Pam R

Puffing dough - do you dock it before baking?

Is it just me, or is there more to watch on FTVC these days? As Kerry pointed out in this topic, Heston Blumenthal's In Search of Perfection has been a nice addition. Add to that Top Chef, Ace of Cakes and a few others, and I actually find myself tuning into FTVC more than I have in the past. Sure, a lot of the shows are British (Ramsey, Blumenthal, Nigella, Oliver), but I'll take them over a lot of the US shows. If only we could get some good Canadian content on there . . or is it there already and I'm missing it? OK, the truth is I still don't watch it the way I did when FTVC first hit the air. But I like to have it on in the kitchen when I'm working and I think there's more there than there has been in the last few years. Anybody else feel that way? Are there some shows that we should be checking out?

Rob, I'm assuming there will be pictures. Thanks!

Yeah . . I helped my parents shop for new flooring and we were told by a few people/places that laminate is no good in any area that could potentially have water sitting on it or under it. Meaning no good for the kitchen, bathroom or laundry room. In the end she (mom) chose a solarian flooring (vinyl I think). It looks like wood and costs more than laminate. 3 years later she's still happy with her choice. And no, for the first 6 months she had to ask every person who came to the house and nobody guessed that it wasn't really wood.

Can you ask them at the next dinner and see what they say about lamb? Just to get an idea. A simple 'Irish' stew might go over well. Chunky carrots, potatoes, parsnips (or not), celery, pearl onions, simple seasoning. This may be hard to imagine, but I wonder if lamb used to be more popular or standard in Canada than it is now. We've been bringing in fresh lamb for the last few months and sell a lot of it to seniors. But my seniors may not be your seniors.

We aren't alone. . no. Dim sum is great, and we go often. But I have at least one group of relatives that visit at least once a year and don't like it (well, didn't like it - one of them has been living in Beijing for the last couple of years -- we'll have to see what she thinks next time they're in town). And we usually do brunch with them a couple of times each visit. I think I've been to the Mother's Day brunch there once (I'm not 100% sure - it may have been another holiday) and it was excellent. I've always enjoyed it -- except for the last time I was there. There was less variety, and what sticks out is that the desserts were not as good as usual. Tavern is nice because the food is usually good (also had some issues when I was last there - in May) and I love the room. Do you have a Pancake House in Brandon? When you're in Winnipeg, you should stop in and have an apple pancake if you don't.

Mom is allergic to kiwis. Damn allergies. I was trying to figure out what I could do with pears or green apples that would keep their bright green colours. But I was stumped. Of course, next year we might need completely different colours. We could do several Earl Grey flavoured desserts. I was pleasantly surprised by the cream puff.

Sigh. Close. But at least we had good dessert! It wasn't all completely successful (kind of like the Bombers), but it was all tasty. Bottom left, light green. My first attempt at a macaron. No feet and it cracked. Filled with lime curd lightened with a little whipped cream. To the right, a 'football' choux puff filled with Earl Grey pastry cream. Yum. (like the football shape??) To the right of that, a blueberry Napoleon. Puff (thanks President's Choice), layered with whipped cream and then I cooked down some frozen wild blueberries with a little sugar. Iced with icing sugar/lemon juice - the blue lines just had a little blue dye. Scary looking, but tasty. Finally, the pineapple upside-down. I don't know why, but I had it in my mind from the beginning. The yellow doesn't show in the picture as well as it did in person. Cake had a lot of allspice in it and I made some extra rum-caramel to pour on top. It was fun. We enjoyed it while watching the second half of the game. Next year .

Hey Mark, A miracle is right! How big are the latkes? I can do 8 at a time in each of my electric frying pans - and work 3 of them at a time. 300 lbs. of potatoes took a lot longer than 6 hours . . .

Slow, low roast. Serve with homemade (easy) mint sauce or gravy.

