Sugarella

I agree that a reduction really wouldn't work.... the carbonation would dissipate on heating and it's a flavoured sugar syrup so you'd just end up with caramel eventually. Actually, cola flavoured caramel doesn't sound half bad...especially with a lot of vanilla. I'm not sure I'd like it in a creme brulee though.

Right.... cocoa butter isn't white, it's a pale creamy colour, same as white chocolate. As for the dusts, each company that makes them gives them different labels, so it's kind of hard to say specifically which ones will be more glittery than another. They're labelled in varying degrees based on the size of the glitter particle in them. I've heard them called sparkle dust, fairy dust, pixie dust, and disco dust too. Generally speaking though, "pearl" is very mild on shimmer, similar to that very vague shine on an actual pearl. The glitter in it is really a powder and is very subdued. Shimmery would probably be one step up from that (sorry - I haven't bought chefrubber's powders) and lustre is probably the common lustre dust, which has a very obvious but not garish glitter to it, but the glitter particles in it are noticeable. Lustre would be quite similar to the lustre colours on the chefrubber site I linked to. Stay away from anything labelled disco dust though.... it's thick and has large chunks of glitter in it like a hooker's eyeshadow.

I don't know about springform because I don't use those for regular cakes, I just use regular cake pans. You can use the springform pans if you're more comfortable with them though. I suspect some people use them because they fear the cake might stick, but proper preparation of a regular cake pan will solve that problem. Regardless, if those are the pans you already own I'd just work around their shortcomings rather than replace them. That is, unless you want to buy new pans for flour based cakes. For regular pans, you have 2 choices, aluminum and steel. Aluminum is a great heat conductor an will help bake cakes evenly and they're cheap, but some people just don't like to cook or bake with aluminum. If you're not one of them, Magic Line is the way to go. That page I linked to is a pretty good deal actually.... 5 pans for $40, and those are 3" high which I highly recommend for cakes. Magic line is a good brand....heavy guage aluminum versus some of the flimsier brands out there which will also burns cakes. Wilton brand would be a good example of bad pans. If you're going to get into buying stainless steel pans, you're looking at a minimum of $30 per pan. Bear in mind though, stainless steel is stainless steel...mixing bowls and cooking pots with steel handles can also be baked in, so if you've got something the right size and shape you can use that too. As far as the bake even strips go, no, I don't think they'll solve your problem. What they do is wrap the cake pan in a moisture layer while baking, similar to the idea of a water bath but not nearly as effective, and keep the cake from baking too fast. They do help prevent doming on the top of the cake to a certain extent, but that's not your problem. Regardless the bake even strips are just another gimmick, IMHO. Save the money. You can easily achieve the same effect as the strip with wet paper towels lining the outside of a cake pan, which don't dry out and catch fire as you might suspect. I can go into the method on that if you want. But bake-even strips or paper towels should not really be necessary if you have a decent quality pan, your oven is calibrated properly, and you're baking at the right temperature.

It appears their lustre cocoa butters are the same price as their matte coloured butters....so if you're buying the coloured ones anyways it's a pretty good deal. But personally, I'd stick with mixing your own dusts with plain cocoa butter if cost is an issue. I can see the ready-made ones being very handy for professional production, but just for home use I personally wouldn't bother adding the extra expense if you don't need to. Having said that, I was just rummaging around on chefrubber and noticed their prices are way off on a couple of items: Their trial sized jars of pearl powders are $10, but you can get them for $5 or $6 at Creative Cutters. Chef Rubber's price of $30 on the 50g lustre powders is a steal though. And their 1 gram jar of 23 kt edible gold powder (halfway down the page) is $60 while it's only $49 at The Gold Leaf Company. (about 3/4 way down the page - labelled Dauvet Powder Gold - Edible Gold Powder Note: If you do buy from the Gold Leaf Company make sure you specify you want that edible Duavet powder.....the majority of their gold products aren't edible.

Yep, 'fraid so. Logically, the top should brown first because that's the only part exposed to air and is in contact with the direct heat from the oven, right? Double thick non stick coating isn't so good for cakes.... those pans are great for cheesecakes baked in a water bath though, because the water regulates the temp on the sides giving you more even baking, so hang onto the pan!

If these are truly exceptional berries it may do him good to contact the Weston company aka President's Choice. Their blueberries, for example, sold in the freezer case in tubs under the "no-name" label, are very exceptional berries. The entire year's supply is picked in Ontario during the growing season if memory serves me right, and they're flash frozen which doesn't seem to have much adverse affects on their quality upon thawing. They're huge and plump and flavourful ....sure they're frozen but they're a million times better than the california berries we get out of season, and a lot cheaper too. Worth looking into, I suppose, if he can get them to buy his surplus berries.

