emmalish

That's my advice too. Shoot them with metallic wrappers so you have the reflections and highlights you want, but then get the art department to adjust the colour to your University's blue. Might take a little time, but it's not a difficult thing. ...assuming of course you have access to an art department. Heck, I would probably have time to help you out with it. (why yes, I DO work in an art department )

Darienne, if you want to buy online, Chocolat-Chocolat has a ridiculously large selection AND they're Canadian. When I first looked through their site I think I ended up with 30 molds in my shopping cart. Sadly I had to cut that down to a more affordable 5.

I've made it once. I left the mint in, and it's really not very visible. It's chopped very finely and spread out sparsely through the ganache, so you won't see it much at all. I'm tempted to zest my lemon and keep it in rather than taking the peel out next time I try this one. And I definitely will try it again. Very nice flavours. Here's a pic of how mine turned out... You can barely see a little bit of green in the upper right side of the sliced one. The finished ganache is a very pale yellowy-green, almost white. (please ignore how pixel-y this image is – I forgot I had my ISO set too high)

I have. I just bought a round cooling rack which would fit inside snugly that the jars could sit on.

Tape! Brilliant.

Wow. I had no idea it could be so complicated. The one time I needed a purée for something, I just threw the fruit in the blender and then ran it through a sieve to get the seeds out.

I have a probe thermometer too, and it seems accurate when I test in boiling water, but when I had both the probe AND my glass chocolate thermometer in together (as a test) there was about a 2-3° difference. I figured it was safer to stick with the old-school one.

Trust me, I'm tempted! Are some better/more accurate than others? Any brand you'd recommend?

I don't work with chocolate professionally – just small amounts for myself & friends – so I don't have as much experience as a lot of you here. But I discovered very quickly that parchment paper is your friend. I lay it out over all my work surfaces before I begin, especially under the melter. It gives me a ready-made place to lay down my tools, and any chocolate that drips can just be peeled off later and added back to my stash. So it's easier clean-up AND less waste. And I jumped right on that cake cutter idea – SO much neater than using the edge of the bowl. I try to avoid getting chocolate all up the sides of the bowl so there's less chance of getting a thumb in it when I pick it up and move it. I've never really had a problem with getting it all over myself though. My biggest problem is that my thermometer always tips over in the bowl and gets so much chocolate on it the numbers are obscured.

This is a great subject, and definitely something I'd like to learn more about! When I'm choosing chocolate to buy, I usually tend to choose the more pure "cocoa-ey" flavours, rather than something with a caramel flavour, for example. I'd like to experiment with different chocolates though, but like Lior I don't really know how they would best be used. As it is, I do such a small quantity that I only ever have one or two chocolates in a suitable quantity for enrobing (because baking uses smaller amounts, I'm more likely to buy small quantities of different chocolates to use in baking). But before I enrobe something, I'll taste a small piece of the filling with one of my available chocolates to see how the flavours blend together. Does anyone else do this?

Those cakes are gorgeous! I love the chocolate leaves with the berries.

I made the marshmallows yesterday – they turned out great! I've never made marshmallows before, so I was a little nervous. And frankly, I've never really been fond of them – but I've only ever had the mass-produced things. These are amazing. I made a half batch, and after whipping for 8 minutes they were still light and fluffy and really easy to spread in the pan (which made me a bit nervous, because I'd read that other people have trouble spreading the marshmallows). They seem fine – they set up nicely, and they're all sliced and coated and waiting to be eaten. So today I decided I'd try making his hot chocolates. Again, a half batch, but this time the marshmallow set up really quickly and I had a really hard time spreading it in the pan (not to mention getting it out of the bowl). It looks pretty clumpy, but because I'll be spreading a ganache over it later I'm not too concerned. I'm going to assume that because it's a much smaller amount than the other batch I made, it cooled too quickly. What I've tasted so far is quite nice. I had the same problem that someone else mentioned (here or in the marshmallows thread) that the cinnamon sank to the bottom of the bowl and wasn't properly incorporated in the final marshmallow. Still tastes cinnamon-y though. Can't wait to finish them off. I'll post pics then...

I have a few recipes clipped from a magazine that I've used in a gift basket before – possibly Martha Stewart? I'll try to dig them out and type them up for you tonight.

