ChristopherMichael

Anybody ever hear of a chocolate shop (yes, production will be on site) having to put in a grease trap? I have never heard about a chocolate shop having to put in one. If you know of a chocolate shop having to do this, please let me know where they're located and who they are. Thanks

That's good to know. I haven't seen the actual DR guitar in several years, before I was interested in having one. They make their own single now and it's clear from the pictures of their single and double that the designs are different. Were you able to send the guitar back? ← After many calls and emails, they did agree to take it back, but at a loss to me. Just put it this way, I have learned my lesson (and lighter in the wallet) that you should always buy from a well established company like Tomric, JB Price, ChefRubber and so on.. The reason why they're well known and established is because they sell quality products and take care of their customers.

I don't have the plastic based one, I have been using the one you have and it's just works very well. The one from DR doesn't cut well because when you go to cut, the wires are almost parallel with the base, so you don't get the vertical angle that allows you to cut firmer pralines. Plus, it looks very cheap and garage made compared to Tomric's and yours. If I'm not mistaken, I believe the one Tomric has is the same as the Savy one as well. I'm sure some people are happy with the one they got from DR, but I just wasn't and I'm very picky about what I spend my money on. Plus, I didn't like how they resolved the issue as well. I don't mean to be negative, but I must voice my dissatisfaction with a product.

Whatever you do, DO NOT buy one from www.dr.ca . The guitar they make is very poor quality for the price and their customer service is really bad. I believe that pastry chef sells the same one as www.dr.ca does. If I were you, I would spend a few dollars more and buy one from Tomric. I forgot to add, the www.dr.ca one does NOT cut firmer centers at all. I can cut the same center on the Tomric one, but not on the www.dr.ca one. My advice is stay away from their guitar and if your going to spend two thousand dollars on something, you probably want the best, you will not be getting the best from www.dr.ca or Pastry Chef (same one as dr.ca), As a matter of fact, it's not worth a thousand dollars or ever a couple hundred. Spend a little more and get something you would feel better about, buy from Tomric.

I want to thank everyone for participating in the thread. I think I'm going to go with the digital readout, which will probably save me some headaches in the long run.

The one Kee uses in not on there website or at least it doesn't look like any on their website. She may have an older unit, because she opened years ago and I'm sure that they have changes the look, actually I'm pretty sure they have.

Thanks everyone. I do have one more question. When you use one of those meters with the viewer, is it hard to read what the brix is? Does it give you a number or color? Chefrubber has an automatic one that gives you a digital readout. Is it worth the extra cash for the digital readout or is it very easy to use the one with the viewer? I want something that is very easy to use, because I don't want anyone making mistakes and costing me money if they read the reading wrong.

Thanks Kerry. I actually called about a month ago *finaaly worked up the guts) and she told me the brand. Let us know how you think she does her creme brulee.

I'm looking at buying a refractometer and was wondering if anybody owns one. Could you post a small review of which one you have and what brix range you usually work in. Chefrubber sells them anywhere from $135 to $400 and before I spend that kind of money I was hoping to here from people that own one and what they think.

Kee's is open Tuesday through Friday, 9am to 7pm; Saturday and Sunday 11am to 7pm. Closed Mondays. For inquiries, please call 212-334-3284. She's super cool man. Just call her up and ask. ← Thanks for the suggestion, but I would feel a little strange calling someone up and asking about some piece of equipment they have in their store. If no one knows what she uses, then I guess I have to wait until the chocolate show and go there myself.

So no takers? There has to be someone out there that's close to her shop.

Anyone in here live in NYC and can take a quick trip over to Kee's chocolates on Thompson? I need to buy a couple of displays units like she has and I have no idea of the brand. If anyone knows what display case she uses I would appreciate it. Thanks

Did you mean Ken Goto, Jacques right hand man?

I guess now I can answer my initial question. Is it worth the $? Sadly I would have to say NO. The class seemed to be geared for someone who hasn't worked with chocolate very much. If you read his book and understood it, the class is pretty much the book. I tried asking him some more advanced questions and he always seemed to not give a straight answer. He would always say, "many factors that can cause that". I even asked him to give me all the scenarios and somehow he always ended up away from me doing something else. Truffleguy even asked him about vacuum mixers and he kind of shrugged it off as if he knew nothing about them. I'm probably being critical about my observation, but the class bored me. I guess I'm looking for someone more cutting edge, like Elbow or Shotts. Christopher Elbow, please start teaching.

So is the Wybauw chocolate class worth $800 + expenses? For those who took his class, did you think you learned enough to justify spending that kind of $? If you had the chance to do it again, would you? Why? What did he teach in class? Did he just go over chocolates or did he also talk about other aspects of confections? I know there's threads, but I would really know if it was worth the $. Thanks in advance.

Does anyone has a good recipe for a passion fruit or raspberry caramel cream?

I've actually seen this done and it works, which is pretty crazy.

