resemble rice? I did a dessert fruit sushi for a benefit last year, and used colored soy mamenori - when they're wet, they're a pain to work with but the colors are bright. (I spread the coconut rice on the sheets, and sprinkled dice fruit on it then rolled it. Where the fruit met the soy wrapper they disintegrated.) Edited to add: I used choc quills for chopsticks (AUI has colored ones now); and lime curd for wasabi

This reminded me of a marketing jingle that I used to hear on TV and radio as a child: "Brown eggs are local eggs and local eggs are fresh!" It was definitely a regional thing, maybe even throughout New England, but very definitely Boston! And even now, sometimes the distributor I buy from will ask if I care if the eggs are white or brown and he'll start singing it....