gfron1

Here is the buffalo after 45 minutes in the dehyrdrator. Notice how thin my butcher got the meat. you can see the bars through the meat. The spotting is cinnamon. Much to my surprise, this jerky machine is going to give me...well...jerky. My guess is that this won't be the method that ultimately is used in the dessert.

It does - www.scdailypress.com, but I'm having trouble figuring out how to get in. If I can get in, and its free, I'll post the URL.

1 o'clock MST and we're in the countdown stage. I just started my dehydrator for the meat. I'm going to do the slow oven roast in an hour from now. I'll fry the meat minutes before. I had a minor setback when my friend's icecream maker cannister had a an ice bag frozen inside of it. So I rushed to my store and bought a new icecream maker...that means at least 6 hours until its frozen. Its been fun this weekend because our local paper ran a little story about all of this so now the small town of Silver City is rallying around the dessert.

Art, thanks so much for taking the time to post the pics and process...please keep sharing - its very interesting and fun to see.

We're in the home stretch. Now that all distractions are aside, I've hunkered down to finish the dessert. Today I made the ice cream liquid - sage, sweetened with agave nectar: Yesterday I made the mincemeat first: Then I filled the homemade masa (absolutely stunning aroma): And finally tonight I prepared the buffalo sheets by coating them in brown sugar for the night:

Another cheese party down...this was our German party in honor of Oktoberfest and national Cheese Month (In America). While I wouldn't consider any of these German cheese, all are made in Germany... First the spread: Smoked salmon, many wursts, pumpernickel, many great desserts Now onto the cheeses. Cambozola. Its a very popular gorgonzola camembert blend. It was cold out tonight so it didn't warm up as much as I would have liked Then Champignon. Basically a brie-like with mushrooms And finally a Mirabo - brie-like with walnuts. Good party. It was Harvest moon, so we had the party outdoors and showed Wallace and Grommit for background lighting.

Definitely do your homework on the printer...we do enought that it is worth it but not too much that it doesn't...if that makes sense. Here's the best price I found today for the printer. I bought mine with a rebate which I've seen many times over the past 2 years.

I agree. Just like Chufi's dutch thread, having a Russian thread would be very exciting.

I've been lurking on this thread for a while and I'm glad you have got some momentum. Your products look great and it sounds like your pricing is getting closer. I opened my high(er) end speciatly food store in the middle of nowhere 3 years ago, and we've learned quite a bit. Here a few tidbits for the cause... We got out cards (business and postcards) printed at vistaprint.com with their never-ending specials. I think we paid for just shipping on 250 cars which lasted a while. I haven't beaten their prices yet. We also bought a Samsung CLP510 color laser printer for $150 (plus toner) and do almost all our in-store signage, fliers, and newsletters on that for pennies and at our convenience. Hint - get the high density toner cartridges (5K copies per v. 2K). A good friend told us before we opened that there are three main components to small business - price, quality, service...pick two NOT three. We went for quality and service and charge prices that we need to for the other two. Our town has not disappointed.

Tres Leches...although you're more than likely to see a Duncan Hines box cake

FOUND IT!!!! Most disturbing thread ever!

I am so sorry I can't find the roasted goat head thread from last spring....It would be a nice time to reintroduce the most disturbing thread ever created on eGullet.

Since Anthony is getting impatient I'll get everyone up to date. First, let's go through my excuse list... 1. Being sick...CHECK 2. Having to carve a head out of cheese...CHECK 3. Throwing a cheese party for 125...TONIGHT But, I have made good progress. Last night I had the most ethereal moment. You know that point when food moves beyond sustinence over to life energy. I was making my tamales using the method taught me by a friend last week who lived in Mexico. She had me use frozen posole, rub the skins, process with fresh corn, etc., and for anyone who knows how great fresh homemade tamales smell, imagine digging past the processing, the tiredeness, the packaging of powdered masa, and inhaling the most pure, intense masa smell ever. Then add in the orange zest that I added, and you'll understand why it was ethereal. I'm sure the moment was enahnced by watching Farenelli (a movie about a castrati opera singer) and drinking our favorite Spanish trilogy, but its an aroma I hope I don't soon forget. This morning I'm going to make my ice cream liquid so it will be ready for tomorrow, then tomorrow all I have to do is the main animal component and plating. The idea of having to prepare a dessert basically for a photoshoot is unusual. I'm used to doing multi-day, multi-component desserts, but this is a bit different since all of you will only see the pictures (unless you try the recipes). It adds importance to the picture which I typically would sacrifice for taste. Just a bit odd... BTW, I believe I have targeted our next challengee...and I knew long ago what their challenge will be.

Its the first time I've carved anything like that - it was very fun - velveeta is a surprisingly good sculpture media. It took me about 3 hours. I want to carve a hole in the top of his head and put chips in it.

This is scary! Here's what I created today in preparation for tomorrow nights cheese party...a bust of one of our first members

One distraction is over. Here is the almost complete cheese bust...step by step:

Thanks Anthony. I was afraid that someone would say its pulled sugar instead of spun. I've been wanting to play with pulled, but not at this point in the game. I'll rely on something a bit more comfortable with - chocolate.

I could use some assistance from our sugar people... I want to create a sugar thread that is shaped like a spring. When i do threaded sugar I can't seem to get a continuous thread beyond a few inches. How are those made?

I can't tell you how much I appreciated the pineapple warning - you learn something new everyday don't ya Today I was knocked out by a cold...the good news is that I can skip work tomorrow and focus on the cheese bust. I also struck it rich with a friend who lived in Mexico for 15 years and helped me tweak the masa recipe. Hang in there everyone - and keep the ideas (and warnings) coming. Its almost time.

Great picture Ling!

Thanks Ludja...no dispensation needed...its all part of the challenge. The 5 spice idea is interesting since I just made a mango 5 spice dome a week or so ago, but that would shift the southwest concept a bit.

Gack!!!! Geez, thanks for the warning Jackal. OK, plan #2....

Good morning all. Two things came up whilst sleeping... 1. I've heard that tamale masa should be bought premixed (wet) for a good tamale maker (which we have plenty of around here) because its more refined than buying the bagged powder. Anyone know anything about this? The only reason this causes concern was that I was going to rub lemon (or orange) zest into sugar, and then incorporate that into masa before mixing....if its already wet, that may not work as well. 2. I have 6 paper thin sheets of meat (cut against the grain). My plan was to take lengthwise cuts of pineapple, layer them with the meat and brown sugar, and let the acids cook them a bit. Then I was going to try three cooking methods for the meat - 1. a dehydrator, 2. in a skillet with butter, 3. in the oven between two baking sheets on a low temperature. My goal is to have the meat be very delicate and break off as soon as its touched. I assume that when I pull the meat from whatever cooking process, that it will be soft, but as it dries in the air, it will become delicate. As a side note, we rarely have rain here, so the humidity is generally very, very low, but we have a rainstorm coming in for the next 2-3 days - that may effect the drying.

Yes they are more chewy than crumbly - no crumbs missed my mouth in the eating of this cookie And yes I did use the whole clove for the stem. The orange water/sugar dipping process formed a glaze, so while the pic makes it look like there was loose powdered sugar - there wasn't.

Amygdalota me Orange These are almond cookies dipped in orange blossom water, powdered sugar, shaped like a pear. A little distraction from pig snout desserts