ejw50

It was a year ago; I wish I remembered the details. One one night I had the steak and another the lamb. My wife had fish both times. We both thought it was the best meals we had in Maui. We bought "Wolfgang Puck Makes it Easy" autographed, and a bunch of things in our meal were in the book. This includes the Pineapple upsidedown cake, the potato purees, and a few of the marinades (inculding soy-mint one).

Pierre has a lime cream recipe in his other book (The Patisserie of Pierre Herme). If I remember correctly, it's the lemon cream recipe with lime substitution (equal weights). If you're doing it from "Desserts by Pierre Herme" you have to account for the fact that limes are smaller than lemons.

thanks for the ebay tip. Did not know about that before; just bought myself a pound.

Everything is better with Bacon! "Making Artisan Chocolates" by Andrew Shotts has a nice section on this on spices that pair with Dark chocolate (peppers, coriander, curry, wasabi), then some with white chocolate (cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, coriander, ginger, more) and more. Nice book if you want to see how one of the pros does it.

I've been looking for an ice cream book but didn't want to spend on the $200 one at JB prince. Thanks for the tip on this one!

Pierre a similar cake in his book 'The patisserie of Pierre Herme". Can't recommend this book enough. $150 or so, but worth every penny. The recipe in the book uses genoise instead of dacquoise. Pierre's recipe is 1:5 pastry cream to butter cream plus pistachio paste. He has different mousseline creams in the book that use different ratios.

ah, that makes sense. It seems it's just as you'd use cigarette paste + parchment. I am used to chocolate, where the transfer sheet goes on the top (duh, should've known). Thanks for that tip, will look into it!

Thanks for that tip, I did not know about that. Can you describe how you use the PCB transfer sheets? I click on 'instructions' on the website, but it doesn't work. Do they go on top of the cake sheet before baking?

bonbon. I appreciate a beautiful piece of marble, but I appreciate it more when it is made into sculpture.

Spago is in the Four Seasons in Wailea, I loved it it the 2x I went. Gerard's in Lahaina is mentioned in both Frommer's and Fodor's as one of the best. I thought Humuhumunukunukuapuaa was a little overrated. OK food, small portions, expensive. But their fishtank is beautiful. Second the mention for Nick's Fishmarket. Excellent service, very good food.

I like the Wybauw book better, but only after the "second translation" provided on the forum by DavidJ, you, Kerry, John, serj, and others. After getting the info from the classes, it's like a whole new book. as much as i love wybauw, i have to agree. i think a lot of it has to do with poor translation whereas the peter greweling book was written by a native english speaker in his own language being read by native english speakers. is anyone else disturbed by the photo opposite page 114 (cinnamon stacks)? we're always being warned that we need to make sure that our chocolates have no air, etc. in them, but this method clearly allows large air gaps between ganache piping which goes against what i've been taught. ←

Thanks for the tips. I will check the temperature of the cocoa butter and chocolate. I think the chocolate temper is OK, as I don't get any streaking, spots, color-change-to-white-over time thing. It doesn't seem to be all of the chocolates, just some of them - maybe 5/30 or so.

I am having this problem, maybe somebody could help me with it. I am trying to make molded chocolates colored with cocoa butter. All standard technique - I spray the cocoa butter in, chill, put the chocolate in, chill, fill, wait, cover with chocolate, chill, demold. Sometimes I am getting the cocoa butter sticking to the mold instead of to the chocolate. This leaves an ugly chocolate that has the look of something untempered. (If I knew how you all posted pics, I would) Is it a matter of cocoa butter thickness? Temperature or cooling rate? Cleanliness of molds? Any help would be appreciated.

Awesome John, Thanks a lot, and thanks to everybody who has shared their experience.

awesome, thanks! Question, did he show 'slam filling' of molded chooclates that David J. mentioned? If so, can you describe your takes on it?

