Kerry Beal

Sounds like Ruth and I charge much the same - $300 plus cost of supplies based on number of people. I usually do demo with limited hands on - I'll show the first person how to dip or whatever - then they get to show the next person - they cycle through. So I might get them to dip oreos in milk chocolate - each person dips a couple - then show them some basics of decoration - hand over a couple of squeeze bottles of tempered white and dark and let them have at it. I might get them to dip some liquorice sticks or big pretzels etc - again decorate with the contrasting chocolate. With a microwave and extra squeeze bottle lids I keep the decorating chocolate warm and in temper. I might demo making some solid molds. They need enough time to set and a fridge to carry off the latent heat - they are usually ready to be knocked out by the end of the event if I make them first. With remaining chocolate I usually have them make barks. I take a bunch of cello bags - let them package their stuff in cello - or for people who come to the house to learn I usually suggest they bring some containers (perhaps the plastic containers you get when you order chinese food or the disposable Ziplock containers. Each person would leave with the couple of oreos they had decorated, a couple of pieces of liquorice, some bark.

Ran across Despaña while out walking in NYC with fellow chocolatier @carol lang - very impressed with what they had.

Got a couple of minutes - not much more than that though.

I've seen them somewhere recently - can't recall if it's a trade show or bulk store.

A 24 from 8 pm Friday night to 8 pm Saturday night. Good sleep overnight but a very busy day Saturday. Managed to make some Kimchi Jigae for my lunch (but forgot pictures). For dinner - I put a duck breast that I had sous vided a couple of days back fat down into a salted pan on the induction - then wandered back to work. Made a pan sauce with some vincotto that @Franci had given to me. Warmed some green beans in the nuke that I had brought from home.

Ok - so reading the Wybauw book - it talks about 'total water content in the recipe' and mentions 15% but 'with 17% it achieves an ideal shelf life'.

I shall have to do some ganache with and without some 96% ETOH. Unless Ruth already did?

My bad - looking at my shelf life talk - he does say 15% pure alcohol. Can't find my copy of the book anywhere around here though. I know that glucose etc is based on percentage of water vs cream.

Yes indeed - we have had previous experience, haven't we?

Pipe it into preformed truffle balls or cups and seal with tempered chocolate. Don't store for long before consuming. Enrobing frozen stuff never ends well without special equipment.

I think it's 18% of the free water - so 250 g of cream has 162.5 g water - 18% of which is a little over 29 g of pure alcohol. If you use lower proof you need to account for it. A standard dew point Aw meter without special filters doesn't recognize the Aw lowering effect of alcohol. From the Aqua Lab manual - ‟Samples with a high amount of volatiles condense on the mirror during the reading process, but do not evaporate from the mirror as water does. As a result the reading on samples with volatiles may not be accurate with the dew point technique.”

Been there, done that.

They were squid cakes.

Do you have a picture of what you want? If you look for caraque molds on various sites you might find what you want.

Ah - the million dollar question. Most of the time covering the untempered with tempered will be fine. On occasion I've noticed that they bloom. So not much of an answer I guess.

Hello Calorie Squares in my world!

Tasty ribs - tender and unctuous. Celeriac like candy! Housekeeper cleaning the sleep room enjoyed several pieces

Started out this morning vacuum sealing a couple of hens that were no longer laying - so time to move on to the soup pot. I brought along a package of beef ribs cooked sous vide for 72 hours. Warmed up with the Joule then browned on induction. Chopped up a celeriac root - roasted for about an hour steam bake.

Don't know much about the older Gocco's - the new ones are a very, very different thing. The YUDU is basically a light source and a fan - along with a plastic framework that is supposed to hold things in place.

Playing with transfer sheets again after a few years - I picked up one of those YUDU units at Michael's before they stopped selling them. It's been sitting in the box probably for 8 years. I really only wanted it for the lights because the guy who exposed my screens for me died and his son told me he didn't want to take over the business. Found out a couple of days ago that the son and wife actually did take over the business - so all this time... I used one of the crappy YUDU coarse mesh screens to make this transfer - printed it out this afternoon and then realized it was BACKWARDS! DUH!!!!

How about putting some of it in a shell, with a not so sweet ganache behind it.

It's been a while since I've made any transfer sheets - I've forgotten a whole lot! I picked up one of the YUDU systems before they stopped selling them - figured I'd use it for the lights to expose my screens. I picked up some images to use with it when I found them at Michael's for a couple of bucks - so decided to use one of those to help determine exposure time required with the emulsion that I'm using. I need some practice coating the screens so there aren't any drips and the maximum amount of screen is covered (of course the right sized scoop coater is the key to that part). Don't think a single one of the images is complete between the drips and the coverage of emulsion. Printed a couple of transfer sheets (poorly). Tempered up some chocolate with the EZtemper silk. Made some plaques. It's a start! Next screens will be finer gauge (these are coarse - next will be 220), the area with the image will take up much less of the screen so the printing is easier. Fun to play with something I haven't played with for a while.

Allspice Caribbean Cafe

It's actually based on a cookie I've made for years from the International Cookie Cookbook by Nancy Baggett. The Pecan Praline cookie. So I kind of stole it too! Also changed the baking soda from the failed cookie to baking powder. Seems to have removed the spread problem with the original.

But you gotta love the part where she is sweating and her hair is all messy because she's using a knife and a cutting board!