RuthWells
-
Posts
703 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Store
Help Articles
Posts posted by RuthWells
-
-
I recently bought a Badger 100LG gravity fed brush and this is one of the pieces I've made with it:
The brush lets you focus the color much better than the Badger 250, though it won't let you draw a pencil thin line. I painted the cap yellow and then the sides green to evoke a mostly ripe bananna, but I ended up with more green than I was aiming for.
Then here is a multi-colored spatter effect:
I used a toothbrush to spatter the molds. It took a quite a bit of time and produced quite a mess so I ordered a spatter tip for the airbrush in the hope it will let me replicate this with half the effort.
Very nice, David!
-
I am making the whopper cookies (my son's pick) and realize that there is no temp in the recipe!
I am going to try them at 375.
Dorie, if you are around, what is the correct temp?
When I did the whoppers at 375 the Whoppers melted -- go with 350!
-
I made the basic sable recipe for the first time last week, using the lemon variation (rubbing lemon zest into the sugar). These were sublime -- perfect flavor and texture. I made up little gift baggies containing 6 cookies each for a get-together, and everyone swooned!
-
Oooh, those are temptingly inexpensive. Thanks, ChefPeon & Mette!
-
I want to play around a bit with colored chocolate effects, but don't want to invest in colored cocoa butter. Can I use some oil-based candy colors to color white chocolate without killing the texture and temperability?
-
Underfoot: YUM.
I made bread the other weekend -- Rose's basic whole wheat hearth loaf.
It didn't last long.
Oops, I didn't notice this reply until today! (Actually I didn't even know to post here, someone else moved it for me!) Thanks for the compliment, your bread looks great. I wish I could manage to get them to rise properly like yours, but mine never seem to do well on the second rise...
We were having a very cold weekend; this loaf had its second rise in the living room, near the fireplace. !!
-
So I made a chocolate cake last night and wanted to have real buttercream frosting for it. Having never made it before, and having read articles about it that make it sound like a cross between a souffle and hollandaise as far as difficulty and peril, I made it early and refrigerated it, since it supposedly stores well for weeks.
Not that hard. I think my recipe was 2c sugar 1/2c water cooked to soft ball, and slowly added to 4 egg whites whipped to soft peaks, then whipped on low until about body temp, then 1 # of butter, cut into about 1/2 tbs pats was incorporated a piece at a time and then about 2 tsp of vanilla extract was added. OMG this was good. Light, smooth, rich, buttery, etc.
But here's the problem. When I took it out of the fridge a few hours later to frost the cake, or actually, the cupcakes it was like a rock so I let is sit for about an hour at room temp to soften, and it was still really hard to work with and seemed kind of grainy. I tried to stir it and it broke and collapsed to about 1/2 its volume. What happened? Fortunately I had gotten enough butter and eggs to make 2 or 3 batches, anticipating problems and I whipped up another batch, again having no problems with the recipe. Hopefully at least one of my cow-orkers will appreciate my efforts today at the potluck.
But I'm curious what you would need to do to use refrigerated/stored buttercream, since that seems to be at least part of the appeal, making a big batch and storing it.
I think your main problem is you tried to work the buttercream while it was still cold. It really needs to come back to room temp before rebeating. You did indeed break the emulsion, as you suspected. Next time take the buttercream out of the fridge the night before you need to use it, or cut the mass into smaller chunks into your mixing bowl to speed the warming process. When it is back to room temp, rebeat in your mixer.
-
This is a picture of different truffle logs made during holiday season. I like these because you can layer flavors. They are a turtle log, an passion fruit/absinthe(green faire), rum/eggnog, passion fruit/eggnog and a kahlua/cream.
I'd love to see the interior of one. I'd also love a quick description of your method! Those are very cool.
-
Underfoot: YUM.
I made bread the other weekend -- Rose's basic whole wheat hearth loaf.
It didn't last long.
-
Very interesting to watch.
It was certainly a whirlwind tour of molding. Notice his piping technique? - the way he drags the bag off the side of the mold - although it kind of looks like the plate that he applied the 'melted' chocolate to the back of was piped a little differently.
He moves *very* fast in person!
-
And here's a great source for beans of all types at very reasonable prices -- shipping in the U.S. is free.
http://www.organic-vanilla.com/servlet/Cat...815-17%2C5cm%29
-
I produced my first sample box for general distribution as Christmas gifts this year:
I decided to use it as a learning experience and cast my own shells for the Rose Geranium Carmel using a two piece mold and spent time perfecting my chocolate curls for Grewelings dual layer "Hot Chocolate". For the crunchy hazelnut praline I used a burr grinder to create uniform sugar bits and it worked beautifully. Previously I had been using a whirly grinder and ended up with a good deal of sugar powder and too large chunks that had to be fished out by hand. The burr grinder makes it far easier.
