Lisa Shock

You should try to get the wife to read the Kitchen Scale Manifesto:

That's really interesting. I was wondering in season 1 how everyone just dove into the Eggs Benedict challenge and made the Hollandaise fairly quickly -when I've had so many issues training employees to make it so that it stays together.

I love eating a piece or two alongside an eggplant Parmesan sandwich or lasagna. Anything that's cheesy, fatty, and starchy makes a good companion.

I think you'd be surprised by the cheap stuff used in most commercial kitchens -$11 knives and bare aluminum pans. I have lived without a food processor for years, I don't think you need one if you have a good blender and a good knife. As much as I love my Braun stick blender, it takes second place to my Oster classic beehive blender. I'd get a good, end-grain cutting board, a small cast iron skillet, a large cast iron skillet, and a dutch oven. I would get one non-stick pan for eggs, a slope-sided saucier, maybe a straight sided saucier, and three sizes of steel pans for things that involve boiling water. A wok is very useful (the best popcorn popper made) for a lot of things including deep frying. For the oven, a pie pan is essential, as are a couple of high-sided ceramic rectangular pans. You'll need a sheet pan and a muffin tin and maybe 2 loaf pans. Utensil-wise, some silicon spatulas are essential. I'd also get a colander, a ladle, tongs, a big spoon, a ceramic peeler, and a microplane grater (fine). Knives, you really just need a chef's knife, a paring knife and a bread slicer. Honestly, I'd seriously consider using some of your credit to get a Dyson vacuum -something I am really glad that I bought at BBB.

They do come in smaller sizes, 20 gallon is popular. A used restaurant supply house would probably have several. I see quite a few for sale on ebay, too.

The buffet steam table also comes in electric versions, they generally hold the full-sized deep hotel-style pans. A steam-jacketed kettle can be larger than that, they come in a lot of sizes. I have worked with one that was room sized, a couple hundred gallons' capacity. You can cook fruits for pie fillings, fruit pastry fillings (danish, turnovers, etc.), heat milk for ice cream, milk for panna cottas, and cook custards in one. The cost/benefit ratio is something you'll have to figure out on your own. As far as I know, they need to be plumbed in, so that's an additional cost. But, if you regularly need 40 gallons of pudding, it's worth it.

Update on Oriental Fruit Crumb Cake. I labelled it Oriental Fruit Pie, took it to work, and didn't tell people what was in it beyond raisins and almond flour. People liked it enough to hunt me down and thank me for it. One fellow, a diabetic, noted that his blood sugar barely moved after he ate a slice on an empty stomach -so he is now a huge fan, because he can't eat a lot of desserts. (edited for typo)

Try searching for jian bing. I found a bunch of recipes for the pancake and some youtube videos.

Do you have access to a steam-jacketed kettle?

It would be good with tea, and probably very nice made into tiny tarts. It did have a pleasing, soft texture. It's also something that your guests have never had before. Some whipped cream would improve the appearance. I'd also like to point out that once you have made crumbs (evenly crumbled and gotten them nice and dry in the oven) you can freeze them to use later. I did this with my doughnut crumbs because I was afraid of rancidity.

I made the Oriental Fruit Crumb Cake tonight. One quarter of the recipe filled a 9" cake pan nicely. I used oven-dried crumbs from plain cake doughnuts (it took almost all of the crumb from a dozen to make the one pound), butter instead of shortening, and some 'yuzu tea'* instead of citron. I wound up using a quarter cup of buttermilk to help the mixture move in the mixer. BTW, this recipe has no leavening beyond eggs and creamed fat & sugar. I added milk until the mix was just slightly looser than peanut butter cookie dough on a warm day. I would up baking it for an hour and ten minutes, and originally had some cracking on top, but, it fell a little as it cooled and the cracks shrank away to nothingness. The crust pulled away from the filling, but, it's probably necessary to keep things together. Overall, this came out like a fairly firm pie: moist, and easy to cut. The yuzu flavor was surprisingly strong, making this a sort of citrus pie -although not acidic. The raisins added a nice chew, but the flavor was eclipsed by the yuzu. The doughnut flavor was subtle, but, you could definitely taste the contribution of the browned outer crusts. I don't know if I would make it again. The almond flour means that it's not incredibly cheap to make. That said, it was tasty and different without being too unusual or bizarre. I think that a lot of people would like it, it's got a safe flavor profile. I don't know if anyone would ever call it their favorite dessert, but it could have a place on a buffet. * Yuzu tea is just finely sliced rinds of yuzu and sugar. It comes in a jar, and has the consistency of marmalade. One usually adds some to hot water to make a drink in wintertime. It's more watery than candied citron.

