chefjillm

You are all awesome! Thank you so much for the help, I will let you know what we end up doing.

Hi, we have a cake order that wants gum paste roses. We can make them, but since our location is small and the staff is only the two of us we are looking into buying them. I have searched the internet and only came up with one site shopbakernook.com. Does anyone have any suggestions for another site? Also what is a reasonable charge if we make them ourselves? Thank you!

prasantrin, I will look into a better quality mask, it would be worth the money if they do actually work. Funny you mentioned a Neti Pot, I was given one about 5 years ago by a friend at my yoga center, and I tried it once or twice but never really felt that it did much. It has moved around with me 4 times and I found it the other day. I guess the key is to be consistent with it, so I will give it a try again. Thank you for the suggestion!

Thanks Eric, that will be the next book from the library!

Too low, huh? Yeah, perhaps we should offer a higher price. On one hand, I'm nervous about over-pricing, but on the other... we don't want to sell ourselves short. It seems that there is no one else in the area offering the type of quality and service that we are offering, so it's hard to be an innovator and ask for a price that is higher than anyone has seen here. Do you think that $3.00 for cupcakes and $2.00 for iced coffee are reasonable? I'm confidant in the quality of the product, definitly. But we're just worreied people will balk at the price... Advice?

The disposable cheap ones really dont work well and they are annoying. I was hoping someone would have some miracle cure I had not heard of yet. Thanks anyway for the suggestion!

Does anyone have any suggestions for a way to treat an allergy to airborne flour? I have known for a while that I am allergic to flour ( I hear it happens fairly often in this business), but I have not found anything to successfully treat it. I have tried allergy medication, but it did not last for long. I am going to try and get accupuncture once we can afford it, since a few years ago I got accupuncture for migraines, and it was really successful. Until then I am sneezing like crazy when I scale recipes for cookies & cakes, but don't worry, I wash my hands a lot!

Hi, I am the other half of The Sweet Life Bakery team and I wanted to thank everyone for their support and comments. I will be attempting to post more often myself, but Stephen is the writer in the family.

I used these crackers on my cheese plate for a while. They are really good with and without the seed topping. We used a sheeter to roll them but you can do it by hand. The dough is kind of dry and doesnt stick together very well when you first start rolling it then it starts to act a little nicer once you get it going. Wheat Crackers 1# 8 oz wheat flour 4 oz AP flour 8 oz oatmeal, coarse ground in spice grinder 2 t salt 1T 1t baking powder 4 oz sugar 1# butter, cold and cubed 4 oz ½ & ½ -place everything but the ½ & ½ in the bowl of the kitchen aid mixer with the paddle attachment -mix until crumbly and there are no chunks of butter left -add the ½ & ½ then mix until the dough comes together *it will still look pretty dry -roll to 3 mm between two pieces of parchment -take the dough and brush with ½ & ½ then sprinkle on seed topping -lightly roll the seeds into the surface of the dough with a rolling pin -cut dough into rounds with the round cutter -freeze between 2 layers of parchment -bake at 350F for 6 minutes, rotate and then 5-6 mins more until lightly browned Seed Topping 1 part black sesame seeds 1 part white sesame seeds 1 part poppy seeds 1 part black pepper; coarse grind -mix together and store in a container

Here is the recipe that we use in our pasta machine. It is pretty easy to do and it taste really good. Parmesan Cracker Bread 1# 1 oz AP flour 5 oz parmesan cheese, grated 1 t salt 1 1/4 t cayenne powder 1 t baking soda 1 t cream of tarter 8 oz water -place the dry ingredients into a mixing bowl with the dough hook attachment -on medium speed add 3/4 of the water and mix until it comes together, add more water just until you get a soft ball of dough -once the dough comes together, turn the speed to low and let the dough mix for 10 minutes *if you do not have a dough hook attachment use a paddle to mix the dough and kneed by hand on a floured surface -divide the dough into 2 pieces and cover -rest for 1 hour in the refrigerator *at this point you can wrap and freeze 1 piece of the dough for use later on -cut 1 ball of dough in half and start to flatten into a rectangle with your hands -roll the dough on a pasta machine starting at the #1 -cut this piece of dough into 4 pieces, you can trim the edges slightly to even them out -take one piece of dough, turn it and roll through going down one number each time you take it through the machine stopping at #6 -lay the strip of dough onto a parchment lined cookie sheet -after all of the strips are down, brushor spray with cool water and sprinkle with sesame seeds -rest the crackers for 20 minutes before baking -bake at 400F for 8 minutes, rotate the tray and bake 2-3 more minutes until golden brown