Other pieces include Kaluha pyramids, Passion fruit domes, Jasmine Tea, "Caribbean Cocktail" Geodesic domes, and a dual layer raspberry ganache and raspberry pate de fruit.
I make them all over the course of two weeks and used the new vacuum freezer bags to keep them fresh as I worked.
And here are the fifty boxes, about thirty in shipping boxes ready to go out:
David, these are stunning. You have some very lucky friends this year!
-
Congrats! It does get easier with repetition.
-
RuthWells : You mean after you remove cookies from oven, you press the hole ??
Hmm, i should try that way.. so that the hole is deep enoughYes, exactly. After baking, you reinforce the hole that you made previously, making it deeper.
And do this very soon after the cookies come out of the oven, while they are still soft.
You can see my version of the thumbprint cookies here (scroll down a bit) -- note the nice deep cavities!
-
Stunning!
-
I was playing around on my trip to Palm Springs. I didn't have any scales, measuring cups etc, so it was a bit over gelatinized. This was inspired by a bar of soap! Celery, lemon chiffon mousse with ginger, over sour cherry gelee, topped with Italian meringue and macadamia granola. It was really good. I'll work on a stronger celery taste and toning down the gelatin.
Very cool, Rob. That is so many flavors, I'm having trouble "tasting" it in my mind's eye. Which flavor dominates, the lemon?
-
Fromage blanc mousse
Stunning! Could you walk us through the various elements of this one?
-
Hilary, those gingerbread tiles look so elegant. I want a special rolling pin!!
I didn't make a lot of desserts but here they are:
Religieuses Framboises:
Key Lime Bars and Lemon Squares:
Gorgeous!
-
I bake Adult Thumb Print last weekend, mine the hole doesn't get deep enough. I wonder how to do that ? Make the hole deeper ..how?
What I find is that the pre-baking depressions I make get shallower during baking due to the puffing up of the cookie. So what I do is as soon as the cookies come out of the oven, I reinforce the depression with a clean finger. That way I get a nice, deep divot for the filling without fussing too much.
-
If you only let the meringue sit for a few minutes, I don't think that's the culprit. Otherwise, when piping large batches of meringue, the last tray piped would always be "off" as the batter would be then have been sitting for a few (or more) minutes, and my experience does not bear this out.
To me, this looks like an issue of un-dissolved sugar in the meringue batter. Either that, or when folding in the flavorings and chips, you knocked too much air out of the meringue.
Lastly, humidity can always wreak havoc with meringues. Are you in high humidity currently?
-
It's getting close to Christmas again, and I swear, if I get another jar of apple butter or some chocolate-dipped pretzels as a gift again, I'll resign from the kitchen.
I love making homemade liqueurs and confittures, candies, pastry, etc., and I'd love to hear about your new and unusual takes on Christmas gift-giving, holiday sweets and meals, etc.
Tradition is special, but let's try and spice things up a bit this year!
If I have the time and energy, I'd like to christen my new tree ornament-shaped cookie cutters and do very elaborate, ornate piped decor on them. Wrapped individually as gifts, I think they'll be a bit special.
I'm also thinking homemade dulche de leche in pretty little jars.
-
Whenever I bring any Callebaut into the house, I eat it before I can get around to baking. I'm not a real fan of Ghirardelli, myself.
Any opinions about Lindt? There's been a huge influx of all varieties of Lindt chocolates around the grocery stores here lately.
I like Lindt's 72% special bittersweet, but it's not really an all-purpose chocolate (at least, not in my kitchen!).
-
That's a great question. Alternatively, could one use a blend of both nutella and almond paste maybe?
Isn't gianduja hazelnut, not almond?
-
Top to bottom...
Chocolate-Morello Cherry Mousse
Flourless Chocolate Biscuit
Morello Cherry Mousse
Flourless Chocolate Biscuit
...sides sprayed with chocolate, topped with dejaq's dark mirror glaze from the demo, decorated with my first ever (so don't be too hard on me) attempt at sugar work. Caramelized dried cherries, sugar coil and spun sugar.
Gorgeous! Color me green with envy.
Ice cream & Sorbet recipes and tips
in Pastry & Baking
Posted
I have just recently gotten interested in home made ice cream (and gelato, and sorbet....) and have noticed that when I use a recipe that's porportionately heavy on the cream, I often end up with discrete slivers and chunks of fat in the ice cream post-churning, once it has rested in the freezer overnight. Is there any way to combat this tendancy?