RuthWells
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Posts posted by RuthWells
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I can find from Lindt are white chocolate bars with coconut. I don't know if they still sell plain white chocolate at all.
I've had the same experience myself recently, Patrick. And I had to go to three stores before I even found that. I simply won't buy the Ghiradelli white from the grocery store anymore -- it's dreadful.
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Oh come on, I know I'm not the only one...
Do you have a cookie dough recipe that's so good, it gets eaten before even making it to the Silpat?
Right now, I'm loving the Korova cookies recipe (by Dorie Greenspan, adapted from Pierre Herme's Paris Sweets: Great Desserts from the City's Best Pastry Shops). I'm a sucker for anything chocolate with a bit of salty bite.
Here's the recipe:
http://www.leitesculinaria.com/recipes/cookbook/korova.html
My second favourite cookie dough to eat is the peanut butter cookie recipe from the back of the Kraft peanut butter jar. It's especially good when frozen.
Two logs of korova dough from Paris Sweets are chilling in the fridge.... minus the large clump I et. Yum!
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I just received an Amazon gift certificate for my birthday. I would like to spend part of it on a pastry/baking book. I bake at home, and make birthday cakes once a month for 40-50 people for work - I am NOT a professional by any means. But I would like to increase my skillls. I don't know anything really, about different types of frostings or decorating skills, but would like to learn. I am trying to take an intro to cake decorating class at the local community college. They have a 3 part series, each class is 4 weeks. I don't think it's Wilton, at least the catalog doesn't say so, and they seem to have a pretty thorough culinary program, so I am hoping it is good.
I guess I want something clear, concise, and instructional.
Books I currently have, if it helps:
Baking With Julia
Maida Heatter's Cakes
Chocolate for All Seasons (or something similar)
several cookie books
-edited to add list
I would agree with the Cake Bible recommendation. Another good pick, though less -- encyclopedic -- is The Whimsical Bakehouse. Good basic decorating instructions (including basic piping) and good butter cake recipes.
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How about shards of sugar glass in the appropriate colors
I love the idea of colored sugar "glass" -- perhaps rectangular and round shards, rather than random shapes, to further tie in the design? I love the sketch and dearly hope you plan to post a picture of the finished work!!
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Am I explaining things well enough?
Yes!! It's wonderful "hearing" your thought process. Now I have pantry envy...
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Thanks for the info and good wishes -- I'll check it out!
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I used Carbquik. It's a low carb baking mix, the first one that doesn't taste like crap.
Can you tell us what's in the mix, or where you got it? I'm always looking for ways to cut the carbs in my baked goods, for my diabetic father.
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Any chance you would do a demo on this Wendy? (or perhaps this has already been done?) I'd love to see more on this too.
Oooh, what a great idea. I second the motion!
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Wow, those are beautiful! Now I'm hungry....
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Theres many ways to make the patterns. The material that makes the pattern is called cigarette paste. It's spread or piped onto your silpat very thinnly, you freeze it to set the shape, then while it's frozen you put your joconde cake batter over the top of your pattern, then bake to set.
Actually getting the pattern in or with the cigarette paste: I piped it on in the swirled example (in the photograph), I used a rubber cake comb to make the striped pattern (in the photo, it's the orangeish colored cake), and I used a stencil to block out the pattern in the green and yellow cake (it didn't show up well, I used poor color choice on that). There's more ways.............if you want to know more?
Aha! I can imagine there are lots of ways to create patterns. So the obvious next question, of course, is -- what is cigarette paste? If it's pipeable, I assume it's fairly soft?
(And yes, I always want to know more -- but I'll try not to be too greedy!
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I have made a few of the recipes, or at least used the ideas, in Gale Gand's Just a Bite. I really enjoy making minis and am wondering if there are other books that focus on them? Do you have any recommendations or are there other places you draw inspiration from. I'm not artistic by nature but enjoy creating and adapting... don't know if that makes sense
, but I need a place to start.I have both Gale's book and Flo's book and they are stylistically quite different -- I find Flo's minis to be more traditional than Gale's. Both are excellent, tho. One caution -- if you buy Flo's book, try to get it in hard cover (if it exists, and if you can) -- my soft cover was not well-bound and pages started falling out almost immediately. Your mileage may vary.
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Hi Wendy,
I've enjoyed reading this thread and seeing your tubes in action. One question -- how are you putting the patterns on the joconde? Are you simply free-handing with food coloring, or doing something much more complicated?
