miladyinsanity

Are you taking all the veggies out of the stock once you turn off the heat?

I do the marshmallow thing with chocolate bread. Smores!

Okies! I'll try that after the kitchen stops stinking of soaking shitake mushrooms. I'll post.

Actually, because I have an excess of chocolate pudding at home, I'm going to try that. If something disastrous is going to happen, like the pudding will become rubbery, please say something!

Um, isn't the dinner usually held on the eve? That's how it's done with my family anyway.

Actually, I do have a big plasma TV. I'm just afraid that if I try that, or the fridge, my mother will stick her only daughter, whom she thinks is crazy for eating raw cake and cookie batter (I do this in front of her only when she thinks there's not enough sugar or something), in the lunatic asylum. Dejah, I'll do that! It's awful hot here come CNY!

Nope, those are not candied. Just roasted and peeled--maybe you can puree those? But I have to ask, do you really mean literally blew apart?

FWIW, there is a type of curry that is thickened by frying the coconut until it's brown, which is kinda like toasting, no?

McAuliflower, if you don't have the book, you can click here to find the recipe (or at least an adaptation of) Sugarnspice linked to. You could flavor the creme brulee with lots and lots of things, I think.

Actually, this sounds good. Chocolate goes quite well with chilli, so the cool smoothness of real vanilla ice cream should go quite well with chilli.

In Singapore too. There's one right behind my school.

Okay, since CNY is here, and I'm sure I can find some use for the peel, do I just stick the peel in oven at very low temperatures? Or can I dry it in the sun?

Um, I'm reasonably sure that there are no significant populations for whom glutinous rice is the staple food. As far as I know, glutinous rice in the Chinese diet is typically used for festive dishes. Nowadays, it's mostly foods that are not made at home; rather, they are bought outside. This includes dumplings and desserts.

I use Dutched for everything, because the only non-Dutched cocoa I can find here is Hershey's. Nothing's ever gone wrong yet. Alice Medrich thinks that non-Dutched has a livelier taste. She specifies in Bittersweet which recipes require non-Dutched.

You could always just bake half a pan in a loaf pan. That's what I always do.

She did give a recipe.

You mean you're not supposed to eat cookie dough if it's got eggs in it? I didn't get that memo. Scharffen Berger? In a moment of madness and craving World Peace cookies, I chopped up the last of my stash of Valrhona! Amazing cookies though.

Ling, you're back! I've missed you!

Ooh. I didn't think about orange curd, even though it's going to be one of my upcoming projects. Thanks, JeanneCake! But is a marquise heat-stable? That's actually what I'm worried about. I need a filling that won't break or something in the oven.

Yum...can you share the recipe for the ganache? ← Okay, I'm eating it for the second day, and the ganache is Not Amazing. I can send you the links to a Pierre Herme or Sherry Yard caramel ganache recipe if you want.

My mom loves the coasters too. My uncles in Kuala Lumpur own a coffeeshop, so she gets them when we go back for a visit. My little nephew discovered that when wet, they tear quite easily into little shreds. We've lost many that way.

I'm thinking of making a chocolate tart which is, from bottom: 1. Tart dough 2. Some sort of custard-type filling...maybe pastry cream? 3. Chocolate meringue crust The thing is, I have no idea what kind of custard-type filling will last inside. The only one I know of that will be fine is pastry cream, and as much as I love the stuff, it's not quite what I want. Most of the other chocolate custard tart rcipes I've seen, like Alice Medrich's Warm Mocha Tart, instruct you to bake the tart shell, fill it and stick it back into the still-warm oven after turning it off. The meringue will be baked for about 8-10 minutes at 176C/350F. Any ideas?

Chocolate cupcake with salted butter caramel dark chocolate ganache. That sounds so...pretentious. Short version: The cupcake stinks of cocoa powder. The ganache is amazing.

Lilija, we can sit on the fence together.

Susan, regarding the creme fraiche, can I use yogurt instead of buttermilk, do you know? TIA!