patris

If there is an advantage to insomnia, it is that waking up at 4 am means you can get a lot done before 9 or so. After indulging in two cups of coffee and more than half of the first 2-hour episode of the new season of the Great American Baking Show, I set to work on the rest of the confections. All the marshmallows are done, and will rest until I cut them up this evening or early tomorrow: and the peanut butter crunch meltaways (about 200 grams feuilletine in about 1 kg meltaway) are behind (within?) bars to crystallize. Later they and their smooth friends will get a foot of milk chocolate and be cut for the elves to dip as they please. The chocolate for the peppermint bark is melting in those cunning little 3 kg Croquade melters - love those things. i did run into something I hadn’t really seen before - the meltaway slab I made last night has this odd streaky look. The texture is perfect, and it seems perfectly tempered, so I don’t think it matters, but it got me thinking - I bought some cocoa butter (says it’s organic and fair trade) from a source that is new to me, and when it arrived I noticed that it was very light in color - more cream than the faint butter yellow I am used to - and it took a rather high temp (34.5ish) in the EZTemper to make silk of it. I am assuming it is indeed cocoa butter, but found the streaking curious. It’s a big slab, and I didn’t refrigerate it at all, so perhaps it was just latent heat throwing things off a bit. I am off to do some grocery shopping and other errands, and hoping to have time for a nap after lunch to make up for lost sleep.

Ho ho ho! ‘‘Tis the season for the elves to return to Tonawanda. Sunday is the big day, and I’ve taken tomorrow off from work to allow me to retain my sanity while I prepare. @Kerry Beal will arrive Saturday morning, so I am trying extra hard to get all the prep and scut work done so we can get up to whatever trouble finds us. After work this evening I got started on the confections - a hefty slab of peanut butter meltaways and three pans of cinnamon marshmallows. On deck for tomorrow will be another batch of meltaways (this one with feuilletine mixed in), two pans of peppermint marshmallows, one of vanilla marshmallows, and around 12 pounds of peppermint bark. I’ll try to remember to take pictures along the way.

What about doing meltaways? They use coconut oil (refined will give virtually no coconut flavor) and I imagine you could flavor them with a number of oils - mint, lemon, orange, almond, etc. Tempered properly (true confessions: I have an EZTemper, which makes it easy) the texture is wonderful. You could either slab and dip, or fill bonbons.

As it happens, she is already in possession of a couple of them - I gave them to her on her last visit!

This was indeed a genius idea! When I was making my dipping bowls I tried and tried to think of a smaller-scale (and less pricy) alternative, finally settling on silicone rubber bands to string across using the little knobs on the side of the bowl - and while that’s fine, I wasn’t totally happy with it. Happy to say, though, I recently figured it out! A little spool of stainless steel wire (bought on Amazon) wrapped around a bent length of slender threaded steel rod (bought at Lowes) makes a perfect substitute, at a total cost of considerably south of $2.

Redeemed the whole thrift store experience!

You are too kind ☺️

I was thinking I might try it with white or caramelized white in this instance, as well as with colored cocoa butter. At the risk of getting scolded for being off topic I can tell you it works a treat on pottery with stoneware slip! (I imagine I will store or serve food of some type in this bowl once it is fired...)

With so much gorgeousness in this thread I was hesitant to post anything, but i made these for a dinner party tonight (filled with Greweling’s flowing caramel) and they are among the nicest I have ever made. I had meant to try the dendritic technique but remembered too late that I should have molded a solid piece first, so simple finger swipes it was. Happily, it all worked out in the end!

I got obsessed with those volcano chocolates the first time I saw them on @kriz6912's Instagram, so I bought that mold. I do like it, but it has its issues. It's super shallow, so it doesn't hold a whole lot of filling (and my shelling technique is doubleplusungood, so I consistently fail to maximize any mold's potential), and I find it very difficult to scrape excess off when it's filled and backed - the pieces want to slide right out. Makes a lovely bonbon, though. Golf tees stuck in styrofoam do the trick for holding the piece while you drizzle the chocolate over - @kriz6912 posted video of the technique in some detail.

They are totally scrumptious. I gild the lily by sautéing the almonds in butter until the butter starts to brown, then salting them generously. They get devoured no matter where I take them.

I am finding every excuse lately to be in the kitchen making sweets, but sadly forgetting to photograph and post anything. This weekend I managed to get my entire act together: Not the best photo, but pretzel rods wrapped in thin strips of @Kerry Beal‘s recipe from the eG Confectionery Institute and then dipped in dark, milk, and caramelized white chocolate. The ones with sprinkles are wearing a layer of Greweling’s peanut butter meltaway under the chocolate. I have to say that Kerry’s caramel recipe is utter perfection - holds its shape pretty well, is decadently stretchy, and sticks only for a moment in the teeth before dissolving completely. Plus it tastes fantastic. And of course I couldn’t let the excess meltaway go to waste! Dipped in half dark/half milk. I realized that despite my cool tools - handmade dipping bowl, bespoke dipping fork and EZTemper - my hand dipping skills are abominable. Last effort for the weekend was almond joy cookies from this recipe - a favorite recipe and far and away the best macaroons I have ever made. Some of these will go with me to the pottery studio on Tuesday as a pre-birthday treat for my pottery mentor and friend, and the rest will go to our monthly staff lunch along with some butterscotch blondies which I will get around to making as soon as I can find a good recipe.

Any chance you and @Tri2Cook are conflating Paydays and Salted Nut Rolls in your memories? I had the same recollection and realized this is what I was actually remembering.

