Kerry Beal

Welcome! We shall look forward to seeing you there.

I have two speed racks that fit 3/4 sheet pans.

Ah for me - it's a gadget. I love my gadgets! I've used various freeze dried items for my chocolate making - was interested in making things that weren't commercially available that I thought would be good in chocolate. It is interesting though how I seem to be emptying things out of the freezer and freeze drying them. I've had a few major freezer breakdowns myself.

Yup - thinking extra trays myself. Corn - cooked or not?

Ok - trials of thai eggplants. Fresh. Conventionally frozen. Fried from frozen. Freeze dried and reconstituted. These tasted a bit more 'raisiny' than the other. Liked the texture of the traditionally frozen most!

Mike - do you line your trays with parchment? Are your trays all aluminum?

Woefully under filled trays compared to Mikes! Some peach puree I found in the freezer along with meyer lemon slices. Tofu - firm, medium and silken. Tomatoes of course - they are just too nice this time of year not to take advantage. Anna's caramelized onions and Teonzo's albumin. What would you like me to do with the albumin now Teo? I haven't forgotten the stir fried eggplant yet - just looking for my roundtuit.

Mike - do I see whole as well as halved eggs there?

With your garden - it would be an ideal thing! I have garden envy!

I know I've mentioned before the two little girls who come over every year, brought by their aunt, as a birthday treat. I think I've got to start calling them young ladies now - the youngest will be a teen soon! Amazingly this year there was no chocolate on the floor when they left. I've gotten more on there myself today while making chocolate to put together an order of 40 boxes! They made snickers bars, nutter butter bugs, freeze dried marshmallow clusters, hazelnut gianduja squares, espresso truffles and some dipped freeze dried ice cream bars and chunks. Oh yeah, and some bark with marshmallows and peanuts and bark with deep fried chow mien noodles.

I have seen some sitram with a different handle.

Mr Mike - can you tell us more about eggs? All sorts interest me.

Would you consider blending the pastes to get the heat level and flavour you are after? Part Mae Ploy, part Thai Kitchen. I've seen that recommended for massaman curries to get the best flavour.

Looks a bit like a Sitram pan that I have.

I'd give it a shake every now and then as it's cooling.

Not sure where I said short form - think I meant short term and it probably got autocorrected. Can you post a picture of vacuuming on the side in your chamber vac? I do have a chamber vac - but so far haven't used it for anything from the FD'er. I'm just using the Foodsaver to seal the mylar bags (as well as unvacuumed chamber vac bags) and with the mason jar attachment to evacuate and seal mason jars.

Doing a combination of vacuum bags and mylar - and mason jars that I vacuum shut with my foodsaver attachment. Cappuccino bits - experiments to be determined! Wonder how thick-it would work. Still you couldn't reconstitute to regular juice. My bigger foodsaver has an adjustable heater - so I can seal the mylar with the extra time.

Welcome dbonokc. Is there a short form for that? I was wondering earlier if adding maltodextrin to juice would help - but then making it back into juice might be an issue.

I know you won't be able to respond yet due to the approval process - but I'm interested in the whole steaming of twinkies thing. It makes me wonder if a crouton could be made back into a bread cube with steam (i.e. in a Cuisinart Steam Oven). So high fat can be done - just not with plans to keep it for a long time. Having cream powder to keep for a limited time would still be useful I think. The anhydrous butter I made got put in the fridge - wasn't really thinking of it as being preserved - more just dried out! Matt gave me the heads up right away about the ice cream sandwich blowouts - so I've probably been over freezing things to avoid that.

Glad you've jointed us Mike - will send you a PM to give you some info on posting pictures. I've got a couple of questions to start - what happens with cookies and cake etc? (Of course this doesn't mean I won't try them). Have you done high fat cream?

Hmmm - wonder how it would work with good quality unsweetened dried coconut?

I've accumulated a couple of those over the years. One day I might even try to use one of them!

I thought that was a brilliant idea when Matt mentioned it.

But it didn't call out to me!

I'm interested in knowing more about your coconut orgeat.