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If you take random recipes (with-out having made them before to know how they turn out) it's highly possible each mousse will turn out with a slightly different texture. You could have too much gelatin in one mousse or too little gelatin in the next. You have to consider your source and what the mousse recipe was developed for, bowl or torte.
Good point, Wendy, and thanks for the reality check.
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I'm not sure if this will solve your squishing problem, but I have made a triple chocolate stacked mousse with discs of dark chocolate in between each layer. I just used the ring mold to cut the discs out of a thin layer of hardened chocolate. It seemed to stop the mousses from squishing as well as providing an interesting presentation.
Interesting idea. I had a disc of dark chocolate at the bottom of the stack, and it was no help at all in holding everything together.
If/when I solve the squish problem, I'll try chocolate discs between the layers. -
3 sheets, equals three tsp equals 1 tablspoon equals 3/10 oz
Gracias!
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I had another question about flour though. So if 100 g of Canadian cake flour has 11g of protein when US cake flour has 7 1/2 -9 grams, there is nothing else I can do right? Do I have to mail order US cake flour or forget it?
Do you have access to pastry flour (another soft, low-protein flour) or Wondra? I'm guessing you could use either of these in conjuction with a/p flour to reduce the protein.
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this is a recipe I made, and I used it for the plated dessert thread. Unfortunately I didnt post it cause i was in a rush.
Mango Mousse:
-160g Mango puree
-1 pt cream
-80 g sugar
-40 g brown sugar
-20 g water
-3 sheets gelatin (bloomed and clarified)
-30 g rum
Bring your mango, sugars and water to a boil and simmer for 1 minute
Cut the heat and add your rum and gelatin.
Allow puree mixture to rest to room temp
Whip your cream to stiff peaks; fold in the puree mix and fill molds.
Thanks, Chianti. Can you give me an equivalent to the gelatin sheets using powdered gelatin?
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I've made mango mousse before (from fresh mangoes) and didn't have to boil anything. It set just fine.
When you have a moment, could I ask you to post your formula so I can compare it with what I used?
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Hi guys. I am in canada (moved here not too long ago) and I just looked at my bags o' flour:
Ap unbleached, 120 g=14.4 g protein. WOW that's like 14g protein p/cup. Then the cake four 100g=11g protein. So what's a girl to do? Should I start baking cakes with cake flour when they call for AP?
It' s intersting because I tried out that whimsical bakehouse yellow cake from the other thread -- it uses cake flour-- and I thought it came out heavy and crumbly. I'm guessing to much protein in Canadian cake flour?? I thought it was the method (creaming) and my mixing. Guess it could be that too
You guys are great. Thanks
Hi Chantal -- I use the Whimsical Bakehouse butter cake recipes a lot, and I'm betting you're right about the protein in the Canadian flour. When I make the WB butter cakes I never have a texture problem like you describe. Just out of curiosity, what altitude are you at?
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I've made mango mousse before (from fresh mangoes) and didn't have to boil anything. It set just fine.
Well, now I just don't know what to think.......
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Ruth, what are the ingredients for the mango mousse you made? (I don't have the "Bittersweet" book.) I'll be trying out a mango mousse this weekend and want to avoid the problems you ran into.
Thanks in advance.
The mango mousse recipe is not from "Bittersweet" -- I was borrowing a technique of "stacking" contrasting mousses from that book. I grabbed the mango mousse recipe off Recipezaar -- it was gelatin, mango puree, sugar, lemon juice, and heavy cream. As I noted above, I used fresh mangos for the puree. I'll be really interested in your results. Are you going to boil the puree as Chiantiglacee suggests?
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Don't use cake flour! ~ But, you can bake the cake using your bleached all-purpose flour.....
This is good to know, thanks, Sarah. I will also go this route when I get the time to try your recipe.
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I would try chiantiglace's suggestion -- I don't see how it could hurt. Maybe you have mango with exceptionally high levels of the enzyme?
I guess anything's possible. I'll try boiling the puree next time (couldn't hurt). Meanwhile, I tossed the remainder of the soft mousse in the freezer and we're eating frozen mango mousse this week.
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I made Medrich's mint chocolate chip ice cream a few weeks ago, using fresh spearmint 'Kentucky Colonel' from the garden and Sharffen Bergen 70% bittersweet for the chips. Absolutely fantastic!
Need help with cake topper idea
in Pastry & Baking
Posted
So, LCS, how did it go? Gotta pic?