Egg yolks serve other purposes in ice cream as well. The lecithin acts an emusifier and a stabilizer. Stabilization isn't important in a tradtional gelateria where the ice cream is made and served the same day. But in an American style ice cream shop, ice cream is flash frozen right out of the machine (in a hardening cabinet) and then stored for up to many days in a regular freezer before being tempered to scooping temperture. Unstabilized ice cream will deflate if it isn't eaten immediately. Egg yolk is the traditional stabilizer for french style (custard based) ice creams; philly style ice creams have less egg so they typically add bean and seaweed extracts (guar, carob bean, carageenan). In an effort to appear natural and home made, Haagen Dazs uses molecularly altered milk proteins for stabilization (so they don't have to list anything besides cream, milk, sugar, etc. on the ingredients ...) ← I will agree with your statement about ice cream, you know what you're talking about or at least a whole hell of a lot more than me about ice cream. My focus was on gelato and I actually said ice cream in that sentence, my bad. You're correct, a traditional gelato shop does make their gelato every single day and has a very very short shelf life. To me, a gelato shop that uses stabilizers are not true gelato makers. I think of gelato as an artisan craft and something that is fresh and handmade without any "store" bought bases or stabilizers. I have eaten at a ton of gelato shops all over and I can always tell who makes it everyday and who doesn't. Anyway, you stated what I was saying about gelato, so I guess I'm done.

I have done a ton of research on gelato, because I'm opening a gelato shop in the near future. First off, the major difference is that true gelato does NOT use egg yolks. The reason why egg yolks are added to ice cream is due to it being cheaper than adding cream. The egg yolks are used to try to create the creaminess and the thickness of using real cream. True gelato uses only cream and milk, more milk than cream and sometimes not any cream. I have also seen gelato made with a water base (not sorbet), usually when making a fruit gelato. The reasoning behind using more milk instead of cream is that the cream coats the tongue and when the tongue is coated with cream, your taste buds are not as receptive to the flavors. Gelato is also served at a higher temperature than ice cream, same reason as the cream, so it doesn't mess with your taste buds. When eating ice cream at a low temperature, it freezes or numbs your taste buds. One other major difference is the overrun, meaning the amount of air whipped into the ice cream/gelato as it's being churned in the ice cream machine. Less air equals more intense flavors and a creamier texture. If you take a gallon of ice cream and let it sit on your counter until it melts completely, you will end up with half or even less of liquid. If you do the same with gelato, you will end up with far more liquid than you would with ice cream. The above information has come from many different sources that are in the business and are very successful. Some of them are from Italy and some taught by Italian gelato makers. I would take recipes from books with a grain of salt, because they're usually geared to the average home cook and not the industry. There are some gelato makers that use egg, but I find that it's far less than makers using no egg. As for a great machine, I would recommend either a Carpigiani (use only a "G" machine) or Technogel. Both of these machines turn out some of the best gelato I have had, texture wise. I'm probably going with a Technogel myself. Both of the companies sell their machines for about 20K +/- a few k depending on the size.

Has anyone ever used a Mol D'Art 50kg tempering machine or a Prefamac 30kg or 60kg (AKA Bakon in the US) machine? I have always used Mol D'Art melters, but never a machine with a wheel. I'm in the market for one of these machines and was wondering if someone can voice their opinions about these machines, if they have used them. One of the questions I have is about how long the chocolate stays in proper temper without having to do any adjustments. One thing that I don't like about the melters, is that the chocolate seems to overcrystalize quickly when you're working with them and then you have to toy around to get it back to a good fluidity. So if you have worked on the big machines with a wheel, please give me your results and problems you experienced. Thanks for you time in advance, it's very appreciated.

Who's RNC Inc? I tried to google them and did NOT get a box or shipping supply place. I did find a lot of Republican party sites. Do they have a site?

Does anyone know what chocolate Christopher Elbow uses?

THINK BEFORE YOU DO THIS! Before I knew better, I enrolled in a Le Cordon Bleu in Pasadena, CA and it was the biggest mistake I ever made. It's funny that they're telling you they're picky about who they let in. That's so far from the truth it makes me laugh, because they cram as many people as they can possibly get into these schools. When I was attending they kept hiring chef instructors to try to keep up with the enrollment and not all of the chefs were what I would call teachers or even have the experience. Some of them were a few years out of culinary school themselves. Luckily I woke up when I did or I would be 50K in the hole. I ended up leaving midway through the program (taking about 4-5 other students with me) and finished at a community college, which was a couple of grand compared to 40-50k. Whats funny about the whole situation is that the community college kicked the crap out of the Le Cordon Blue schools in competitions. Speaking of competitions, a former student of the community college was a member of the US Pastry Team that won the gold at the world pastry competition a few years back. So for anyone to tell you that a expensive culinary school is better than a community college is an idiot. In the end it's what you put into it. Plus, if you go to a community college you can work in the industry while you're in school. I know a lot of people who did this and many of them where Sous or Executive chefs before they completed the program. Just remember that you will have a $400-500 a month education loan payment every month after you graduate. When you're making $10 an hour after you graduate, you won't be so happy with that expensive education that would open every door (or at least that's what they tell you). Plan on living like a starving artist for a long time. Anyway, this has been my experience and whenever I hear someone talking about going to these expensive schools, it makes me cringe. These schools hire used car salesman to sell you on this grand dream/idea and its bull crap. Sorry for my rant, but I'm so anti-culinary schools it makes me blue in the face. I do have to admit though, that the French Pastry School in Chicago turns out a pretty good product and they're less than half of these other schools. Anyway, if I offended anyone, please forgive me, but when you have had an experience as I did at one of these schools, you would understand. Remember, its what YOU put into it, it's not the school you attend!

Does anyone here have a guitar? If so, can you post some close ups of the thing?