Beth Wilson

Wow! The pictures of the food you guys ate on your trip look delicious! Ok, with the exception of the tartar - I will never be convinced it is food to be eaten without the benefit of a little heat....but that is just me. Were you successful in picking up the 3/4 pan silpats? It has been a few years since I stopped into France Decor and Chocolat Chocolat so I wondered if they had some neat new things? The mold showroom looks huge! Must have been hard to choose

Wow! It looks like everyone but poor pringle had a great weekend. My heart goes out to you Pringle, I know how everyone was looking forward to this weekend so it sucks with your bad luck. I am curious about the pictures Art posted. What are the yellow yolk chocolates? They are really unique and look delicious. Thanks for sharing this great event. I hope you are planning next years! I am so there!

Mmmmmmmm! I think I cam smell that lunch through the computer! I really miss the Greek food of the Danforth...Thank you for sharing that delicious looking lunch for us all to drool over.

Is this something you are thinking of? The site seems to have some other good ideas too. http://homecooking.about.com/cs/atozfoodindex/ht/maplecreamcandy.htm

The same thing happened to me when I thought I would try making toffee with maple syrup. The crystallization happened in the pot before my eyes as I was stirring!!! I took the dried maple sugar and used it in my coffee and oatmeal for a whole winter! It made the best topping for a cappuccino too! I think it would be nice to sprinkle on a dessert of a crumble of some sort or sprinkled on freshly baked sugar cookies. Perhaps a maple buttercream enrobed in chocolate would be nice. I was told by a local sugar bush expert that you have to have a certain level of sugar in the maple syrup in order to boil it to high temperatures. Perhaps your friends at the sugarbush have a recipe for maple butter or have advice on how to make the maple syrup suckers. http://www.maplevalleysyrup.com/MapleRecipes.html This site offers some interesting recipes to try and I just got some oat flour so I might just give them a try!

That chocolate sucker reminds me of all the things I loved when I was a kid I also loved fudge when I was younger... the richer the better How about large squares of fudge on a stick wrapped in cello. Maple, chocolate, vanilla are always popular. Sprinkle with jelly beans or m&m's for great colouring decorations, especially with Easter around the corner. I saw in one thread, I think it was "confections - what did you make" that had white chocolatebark with jelly beans in it! I thought it was tempting and I remember saying to my friend that it looked like "Jelly Bean Extreme". I think you could easily make them in a sucker form if you had a big round sucker mold.

Finished the freezer defrosting and found 3 more bags of Rhubarb from last summer. I seem to have forgotten that we had 2 bumper crops due to the abundance of rain last year. I will try the "rhubarb stew"idea since there is soooo much. I also found in the bottom a bag of beyond freezer burnt assorted fruit. I went on a fruit smoothie kick but only got through one bag of this great fruit before getting bored with them. I don't usually compost in the winter so when I had this bag defrosting I decided to throw it in the back yard for the deer. This morning I see lots of deer tracks around the spot I threw it out. I wonder what the deer thought coming across cherries, melons and oranges in the dead of winter! Made me feel like it wasn't a total waste of good fruit.

I have been watching this thread with anticipation, and really looking forward to attending but it looks like I am going to have to drop out for this year. The timing is not right this spring. I will just have to join you through watching the posts on egullet

That is the problem with computer storage of recipes! I still think back to grade 10 computer science when the teacher told us how great computers were going to make our lives, to keep us organized and give us free time to dedicate to a life of leisure!!!! Still waiting for that easy computer organizing life they promised!!! I am writing on paper and taping it to the front of my freezer an inventory of everything that is going back in. I wonder if there is an APP for that?

So today is my day to clean out the freezer. I just had to get rid of that frosty ice covering the racks. I had 3 bags of rhubarb left (so I thought!) and had been saving them for some spring desserts. I uncovered behind the large turkey a nice little stash of 5 more bags of rhubarb. So now I have 8 bags of 2 or 4 cup measurements that are taking up more space than I thought! I have been using the rhubarb to make Kerrys recipe of Amish Rhubarb Pudding but now I have alot more to use up, I am open to suggestions. Found two bags of blueberries too but those will soon be used for muffins and pancakes. Of course, what started this was looking for some frozen vegetables, but all I found was some fruits, and an abundance of meats. Looking forward to some bar-b-q's!

I think I am the only one that is on the fence with induction cookers and caramel. Actually what I usually do is toffee. I find sometimes it darkens it too quickly(on medium setting) and I have to really stir the caramel to keep it from burning before it reaches temp. When I did the exact same caramel and cooked it on a lower temperature induction, I had better success with the colour not burning but I found the caramel really stuck in my teeth. I thought it was just me but I had a few samplers tell me the same thing. I cooked another batch on gas the same day, took it to the same temperature and this batch was fine.....no sticking in the teeth. I have been reluctant to cook caramel on the induction cooker since.