I know we're talking pie crusts here, but by "baked good" do you mean anything? I wouldn't use lard in the sweet department for anything that calls for vegetable shortening, like gingerbreads or cookies. Best to use butter in place of crisco for those type of things.

^^ The sides and bottoms are browning but not the top? In that case, it's not your oven, it's your pans. Any chance you're using nonstick baking pans? That'll do it, because they don't conduct heat appropriately for baked goods. They take forever to heat up to the right temp, then when they finally do their temp just shoots up and starts burning everything. Outside of buying new pans, try lining the bottom and sides with parchment (circle or square cut to fit for the bottom, plus another piece to line the sides) .... it's not much of an insulator but it will keep the batter from actually touching the pan sides and will help a bit. And for all flour based cakes, bake at 325. Hope that helps. Edited to add: .... and that was NOT a dumb question.

The Globe and Mail, The Toronto Star, and the National Post are the 3 national newspapers. As I said upthread, there are 3.

For magazines, I stick post-its or tabs sticking out from the top of the page, with the recipe name on it. I place them staggered so all can be read at the same time. Favourite go-to recipes in books are the same.... things gathered online are printed on recipe cards an kept in a file, organized by type of recipe (beef, pastry, beverage, etc.) As you can see I'm not nearly as organized as project.

I agree with Daniel... Gill's personal attacks were ridiculous. She could've just wrote "I hate Ling," but I guess writers get paid by the word. I haven't read the blog or eGulleters' thread (have never ventured into that forum - maybe I should) but I expect it's possible the eG'ers who reviewed the restaurant didn't actually have anything negative to say. As far as writing a bad review on eG, I think so long as the reviewer includes the reasons and full explanation of why they were disappointed, and it's an area where the restaurant needs improvement versus just being they way they do things, then I think it's appropriate. But complaining about carmelized hazelnuts sticking in your teeth? Come on! If this restaurant critic was worth her salt she would've eaten carmelized nuts before now and would know that sometimes food does that. No, it is one of 3 national newspapers, and the oldest and most respected. I don't think Vancouverites should be writing to the editor, I think everyone who reads the globe should be writing to the editor. You're right, it was a review of eG, not the restaurant.

Oh good lord..... NO! I wouldn't! ...maybe if I made my own pasta and made one big long noodle.... but piecing the smaller ones together like that? No way. Recipe sounds delicious though.

I was trying to think of a solution to this when I read it but I can't think of anything that'll cause cakes to seem greasy, or rather greasier, then usual. Unless..... you used a different brand/version of something, halved or doubled the recipe and made an error with measurements, or mixed the cake in a different way. Could any of these be possibilities?

Welcome to eG Smokey. I know what alanamoana meant by "lazy" posters and people who ask real questions, regardless of skill, are not what is being referred to at all. A lazy poster would be someone whose very first post is something like... "I need the best chocolate cake recipe.... thanks y'all!" No hello, not introduction, no advising of which recipes they've already tried and didn't like and why.... and where doing a search for chocolate cake would have yielded the person tons of results. You have to put at least 5 minutes into getting a recipe if you expect everyone else on the board to each put in 5 minutes linking to them all for you. At least that's what I've noticed on message boards, in a general sense. So maybe that's why things like that don't get too many replies. Personally, I haven't really noticed threads going unanswered, but then, I don't spend all of my time in this forum either. (I just discovered the fabulous CI threads so I'm going to go spend a year reading all of that! ) I'm sorry to hear that up to this point you've found the board intimidating, and I hope we can change your opinion about that. I, too, lurked for quite a while before joining, and I'm so glad to be participating now. The diversity of cooks and varying skill levels is what makes eG so special. Non professionals are teaching each other and the pros new tricks all the time, not just the other way around. Non professionals are expected to jump in and participate, not be a silent audience. And if you think you don't have much to offer, think again! We all have a few tricks up our sleeves, a few special recipes, and our own special anecdotes to share with others. It's all good and it's all welcome, so jump in!

Thanks everyone for all of the great photos, links and recipes. Wow!.... what a terrific start to this thread. That Wiener Wein Schnitten sounds awesome, and I've never even heard of Hungarian Zserbo before. You guys have no idea....I am sooooooo excited!!! I never said kifli doesn't look good.....or did you mean I posted ugly photos? Those were the best ones I could find online within 10 minutes....I'm sure there's better ones out there somewhere.

