pastrygirl

You mean keep it warm for a full extra day? Wouldn't you be better off cooking it as originally planned then chilling until needed?

Try Rick Tramonto's book, Amuse Bouche.

You can make a large batch of soft ganache and warm small amounts when you need to fill shells, or make firmer ganache that sets up quickly. Butter ganache sets up very quickly, you could fill and cap in an hour. Greweling's book has a section on butter ganache, you mix tempered chocolate into butter, add liquor or flavor, and pipe or slab. Gfron1is right, adding a few non-molded items will make it easier on you. Nut clusters, mendiants, and dipped candied peel or dried fruit are easy ways to add variety.

If you're talking about baking at home, by all means play with sugar ratios. A lot of recipes have room to cut the sugar without compromising texture - your pie is a good example. Fat is no longer the enemy, but you still probably want to work on portion control and stick to "healthy' fats (I don't think butter has anyone's approval to be eaten with abandon, unfortunately). If you're talking about putting together a restaurant dessert menu, you want a range. You will have customers looking for that over the top indulgence that they've been waiting all week to splurge on. Rich chocolate desserts are always going to sell, and people do still appreciate a small portion of something rich. At the end of a nice meal with wine you don't often want a huge dessert, even if it is lighter. But you also should offer something light and something on the less sweet side, and make sure you have at least one gluten free option and ideally a vegan option. A sorbet dressed up with multiple garnishes and plated prettily can still seem fancy for people on restricted diets.

Thought I'd update on the bars. I made all three of my bars with inclusions today - Dulcey with almonds, 72% with candied orange, and layers of both of those chocolates with cocoa nibs. For the almond and orange bars, i did not let the first layer set, instead filled, dumped, added bits, filled and leveled. the inclusions seemed to stay in the middle well enough, and i only lost one bar in unmolding out of 96 total. With the two layer bar, I did let the white layer set first, as I had to re-temper the dark. They held together fine for wrapping, but I suspect the layers will still try to separate on any that I cut into samples at an event this weekend. Though as long as they get to the buyer in one piece I don't care what the samples look like. Back at Easter I was making some pretty deep bunnies with whole hazelnut or rice krispies inclusions. Both of those are hollow and tend to float, so I somehow assumed that all inclusions needed to be glued down. Not letting the first layer set went a lot faster and worked better, so I'll be doing it that way from now on!

The Cake Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum is an excellent reference on how and why cakes work, I'm sure most bakers here would recommend it.

Hi Brooks. Do you intend to bake the full mammoth 12" carrot cake, or scale it down? Carrot cake should be very moist, and your suspicion is correct, the tooth pick may not come out pristinely clean. I also touch the top of the cake with my finger tips, if it springs back and doesn't sound wet - should not make a sound, that is, underbaked cakes have a squishy, wringing out a wet sponge sound - it's probably ready. Cakes will also begin to pull away from the sides of the pans when they are done. I think batter depth has a more significant effect on baking time than pan diameter. A carrot cake layer 2" deep in a 9" pan is usually going to take at least 30 minutes. Also depends on your oven, if you have convection... but start checking around 25 minutes.

I think if they are above 40 for all six hours it could be risky, technically, with rice being a nice growing medium. On a practical level, I doubt anything too nasty would grow in 6 hours, or that wouldn't be neutralized by thorough re-heating. I'd find some ice packs that could be put between the pans, then wrap them together and try to keep them in a cool part of the car.

I don't recall which model I have, but I primarily use it for cleaning the tables after I work with chocolate. A pass with the torch in one hand to melt the hardened bits followed by a wiping towel in the other hand, and done!

Are you using your isi to carbonate with CO2, or do you mean N2O for whipping? I have not noticed a difference in N2O brands, can't speak to CO2.

Who the hell buys sprouting potatoes? You're right to be annoyed.

That's a beautiful label. Way to go eliminating the middleman.

I love all things coconut. I really want to try that!

Edward, this woman used to be the catering director at the restaurant I recently left. She's super hyper and would book as many events as possible, then bitch about working too hard. She has her good moments, but a lot of questionable ones. Will I ever succeed as a capitalist if I can't learn how to use people to my advantage?