I have made crackers at work that we rolled with a pasta machine. It worked really well, then we left them in the strips that they came out in when we baked them. Then you can break them up once they are cool. You could also cut it into a triangle or perfect rectangle before you bake them. The pasta machine works well because it will be a even thickness for baking.

I know it has been said over and over already, but getting some real life experience is better for our business over all. Example, I have a girl working for me (she is in the process of leaving) and she had no previous food service experience. She really had no idea what she got her self into. She wants a break to sit down and eat, she wants weekends off, always asked for special days off, didn't work quickly and efficiently. It is so hard because she is a nice girl and I try to be a nice boss, but she is way more trouble then she is worth. Will she make it in the business, most likely not but I hope for the best for her. If she would have gotten a job before she started school she would have saved herself time and money, plus saved me a lot of heartache. Point is, have them work somewhere for at least 6 months and speak with people in the business. I really wish culinary schools would require real experience like they used to.

Ohhh that looks nice. Clean and tasty...

I was a fellow (TA) at CIA and we made those scones every day. They are a really nice scone, not very flaky like some scones. From what I can tell, the bread flour was to keep them from falling apart. If it was made from a softer flour the crumb would not hold together well. Not sure if that is exactly correct but that would be my guess from working with them. Good luck and that is an awesome recipe. Try adding some pink peppercorns to it. I did those scones with strawberries and whipped creme fraiche recently at the restaurant.

Okay, I dont get many chances to do cakes at the restuarant so as I said I always put gelatin in to be safe. My question is, if the cream isnt stablized, what happens when you cut the cake? I am always concerned about everything squishing out as I try to cut it. Also, we use an extremely high fat content cream, it even has chunks of fat occasionally when you pour it from the container. It whips up nicely, but it almost looks chunky as soon as it starts to whip. The first time I saw anyone whipping cream out here (San Francisco) I thought they just didnt know how to whip cream. I do find that it starts to weep after a few hours but I just use a hand whip to lightly bring it back during service. Sometimes it gets overwhipped during service and I have to thin it with a little cream or pitch it. Usually we can get cream to last for 1 1/2 days but we go through enough that we tend to rewhip everyday. It only takes a second so I dont find it to be a big chore.

The only time I stabalize cream is for a cake, I would rather be safe then sorry. I make a gelatin base, 1 c water to 1 sheet of gelatin. Bloom, dissolve and store in the fridge. Then when I need stabalized cream I dissolve 1-2 oz of this stuff with some sugar and mix it into 16 oz of cold cream. Put on the machine and whip to desiered peaks. The largest batch I have tried was 2x's so I dont know if it would work for large amounts but I cant see why not. I have found that as long as I just melt the gelatin without getting it to hot then this works fine. The gelatin/water mix melts really quickly so it never gets really hot and it whips very well.

I have tried using lemon verbena a few times but never actually got to put any on my menu. One thing I really liked was a cold infusion of heavy cream that I then whipped the next day. It would have been perfect with a pound cake or angel food cake and some strawberries. I just chopped some of the verbena, add it to my cream with some sugar (very lightly sweet) and then let it sit in the fridge over night. Strained it and whipped it the next day. Same with a syrup, cold infusions with verbena tend to have a fresher flavor. Just sugar, water and verbena, in the fridge atleast over night but it can stay longer. Only problem with this one is that the color changes after a few days but the flavor is so nice. I have mainly used the fresh herb, the flavor doesnt seem to be the same once it is dried.

I have used a blow torch, it works well as long as you are really careful not to actually torch the glaze. The sauce gun is my preferred method but I do not have one at work so the torch it is.