Thank you all so much for sharing your stories - as I read them I am finding myself mulling over some bittersweet memories as well. My mother was an outstanding cook - despite what as an adult I now understand to be our very limited means, every night we (Mom, Dad, and some combination of my 7 older siblings and I) would sit down together to an expertly prepared and well balanced meal - some kind of meat, usually a large roast of pork or beef with gravy; a starch; two vegetables; often a green salad; and a dessert, sometimes store-bought cookies but many times homemade. I may have taken it for granted when she prepared one of the very few meals I did not care for, but I recall finding most of what she made absolutely delicious. She took great pride in her cooking, though she did not particularly enjoy having to do it, and as she got older and frailer and less able or willing to cook for herself, she often bemoaned the lack of appropriate flavor development or seasoning in restaurant meals and even some of the dishes my sisters and I prepared for her in her later years. She passed away 18 months ago at 85, and spent her final month between hospital and nursing home on a strict low sodium diet. She felt so lousy that she had little appetite, and though the food in the hospital was better prepared than the nursing home, it was all devoid of flavor and pleasure and it was nearly impossible to get her to eat very much, even with judicious use of the salt packets we hoarded and smuggled in for her - which only made her weaker and frailer. Further, specific dietary requests made at the nursing home (for example, please no meat of any kind on Friday, for religious reasons) were completely ignored and when alternate meals requested they either did not arrive or arrived stone cold. So much about it infuriated me - it was clear she did not have much longer, so why deny her decent food? Why be so careless about her nutrition when she so desperately needed calories? It all seemed so counterintuitive to caring for the whole person. When I think back on that last awful month, there are three food-related things that stick out in my mind as... redeeming? Not sure of the right word, but moments of pleasure that she hadn't felt for a long time. First, since it was the holidays I made a massive basket of chocolate barks, clusters, and dipped pretzels for her to give out to the staff whom she particularly liked. She loved being in a position to share something handmade with people who showed her care and kindness, which seemed to give her a bit of joy she might not otherwise have experienced during her last Christmas and made her something of a temporary rockstar with the chocoholics on staff. Second, I made her some specialchocolate bark with ingredients I knew she loved, in hopes it would entice her to snack and get some calories in her. It did the trick, at least temporarily - she truly enjoyed it and I was able to replenish her stash a few times before her appetite went downhill completely. Finally, on the last day in the nursing home before the final hospital stay - the last day she was reasonably coherent - I was visiting when her lunch was delivered and since she was nearly too weak to feed herself, I ended up feeding her the cream of mushroom soup on her tray. This must have been delivered to her by mistake, as miraculously it was both hot and tasty to her. She ate most of it - more than I had seen her eat in weeks - and it ended up being the last real meal she ate before she died a few days later. When I think about those final days I often think about how that simple bowl of soup might have been the last pleasure she enjoyed, and my being there to feed it to her might have helped her enjoy it without what, in her condition, would have been a profound exertion if she had had to feed it to herself. Whoa. Sorry for the wall of text. Food is such powerful medicine, in all kinds of ways, isn't it?

This breaks my heart!

Would you mind sharing who makes that mold and the mold number or other identifying info? The bar molds I have are flimsy and terrible.

I don't know what that is, but I sure want some.

Forgot to mention - browning the butter makes all kinds of difference.

I use this basic recipe, but add an extra cup or so of cereal and a whole lot more butter and marshmallow creme - I eyeball it but I would say maybe a couple extra ounces of fluff and maybe an ounce more of butter. They turn out super gooey and buttery every time, and keep well for at least a couple days if you wrap them well.

Got it - sorry I won't see you in person and thank you!

You’re welcome and thank you!

@RobertM bubble wrap is a great idea... The gang is finally all together! I hope you will indulge a final class photo along with a few remaining details. With the exception of @Tri2Cook and @Sweet Impact Mama whose bowls will be shipped to them, I will meet the group toward the end of your Tomric visit on Thursday and will take payment at that time. Cash (USD) is preferred, but checks are ok if necessary. If you use Apple Pay or the Cash App, that would be fine too and we can handle that on delivery. If you will NOT be at Tomric, please send me a PM so we can sort out payment, and I will ask @Kerry Beal to bring your bowls to the workshop. @MelissaH - I know you will not be at Tomric and I think you have my details for sending a check. One final comment about glaze behavior over time. A few of the glazes (hyacinth and forest green in particular) may develop very fine cracks or crazing. This is a feature of these glazes and does not affect their durability or safety, so don’t be alarmed if you see it happening. All the glazes are microwave and dishwasher safe. Looking forward to seeing many of you on Thursday - safe travels to all!

First big batch of bowls out of the glaze kiln today! Our glazes are mixed in-house, not purchased in liquid form, so there is always some variation, but some of the results on these are really striking. In particular the Castile blue and Hyacinth bowls, at the left of the photo, came out just beautiful, with a deeper color on the inside of the bowls and much lighter color on the outside - even some cool streaking and variations in the finish in certain areas, especially on the two Castile blue bowls. The remainder of the bowls (17 in total!) came out of the bisque kiln this morning; I glazed them all and they’ll go in the next glaze firing. There are a couple more Castile bowls in that group - it has been mixed a little differently since the last firing so I can’t wait to see how they come out. As they are fired, I am checking each one by filling them with water to measure capacity and they consistently hold 650 grams with about a half to three quarters of an inch of room at the top. This is my first experience doing anything on this scale and I am learning so much - thanks to everyone for your interest. It is giving me a wonderful perspective on my own work going forward!

Wegmans carries Ba-Tampte pickles - at least the half sours - here in Buffalo (I think of you every time I notice them). Not sure if your shiny new double decker Wegmans does, but it’s worth checking out!

It’s #2. Glad you’re enjoying the photos!