[French Culinary Terms]

How about Dulce de Leche?

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http://www.forvo.com/word/dulce_de_leche/

[Homemade Doughnuts]

Does anyone make doughnuts using pate a choux piped directly into the hot oil? are these even considered doughnuts?  I want to try this out. I think it would be fairly easy since I have made pate a choux several times and it avoids the need to roll out dough.   I've got a recipe I want to try (from the Eggbeater blog), but am certainly open to looking at others as well.

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ever eaten a churro? that's what they are, more or less.

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Not really, choux has lots of egg, whereas churros usually don't contain any egg at all.

Churros with hot chocolate.... hmmmmm

[Dulce de Leche]

As someone who lives in Buenos Aires, Argentina... I felt like I had to chime in.

I'm a HUGE Dulce De Leche fan... gimme a container of it and a spoon and you'll see it disappear in 10 minutes.

I have tried just about every brand they sell here, and believe me, none comes closer to the Conaprole brand dulce de leche from Uruguay.

Unfortunately they don't sell it here, so every time I go to Uruguay I bring back 4-5 jars of it.

I've seen it sold on eBay a few times, and also this online store seems to sell it:

http://www.amigofoods.com/codudele440g.html

If you ever have the chance to get some of it, by all means do... it's amazing.

As for the sandwich cookies, the correct name is Alfajores, and there's tons of varieties. Probably the most famous Argentinian brand of Alfajores is Havanna ( http://www.havanna.com.ar/ ). They are yummy.

Here in Buenos Aires you have about 20 different options of Alfajores when you go to the supermarket. If you wanna take a look at what's available, go here:

http://www.cotodigital.com.ar

Click on "Saltear Introduccion". Then click on "Ingresar Como Invitado". Then, on the left pane, open "Panaderia y Golosinas" > "Golosinas" > "Alfajores".

Another type of alfajores is "Alfajores De Maicena" (cornstarch alfajores). They are crumbly and delicious. If you want a good recipe for them, let me know and I'll post it here.

Cheers,

Federico

[Wybauw's 'Black Devils']

That's right, the bicarbonate will alkalize the mixture, which could serve as a way to prevent milk from curdling, and will also darken the cocoa contents (Dutch-processed cocoa is cocoa with alkalizing agents).

Also, an alkaline medium promotes/improves the Maillard reaction, which would result in a better browning of the mixture. For example, sodium bicarbonate is used when making Dulce de Leche to give it a deeper brown color.

[pate sablee crust]

At work we do tartlets (7cm in diameter) with a 90 degree wall and never had a problem with the wall falling over. I'm not sure what might be causing that problem for you. We use an almost-1-2-3 recipe.

Hmm... make sure your dough is cold before molding the tarts. The way we do it is, we roll out the dough, cut discs, and chill them. Then we put our rings on a baking sheet, spray the insides with vegetable oil, and then mold the tartlets. Make sure you press well on the joint of the base and the walls, so you get a nice sharp edge.

Cheers,

Federico

[Chocolate Sphere Molds]

David, I think he was probably referring to something more like this: http://pastrychef.com/Catalog/confectioner...eel_1026443.htm

We use them at work and they are a real time-saver.

[Freezing Pastries & Baked Goods]

Mel, here's some of the things that we freeze in the hotel I work at:

Scones (unbaked)

Financiers (baked)

Brownies (baked)

Genoise (baked)

Bread (unbaked, baked, and half-baked)

Pate Sablee (unbaked)

Pound Cake (baked)

Fruit purees

Mousses, bavarois, etc.

Creme Brulee (unbaked)

Coulis, sauces, etc.

Strudel (unbaked)

Puff pastry (unbaked)

Hmmm... that's all I can remember right now, I know we do freeze a lot more stuff... on wednesday I'll give the freezers at work another check and see what I missed.

Regards,

Federico