Darienne, I'm not a fan of sweet things either, so I'll probably enrobe these in dark chocolate as well (but I'm giving half of them to a friend of me who loves marshmallows, so I'll keep some plain as well). I'm pretty sure someone upthread (Kerry maybe?) mentioned that when she knows she's going to enrobe her marshmallows, she doesn't coat them with powdered sugar/cornstarch at all. Oh, and I'm very new to making confections too, and I know there are quite a few of us newbies around here, so you're not alone in that. But this is a great place to learn and share. You're gonna love it!

Welcome, Darienne! I just made my first batch of marshmallows tonight (they're setting up now), and just from sampling some out of the bowl I can say the same thing as you. I've never liked marshmallows, but I've only ever had the mass-produced ones. After hearing everyone hear rave about how much better homemade ones are, I decided I had to try them. What a difference! I can't wait to try making different flavours too.

I haven't seen this one, but I love watching these challenge shows. Especially the pastry & sugar art related ones.

Awww, the Cuoca.com wee planes are adorable!

Alright, Lior! You have a great selection of flavours there. I especially love the look of the double heart with the milk & dark chocolate detailing (bittersweet mark).

Abe Books is another good source for out of print books. The pricing here looks pretty much the same as what's on Amazon.

It was a cool weekend here, so I decided to try this again. This time with a heat gun. I made a couple batches of caramels this time. I wanted to try the chocolate I'd had a problem with last time to see whether it was contaminated or just overcrystallized. It melted and tempered perfectly, so it was just overcrystallized. Having both the melter and the heat gun? Made this such a painless process! Thanks everyone who's helped me wrap my head around working with tempered chocolate!

Hmmm. I need to buy a heat gun. So before I had the melter, when I had to keep re-heating in the microwave to keep temperature, did that do the same thing as using a heat gun as far as keeping the chocolate liquid? The ganache wasn't completely liquidy, but it wouldn't hold its shape if it was touched or handled in any way. It was probably the texture of soft butter. I pre-bottomed with a layer of chocolate and that helped the pieces hold their shape and gave me something to hold onto while I dropped them into the chocolate.

I had a chance to use my new melter on the weekend. I would've posted sooner, but I've been battling a head cold this week. (guh) Anyway, I meant to let the chocolate melt overnight, but forgot to set it up. So first thing in the morning, I put my chocolate in and turned the melter up to about 50° for 4 hours (as instructed on the Mol d'Art site). After that time, the chocolate was only about half melted, so I put the cover back on and let it go for a couple more hours. It still hadn't melted fully, and the temperature by thermometer was only about 35°. So at that point I poured the chocolate into a glass bowl, melted it fully, and returned it to the melter to seed and temper. It seemed great! I tested temper and it was perfect. And what a joy to not have to keep returning the bowl to the microwave to bring it back up to temperature. However... I only got about half of my items dipped before I noticed the chocolate was getting thicker and thicker. I checked temperature and it was still good. I checked with another thermometer, just in case, and yes it was good. I had been stirring regularly as I dipped. And even with the thick chocolate, all the items I dipped set up nicely so I'm confident it hadn't gone out of temper. Here's the thing. I'd made Peter Greweling's strawberry balsamic ganache. The recipe called for tempered white chocolate, but I'd read that while he always calls for tempered chocolate, a lot of people don't bother. Well, I was lazy and didn't bother tempering it. I just melted it and added it to the mix. It ended up a nice smooth creamy ganache... but it never really set up. It stayed quite soft and gooey. Could the chocolate have picked up enough moisture from this ganache that it would seize? Or is the problem that it was melted for such a long period of time? Sadly, I didn't have any cocoa butter to try thinning it out, so I put the remaining ganache in the fridge and poured the leftover chocolate out on some parchment. Worst comes to worst, I'll use that chocolate in baking. Any ideas?

Personally, I would respect a baker who told me up front that they didn't use any artificial colours or flavours. What if, for example, someone wanted pink frosting – would you be willing to do it if it were coloured and flavoured with a berry purée added to the frosting? In which case the colour reflects the flavour. And is still all-natural. I would be willing to pay extra for that.

I didn't even know they'd introduced the flavour! I'll keep an eye out for that one. It sounds like it'll fit my flavour profile to a T as well. edited to add that while it shows up on the main Häagen-Dazs site, it doesn't appear to be listed on the Canadian site. Maybe we don't get it here...

Cool, thanks. That makes sense now that I think about it.