Thanks partly to this forum, I went to Piron last Christmas while I was in Evanston. Great chocolates. The flavors are pretty traditional, but they do them all very well. "Fanciest" one is the cherry cordial. Flavors were consistently excellent. And, as the review states, extremely reasonably priced - I got ~8 chocolates for ~$12. I did notice a few pits and cavities in the tops of their molded chocolates, which made me feel better about my own work. I asked the guy how they temper, and he said they use the slab method. Interesting to me anyway as I thought most people these days seed (could be wrong here) With one exception, I've always found Vosges flavors to be subtle to a fault. As a person who likes the unconventional flavors, they sound wonderful, but I usually find the flavors almost undetectable. The one exception I had was a fresh truffle rolled in curry powder (not just dusted on top like the Naga) that was made that day and purchased at their boutique on Michigan Ave. That one was a powerhouse, but the rest have paled in comparison. ← From my experience, they are over-priced for what they are. I agree that some of her flavors are to subtle for me, and a few, most memorably the "Rooster," was downright offensive. I often gravitate toward unique and novel combinations, but Taleggio cheese and chocolate was not a match that I cared for. When Markoff got going a few years ago, her truffles were much better, IHO. Recently, I've altogether abandoned her truffles for her bars. The Oaxaca, Red Fire, Creole, and Barcelona (the only milk chocolate I'll ever consciously put in my mouth), are among my favorite. ←

If you just want a big sheet, I second the person who said local art store. Won't have to pay shipping, and you can test out the technique. Agree with everybody who said it's the same stuff. If you want pre-cut rolls for cake lining, then agree with jbprince. thanks alana, I will get it from jbprince. the thing that sucks, I was just at their store last month in NY. oh well luis ←

Just to quote the master, JP Wybauw says (in his book) there are a few possibilities 1. chocolate is undercrystallized 2. chocolate is over-crystallied 3. insufficient cooling can be avoided by 1. working with chocolate with correct amount of beta crystals 2. ensuring smooth but not overly rapid cooling Basically what Kerry said.

The throwdown was all right. Bobby Flay made some ganache with ancho chili, cinnamon, and dark/milk chocolate, dipped in dark chocolate and drizzled with colored white chocolate. Fritz Knipschildt was slated to make a regular truffle, but at the last second busted out the molds with painted cocoa butter, luster dust, and I think a dark chocolate coating with caramel inside. The sculpture was no contest. Tough one for Flay as his skills in this arena were way below the level of his competition. I thought he did OK for somebody who is not a pastry chef. Fritz seemed to have fun with the whole thing. We got to see him demoing his technique on the molded chocolates, which was the neatest part for me. Batali vs. Laiskonis was on right before.

Thanks for the report! One question about freezing. Did he mention how he does it? Do you know if he stores them in regular chocolate boxes? Vacuum sealed?

A vote for molded here. Tastewise, I prefer a creamier ganache over a dense ganache. Aesthetically, I prefer the shine and color possibilities of molded. Also, as an (amateur) chocolatier, I can appreciate the "difficulty rating" of molded vs. enrobing.

Looks sweet, please keep up posted!

I have the book too (first review on Amazon). My only complaint is the book says it g pectin is a pectin "that I developed", but it that isn't sold at garrison confections website. So there is no real way to know how to use it or substitute for the lay person who doesn't come on this site. I appreciate that Andrew has let us know how to order it. I haven't tried the recipes, but the ideas have a nice range of classic to more modern flavors. There are some nice ideas and a nice table of appropriate spice/chocolate/flavor pairings. I like the techniques sections the best. For $25 (list) you can learn all the techniques you need to be a chocolatier. In that way, I think it's a revolutionary book in the field.

Welcome ej, great place for a first post. Are you into chocolate in a big way? ← HI Kerry It is a hobby for me. Enough to where I got one of those table-top tempers and an airbrush to recreate what I saw in a Norman Love demo in an old Pastry Arts and Design article. Not enough to sell them or anything. David's report really does reinforce all the lessons JPW tries to teach in his book. This is a great forum. Thanks to everybody who has posted. You've all helped me a lot already. All of the problems I've had - difficulty in sealing molds, differences in chocolate viscosity (which David answered, I had no idea about the different Callebauts) - I"ve seen discussed on this forum already.

Thanks you. I had to register just to say that this is the greatest post of all time.