I agree. If you have freezer space, you can freeze your own blocks in plastic containers. In my cooler, freezing a container designed to hold cereal (tall) works really well.

Thanks for bringing this to our attention! I knew about the events, I had no idea that there was an online presence.

See if your local community college offers any pastry classes.

You might be able to use the batch as the basis for a cake, check some recipes for ratios of chocolate and sugar.

I have to admit that I re-visited the aspic de pommes last night and failed to produce the dish. I used Pink Lady apples, omitted the candied fruit, used a ½ cup less sugar, and subbed a teaspoon of molasses for the rum. I cut the apples into smaller chunks and cooked the mixture for an hour and a half at a low boil. At the end it was still a bit watery, and the apples were still in distinct chunks floating in a clear liquid. It tasted good, not too sweet and the liquid coated gave my spoon a sticky coating that seemed to gel when cooled. I decided to stop at this point because the mixture was tasty, not too sweet like before, and I was wondering if I overcooked my last batch a bit. So, I stopped because I thought I could make it work and not be too sweet. Annoyed by the chunkiness, I cooled the mixture a bit and ran it in the blender til smooth and poured it into the molds. Well, I unmolded a very stiff applesauce tonight. It's tasty, but, it isn't really an aspic. It really needed to be cooked down a lot more, which is unfortunate because, apparently to jell, it winds up being too sweet. (I don't think that cutting down on the sugar this time affected the jelling, if I try again I will eliminate more sugar.) In the future, I might make this and mold it in thin discs to use a layer in an entremet or plated dessert. I may also try running this through a chinois to try and make it clearer. When it's done right, one batch serves about 40 people because it's so sweet. Notes to anyone wishing to attempt this in the future: *Try older varieties of apples that will break down when cooked. I'm thinking Rome, Yellow Delicious, or Winesap. *Cook it far longer than you think necessary. Bon appetite!

Episode 3: It was nice to see Brian Boitano on the quickfire. His show was the last thing that I have honestly had fun watching on Food Network. It was also fun to see Shibuya, I have enjoyed visiting there in the past and it was fun seeing their kitchen. I think the team that won had the best strategy, they were forced to use a tool so, they each did things that they did best. They didn't try to make an unfamiliar cuisine just to match the tool (teppan griddle). Chef Rautureau's dish looked delicious, I was jealous of the judges for being able to taste it. Go dessert!

It looks like there was too much sugar in them. It would be a lot easier to tell in person, the feel of the crumb can tell a lot. But, you may also be correct in the milk. Overall, it looks to me like too much liquid.

I'm thinking that many of these places declined once they started using factory-made frozen dough.When I was a teenager, in the 70's, I worked a mom & pop place that got dough delivered daily from a bakery. The Pizza Hut where my brother worked used a lot of inferior ingredients (at that time, the location he worked at used a cheese-topping product to simulate mozzarella -the main ingredient in it was vegetable oil) but, they made dough from scratch. My recollection is that the crusts weren't like this when I was a kid.

Well, we have the Bento thread: And, the Kosher dairy lunch thread:

My stand mixer has an attachment that's a tiny blender with a glass jar, sold as a baby food maker. I also own a Braun multi-mix, a device that's a hand mixer, immersion blender and tiny food processor -you just swap off attachments.

It seems low. I know a banker who specializes in restaurant loans and he won't write a loan for less than $200,000. On the buildout, be aware that you will probably have to deal with plumbing issues. On payroll, remember that you have to pay the employer portion of SS plus unemployment insurance, etc. You'll have licenses to pay and inspections with fees as well. It's usually a good idea to have enough to cover payroll for a year. Don't forget that you're going to have to purchase a couple thousand dollars worth of food and dry supplies before starting. And, the big one, you need to have a couple thousand socked away for emergencies like when the walk-in dies or the roof leaks or the sewers back up and flood the place.

You can also make a few things with the apples when they are still green. Some people say that applesauce is better made with unripe apples. You can also extract your own pectin, and make a mock crab-apple jelly.

Flourless chocolate cake uses a goodly amount.

I second chopping it down. Every year you wait is a year that a better tree could be growing. That said, juice is good, apple jelly might be ok if you're willing to spike it with some herbs to boost flavor.