jumanggy

Hi everyone, thanks to those helping me out with my catastro-cream. (My crea-lemma? ) The cream here is sold on the regular shelves. Imported "whipping cream," "heavy cream," and "cooking cream" are sold from the chiller, and I suspect these are the proper ones to use, though they cost 2-3 times as much. I haven't bought them. Anyway, the regular shelf cream: I have two different types here, both interestingly enough by Nestlé. The one in a tin can is "Nestlé Cream. Premium Quality. It is preserved solely by the perfectly clean and hygienic process of complete sterilization. Do not freeze, except when making ice cream. Manufactured in Brazil." No info on the butterfat percentage or anything. The second is a tetra-pak: "Nestlé All-Purpose Cream. Easy Whip! For easy desserts, just chill... for at least an hour. Cut open about 1/2 inch in the corner and squeeze cream directly on cookies, muffins or ice cream. Ingredients: Water, Milkfat, Nonfat milk solids, emulsifier and stabilizer." From the website: Though the picture is hopelessly out-of-date, so I don't know if any of it is still true. True enough, it is thick, but I've never successfully whipped it into a billowy mass. Thanks reenicake, I figured it out re: choux pastry. Though some may sneer, I still did the pierce-after-baking thing on the side, because there was no way I was going to give these lovely puffs a chance to fail.

Becca, I hope you've just been saving up pictures, because if I made all those desserts in a row I think I would lapse into a coma! I love the idea of the caramel eclairs. I made some puffs and I thought I'd do the same but I was too chicken (especially after Ann Amernick described her experience of losing her fingerprints). When I ended up with so much extra glaze from the Chocolate Éclairs, I thought of this old article about frozen fruit bonbons. I bought a bunch of bananas, layered it with Good Shepherd Peanut Butter, froze them, dropped them in the room-temperature glaze, then froze them again. The result isn't too pretty till you look inside at the layers, but the taste is rich and delicious.

Hi Chris, Claire describes Cook's Illustrated yellow cake as moist, so you may want to look into it.

I had a choux disappointment (kinda pictured and described here) and May referred me to Pichet Ong's recipe. I'd actually found this thread long ago but went with Pierre Hermé's recipe because, well, it's the recipe! The dough is magic. I actually did not have faith in it until 10 minutes after I started baking. The recipe is actually almost exactly the same as Hermé's, only with a tad more liquid. First of all, when I dried it for almost the same amount of time (5 minutes), it didn't look as dry. Worry! I only added 4 eggs because it was starting to get runny but I was able to add 5 to Hermé's without that problem. Worry! Actually, it stuck to the beaters for a while, so I thought it was okay, but when I loaded it into the bag, it was really loose! I couldn't pipe a decent shape, it was so runny. Worry! After I'd baked it at 205°C for 5 minutes, it flopped and I got so depressed. Depressed! So I ate a little dinner, and five minutes later, I was amazed to find a row of perfectly risen spheres!!!!!!! They were so hollow! I'm not sure what I'll use next time. Hermé's dough is more manageable, but Ong's rose really well. Maybe I'll dry out the dough a LOT more next time (10 minutes?) and ladle in the eggs instead of adding them whole.

I remove all the kernels with a knife. I recognize I'm fussy. It's just that it's easy for the seed coats to get stuck between my teeth, which I hate. On the other hand, my teeth are perfect

Wow. You are a machine. I'm so looking forward to the next few days. I noticed that many shops don't allow picture-taking, don't know why (spies? copycats?). I take my clandestine photos with a camera-phone, pretending to think while placing it against my chin (a la Oprah). The Sang Tung chicken reminded me of Mortal Kombat (hello, twentysomething). Sounds great, though when you type out descriptions it always seems as though there's crack in the food ("ultra addictive")

I outlined my choux pastry disaster here: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...dpost&p=1430034 I'm blaming my oven/ me for not having an oven thermometer/ the recipe/ the humidity. I'm pretty sure the dough (before piping) looked fine. Next time I'm piping directly on nonstick sheets. Also, my piping sucks. A soggy eclair is still quite tasty, right? *sigh*

Today I made the chocolate éclairs. They tasted great, but I wasn't happy at all with the lift of the choux pastry. Plus, some of them were still eggy in the center after I was done. I just might go ahead and buy a $10 oven thermometer now (though it's hard to choose-- I broke my candy thermometer, so that's $4, I want an instant-read thermometer, which is $26, I want a scale, which is $25-$60... so on so forth..... AUGH!) They are getting geometrically soggy even though they haven't been filled. Oh well. But I'm having my doubts with the specified temperature in the book, though-- isn't 190°C (375°F) too low?

When I hear "sauce" I usually think of dishes where the sauce IS the dish... Sweet and sour sauce, lemon sauce, black bean sauce, curry (eh? Does that count?), etc. In fact, for instance, when we order such a dish, the identity is usually the sauce, for instance: "I'll have the Puttanesca," and my family couldn't care less what pasta it's on! The second category of sauces in my mind are quite overpowering. Peanut sauce, liver gravy, hoisin sauce... They don't fit the definition in the text. But if we are strictly speaking of the (er) "Western" sauces (for lack of a better term, someone please give me an idea) like Bearnaise, Maltaise, Hollandaise, Beurre blanc, etc. I haven't a clue. I think the number of times I've eaten such sauces can be counted on one hand Which is probably why I'm here, thinking of buying "Mastering the art of French cooking."