Ha! EdwardJ, I knew you'd have something to say They are supposed to be getting back to me with a 'trade agreement', so I'm curious what that will be. In theory, I could probably still decline. In practice, I feel stuck. Jeanne, when my friend initially mentioned the party there was no talk of trade, and I'm irritated that she seems to have promised my services for trade without my explicit consent. It's an industry event for local wedding planners sponsored by a wedding planning website. Friend works with the event space and does send me paying business sometimes. And thinks I owe her big for this amazing opportunity It sounds like good exposure on the surface - local wedding planners and my sweets, but in reality, don't most people either get a cake from a cake artist, or go with whatever dessert their caterer offers? I would rather sell party favors and chocolates than be a caterer per se, so I guess I need to promote what I want to sell. I have a few things in the freezer I could get rid of

Do you ever trade your food or services? Rather than selling them, that is? A "friend" roped me into doing some desserts "in trade" for an event, I'm not sure exactly what I'm supposed to get out of it (contacts/referrals for future orders, I suppose), so I'm still a little skeptical that it will be worth doing. I feel like the whole thing is a bit nebulous with an uncertain return on my investment of labor and product. The client is supposed to be making an offer, I'm curious to see what they have to offer, if anything, beyond exposure to their contacts. How much is exposure worth? What if it's to a segment of the industry you have mixed feelings about? In this case, wedding catering... I just want to make stuff and not have to deal with crazy people! If you have any experience trading your product/services for something other than money, I'd like to hear what deals were worth it to you and which weren't. Or more generally, how to make trade worthwhile. Thanks!

Would more fat make it more tender? I'm thinking of butter mints, now I want to try a peppermint butter mint piped onto a circle of chocolate then dipped. Or what if you used coconut oil, like in a meltaway?

I've found that with regular scooped ice cream, 40 proof alcohol has a softening effect approximately equal to sugar by weight. If i wanted a bourbon ice cream that would still freeze, I'd reduce the sugar by the same amount of bourbon that I was adding. If you can figure out how much sugar a commercial slushie mix has, that would be a good starting point. I believe granita base is usually around 20% sugar by weight, so using that example you could do a cocktail that was 5% sugar and 15% alcohol and hopefully maintain the slushy granita texture.

I actually like those photos, they look composed and well balanced, but I agree that asymmetry can be over done and done poorly.

So you already prep your dough ahead, and you're getting more oven space. With pies taking so long to bake it seems like oven space is always going to be an issue. Freezing whole pies is going to add to oven time and might not be worth it, unless prepping them days ahead helps you. Do you have a lot of inactive time while the pies are baking? Does it seem like making fillings takes a long time? IQF fruit like cherries and berries can be very convenient and good quality. I wouldn't recommend canned pie filling unless you count canned pumpkin. How many flavors and sizes do you do? I would do 7 or 8" for my large pies, should be able to fit 5 or 6 on a sheet pan (hoping your oven fits full sheet pans!). Smaller pies will fit more per sheet, and depending on your market, mini pies could be good for immediate consumption. Are any of your ovens convection? I think you should be able to bake way more than 20 pies a day, if your dough is prepped and some of them are small.

If Lyle's Golden Syrup is readily available, I highly recommend it in a caramel. So good!

Unless you're shipping to warm climates or live south of 40 degrees N, you're probably OK, especially if you have an unheated pantry or spare room. Assuming these are winter holiday gifts, that is. I keep all my chocolate in my extra bedroom and never turn the heat on. It did get a bit warm when we had weather in the 90's this summer, but the chocolate has not been noticeably affected. In the winter that room is quite a bit colder than the heated living areas.

I cook mine to about 255F, also add salt and often vanilla bean. I caramelize the sugar separately then add the warmed remaining ingredients and cook to temp.

Yay! We love a success story!

To me, brown sugar, butter, and vanilla represent the chocolate chip cookie taste, but I think the caramel notes in Dulcey would be close. You could even add a tiny bit of molasses for more brown sugar flavor. Cocoa nibs on their own are unsweetened, just crushed roasted cocoa beans. Consider them 100% dark chocolate.