Well, we all just learned about the adorable Danish pastry træstamme thanks to filipe, and that got me thinking about all the other pastries out there which may be native and common to some, but generally unheard of by most of the rest of us. I'm ½ Hungarian, and likely our most famous or well known pastry is Kifli. (pronounced KEE-flee) You'll notice they look an awful lot like Rugelach, (which is debatable whether or not it originated in Hungary) but they are quite different. My grandmother used to make hers as cigar kifli rather than in the traditional shape..... you can see a photo of something similar here. We also have the traditional Dobos Torte (pronounced dah-BOSH) which is a layer cake, often chocolate. Do you have any pastries from your heritage that the rest of us may not have heard of?

Thanks Foodman. I'll make the syrup this weekend and see if I can get over my aversion to rosewater. The recipe you posted for Asabih El haroos (nut-stuffed phylo rolls) called for melted Samen or butter; specifically, "Working with one phyllo rectangle at a time brush it lightly with the Samen. " So not wanting to ask a dumb question about what samen is, I looked it up in Wiktionary and got this: ... And all I have to say is ------->>

Thank you!!! Excellent site. Ikea has a restaurant (with a $0.99 breakfast in these parts) plus they have packaged foods for sale, mostly Swedish in origin if memory serves me right. I don't like Ikea's home furnishings very much but their kitchen section I always get lost in.....

Thanks for this. I usually just buy my paste because every recipe I've come across for paste uses almond, p. sugar, and veg oil, which I knew couldn't be right. I'm assuming the above would of course work with almond flour??

Now I'm very interested in this Dutch pastry mergpijpje or træstamme or whatever it's called. I get that it's kind of like a cake ball/ rum ball done as a log and rolled in a sheet of marzipan..... my head is spinning with the possiblities of this! Any ideas, either of you, for recipes for fillings? Or how to pronounce these names exactly?

Why didn't you punch him; were you chicken?! At least he didn't call you a tart. He's a bad egg.

Congratulations and best of luck!!! How fortunate to be recruited like that when you didn't even intend it. I'm sure writing it all seems daunting now, but knowing as much as you do I'm sure it'll all just flow once you actually get into it. I'm particularly impressed with this, seeing as how I've been watching him for probably 20 years and still can't pulverize garlic with one flick of the clever....

I have never come across people who share recipes with me that they received at the pastry forum, but I'd be honoured and happy if they did. I wouldn't even know where to find these sites. I suppose those recipes are given out, in forums, in private classes etc., will the full expectation that they'll eventually "get around." But I admire your respect for Love and not wanting to impose on his livelihood. He may very well, after all, end up publishing them all some day. When that day comes, it'd be nice if people still "needed" to buy his book, instead of someone online going... " Oh all the recipes in that book are on so and so's website... clicky." We actually had one like that on another site a while back. Sometimes when people get married they take a shine to all the pretty cakes they've seen, assume baking and decorating is easy, and start taking money from all their friends under the guise they can actually do their wedidng cakes no problem. One evening this girl was frantically trying to figure out how to do a whimsy cake and had no idea how to cut them, so I explained it ALL for her. Then she comes back on and says this is her first cake ever and it's for a wedding TOMORROW! I was actually sorry I answered her at all. Not because it would've screwed her and the bridal couple if I didn't, but because all I ended up doing was enforcing the idea that she can take someone's money with no clue how to actually make the thing she sold them, then get the instructions online at the last possible second. Makes me crazy.

I'm sorry you feel you were lied to. Heck, it might even be true. But sometimes, as much as I love eG and all that it stands for, sometimes things just go too far. If I actually owned the restaurant in question I'd be horrified to read a thread on a message forum that'll be here in print until the end of the world as we know it, accusing my restaurant of lying to a patron, and this being the first I'd ever heard of it. I think you should address the manager. Having worked in restaurant kitchens myself I can assure you likely one of 3 things happened: 1 - As scott suggested, the bananas were temporarily misplaced.... happens all the time. 2 - Your server was a twit and treats patrons like crap.... the manager would like to know about it. 3 - (And this I suspect is most likely) Things were so backed up in the kitchen, or the deep fryer got overturned accidentally, or the banana guy hurt themselves and was out of commission for a bit, or whatever the case may have been. This happens a lot too, and it's just easier, when you know you can't produce a dish for a patron in a timely fashion, to just tell them you're out in hopes they'll just order something else that's easier or quicker. If you like their fried bananas so much you were looking forward to them all through dinner, I think you should most definitely go back to that restaurant. This next bit, however, is totally unacceptable:

If you're going to be using a bunch for muffins, pancake batter, cakes etc. just let them turn really black, then freeze them whole right in their peel. The peel will keep the freezer from adversely affecting them, and black bananas have a much more intense flavour, well suited for batter. For banana chips, just slice the fresh ones, dip in straight lemon juice to keep them from turning brown, then dehydrate in a low oven (about 150 degrees). They'll store practically forever in a airtight container if they're fully dehydrated. I can't think of anything else to do with bananas other than what's been mentioned, sorry.