We do brunch on the weekends a lot. Depending on who is in town, the spot changes. For casual brunch, Pancake House, Stella's, Cora's (about once a year) and dim sum. For a not-so-casual brunch, Tavern in the Park or Fort Garry. Are we missing out on any other good spots? I'd like to have a few more options.

I think I'm on a different wavelength! I have limes, lemons, pears, green apples, pineapple and frozen wild blueberries. I have a few things in mind . . we'll have to see how it plays out. Think of this as a dessert sampling, a tasting if you will.

I'm so glad! Now, what other things did you want to cook for them that you didn't think they'd like? Maybe we can sneak something else in there.

Maple would be a great Canadian flavour, but for some reason I'm stuck on the colour. And I want something for each team. I'm going to swing by the grocery store on my way home from work today. I'll see what they have that looks good, but these are the things I'm thinking of playing with: lemon lime pear green apple blueberry (frozen/dried) Earl Grey and green tea (shortbread?) pineapple (mini upside-down cakes?) Cupcakes are also a good idea. But I'm thinking I want this dessert to be made up of different things. Tart, cookie, maybe a creme brulee, etc. Then again, it's been a long time since I've had a cupcake . . . Am I the only one baking something for Sunday?

Smoked turkey makes wonderful soup. I like to add some beans, carrots, celery, onions, maybe some mushrooms and wild rice. Turkey leftovers are good. It wasn't even Thanksgiving up here, but I'm looking forward to some leftover turkey sandwiches this weekend.

I like the Earl Grey idea . . but it may be a little cool here for ice cream. But maybe I could do something with Earl Grey (cookies?) and green tea (also cookies?). We shall not ignore the Rider fans (dad grew up in Sask. so this is a win-win Grey Cup). Now that I'm getting into this idea, there needs to be something green. Blueberries and caramel . . sounds very good.

Sorry - I wasn't very clear. I need two desserts. The first one blue and gold (yellow) the second one green. I'm allergic to pistachios. But thanks!

My family will be getting together for Grey Cup viewing on Sunday. As per tradition, dinner will be Chinese delivered from our favourite spot. But I was thinking it could be fun to bake a couple of things for dessert. This year we need something for both sides (I'm not sure how this is going to work . .) so I need something blue and gold and something green. All I can think of is a blueberry/lemon pie (lemon curd with some kind of blueberry sauce) and . . lime. I'm not really excited about the pie idea. Anybody have a good suggestion? Anybody baking anything special?

It's almost time, people. I've made the decision not to make latkes at work this year because I don't have the time. But, I'll still make some for the family. Over the years I've done zucchini and leek, wild rice and mushroom, sweet potato and curried sweet potato, cauliflower and corn and of course, the classic potato and onion. I will do a batch or two of the classic, but I'm wondering if anybody has anything new planned. Or should I throw all this new-fangled-new-age stuff out the window and just stick with classic?

Any news Rob?

I've done it a couple of times and it's been fine. Just as you say - keep the cans fully submerged and keep the water at the just-simmering level.

At home: I'm very much a 'read a bunch of recipes, pull the good bits from each and come up with my own' sort of person. If it's something I've never made before, that's what I'll do every time. (If it's something I have made before, I usually won't look at a recipe.) Check my cookbooks, do a search, but ultimately, I rarely follow an exact recipe. Like eskay, I even fool around with baking recipes. It's fun to experiment!

You can also try asking the guys in the meat department to order the bones in for you (after you've befriended them, of course). Even if it's not something that's carried in the store all the time, it doesn't mean it's not available to them. They probably don't bring the bones in because they don't think there's a demand for them.

Marlene, what do you save them as in Gmail? Just a regular doc.? Mastercook lets you 'copy recipe' and paste it in to a gmail doc. . . I usually copy the recipe and then paste in a word document - I'm not sure if I set it up this way or if it's standard, but it automatically includes ingredient list, directions, any notes I've added and nutritional data.

One of those sheets, cut in half, is a pretty good size for a regular, home-oven size baking sheet (ie: half the size of a full sheet pan).