Wow! What a nice space! What will you do with all that space you will free up in your kitchen when you move all your chocolate stuff down to the laboratory! Oh, the possibilities!!! It is really coming together

Enablers! You are all Enablers Made Cherry Jello Last night. It has been years since I have had it and I think I will get it again! This thread has me looking at things in the grocery store I have avoided for a while.

Ah, Customs! The horror! I have had a few customers purchase my chocolates and ship them off to France and Britain. The package to Britain arrived with an imprint of a rather large boot on it and apparently the chocolates were all smashed onto the lid. The package to France had been opened by customs but appeared fine - until they went to eat them and realized the bottom of each chocolate had been pressed up to reveal what was in it. These were just packages sent a few years ago, from family members as I do not ship outside of Canada. You might want to talk to a customs broker to go over all the rules to ensure quick shipments. You may have to go with a more expensive mode of shipping like courier companies that offer the customs clearing services. Stable, temperature safe packaging will be key.

Do you think they could be dipped in dark chocolate? I love orange and dark chocolate, are they dense enough to handle coating?

Wow Lior! That looks great! I was wondering what Manjari is? Is a brand of chocolate or type of chocolate? Just curious - I have never heard of it before.

I am no expert on alternative flours, but I have a couple of books and am going to try. What I have noticed about alot of the recipes is more than one type of flour is used. If you google 'spelt flour recipes for bread' and a lot of recipes come up. I am planning on trying this one myself - http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/honey-spelt-bread I admit I have been procrastinating on baking with alternative flours as most people seem to discuss their first attempts as doorstops. Keep on trying, it seems to be a learn as you go process.

I have used Peter's caramel for years and I have found that, this year the product has changed ever so slightly softer. I used to be able to make up some little balls of the caramel with a bit of nuts mixed in the night before I was dipping them. I could make up hundreds of these little treats, exact measurements and room conditions did not change, but when I went to dip them the next day,this year, they were little pancakes on the trays. For some reason they are way more viscous then they used to be. Now I can't make as many in advance and they have started oozing almost immediately after dipping in tempered chocolate. I did ask my rep about this and she has never come back with an answer on this other than I am the only one having the problem. I have added alot more chopped nuts (finer than before) and it seems to have helped. I went through a lot of this caramel this past year and they all were really quite soft. I used to heat the caramel in the microwave for one and a half minutes to get it melted to how I liked it, but the new stuff only requires 45 seconds and that sometimes was too much, so I think the caramel is definitely softer. Still tastes the same. I may try the additional compound trick to see if it affects the caramel. It would make life easier to go back to the old ways of making up a bunch of stuff without it pooling into puddles overnight. You might want to try adding finely chopped nuts to the caramel to give it more body to stick to the apple, but when you are dealing with weddings, nut allergies might be a factor.

I got my little nut grinder (hand crank with a glass jar) from a thrift shop and it has done a lot of pecans in the last few months with no problem! I love it! Now this suggestion comes from watching a little too much tv over the freezing cold weekend. Anybody used one of those slap chop type of cutters? I am sure there will be an abundance of those showing up in the thrift shops soon! :-) Just a thought!

If you do a search for gluten free recipes there are some that call for corn flour.

This machine intrigues me! Anna, sounds like this wonder machine will be responsible for a springtime yard sale. I did not realize it was such a good grinder too. You guys are a bad/good influence on my kitchen wish list, but if it does all of this stuff it might be THE kitchen appliance to have. Can't wait to see what you come up with next.

It sounds like the kinda place I would check out! I wish you luck in your big project!

You must put the Hoito on your list of Must Do's in Thunder Bay! It is located in the lower part of the Finlandia Club in Port Arthur. Finnish Pancakes!!! Mmmmm..

I usually like my regular coffee with a little cream but I love a maple cappuccino once in a while. Well I did until the espresso machine died Years ago I was at some sort of trade show and they were offering the maple cappuccino and I was hooked. Sweeten your espresso with a little maple syrup and top the foam with a little dusting of maple sugar. The key is to not over do it on the maple or else it is just syrupy. Less is more!

I was browsing through some confectionery books on Amazon and was excited to see a new book coming out with Peter Greweling - Chocolates and Confections at Home with the Culinary Institute of America. http://www.amazon.ca/Chocolates-Confections-Culinary-Institute-America/dp/0470189576/ref=sr_1_17?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256174107&sr=1-17 Finally something to put on my wish list!