Solar hands? Interesting... The torrents do exist, search at torrentz.com. I've been looking at synopses: http://members.optusnet.com.au/davidlee1/chuuka/episode.htm I realize that some of the things that wowed me when I first saw the series (during the "noodles but not noodles" challenge, Mao places some puree in a perforated bag and extrudes noodles), I saw later on in Iron Chef Japan. Some of the dishes are really inspired and could work in real life.

It hasn't yet been released at the best bookstore here in Manila... Till then, I'm excited to see what you guys are making! W/r/t the lack of pictures... I get a little nervous because I might not be doing something right (even a picture of the end result helps), but I have to admit, when a book doesn't have pictures, it makes it even more rewarding to bake, style, and photograph a dessert you've made Rob, that fried mocha custard square looks lethal.

I bought a french rolling pin, and it works great, except that the warmth here makes things stick after a while. Should I never wash it and instead do the washing-sanding-mineral oil thing once a year?

GTO, that tart looks great. Your crimping looks so uniform, one would think you've been doing this for years! I've never made frangipane before, but only because the price of almonds is so discouraging-- £1.35 for 100 grams and not much cheaper unground (which I would have to grind in a mortar and pestle anyway-- sniff, sniff). I wanna see pics of your chocolate cake! Could it really have been that bad? What was bad about it (appearance, taste, texture)? Maybe you'd like to post it in the commiseration central thread (well, if anyone can make an awful cake look good... heh heh.) Rona, your cupcakes look so enticing, I can't believe you only ate a quarter of one. That's some willpower! kbjesq, I WISH people would just give me food-related stuff Cherries are one of my favorite fruits (and, lucky for me, don't grow here), so I'm really jealous of your clafouti! What do grow here are pineapples, though, and i made this Pineapple Galette for my family. It would be completely sugar-free if I hadn't used canned pineapple (curse you, Del Monte!! or curse me for not just buying a fresh one). Anyway, it was fresh-tasting and delicious Edited: to correct subject-verb agreement. D'oh!

Ooh, I second the jello (unflavored gelatin and unsweetened fruit juice)-- the meringue idea sounds great too. Make it glisten with, er, more gelatin.

Maybe it was a really protective Baked Alaska!

Talking about my cooking influences allowed this gem of a cartoon from Japan to resurface in my memory. Cooking Master Boy (Chuuka Ichiban in Japan, meaning "China's Best") is the story of Liu Mao-Hsing, an apprentice chef who takes part in one earth-shattering kitchen battle after another to become China's best chef, in the process saving the country and stuff like that. It's a family-friendly show and I encourage all lovers of chinese cuisine, the Iron Chef series, anime, or if you have kids who love to cook, to watch it: this is the show for them. I got to learn about so many Chinese dishes watching this show, and even learned a few things about cooking fried rice, making dumplings (steamed and fried), making tofu (Mabo Tofu is dealt with in a 3- or 4- episode story arc. Better believe it), cooking vegetables, plating and presentation, and using knives. Of course most of it is fantasy and silly fun, but fun nonetheless. http://www.youtube.com/results?search_quer...king+master+boy Watch a few snippets on YouTube to see if it's for you. Unfortunately no official DVDs are out (though there are anime-enthusiast-made recordings).

Here's something from Martha Stewart: 1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar + 3-4 tbsp milk, water or lemon juice (whisk in 1 tbsp at a time until smooth and thick enough to coat the back of a spoon). Spread over cookies with the back of a spoon, add other decorations, then let harden (about 20 minutes). You'll be fine! Good luck!

I tend to cook from other cultures. I'm from the Philippines, born and raised-- I haven't really learned to make the traditional Filipino fare, but I figure there will always be time in the future to learn that (and in the meantime, plenty of other people who will cook those). All this exposure to the internet, foodtv, restaurants, magazines, and ESPECIALLY the eGullet forums is exciting me too much to want to learn things I've basically eaten my whole life. What attracts me to what I choose to cook is its "newness," flavor, health-consciousness, and since I've been here, how much people regard it in an international scale. However, I haven't been cooking seriously for very long. I've always gravitated towards Italian and Chinese cuisine. My interest in cooking started from magazines. I used to leaf through Food & Wine when I was a kid (while listening to Wilson Philips, ha ha ha). Then we got cable, and I watched the 3 big cooking shows of my life-- Baker's Dozen, Biba's Italian Kitchen, and Caprial's Cafe (and I hated the Urban Peasant). Then I was old enough (and we had enough money) to dine at this new place that serves this oddity called "fusion cuisine." I was hooked. Magazines-tv-learning from what i eat-internet. Big steps. The only direction I want is "up," if that makes sense. That is, my short attention span wants something bolder and more exciting each time. But I'm still trying to get all the techniques under my belt. Plus, it wouldn't hurt to know all the traditional Filipino dishes like the back of my hand.

Todd and Carlovski: actually I was thinking about those things as well. "I'd love a plain cheese sandwich!" "At least they're giving them free lunch?" "Those other options aren't very healthy..." But that last section in the quoted part of the article really alarmed me (here's probably where the "Food Tradition and Culture" part kicks in..). Kids can be really cruel (or I can really watch a lot of Oprah!). Actually I wasn't aware of the US system (when I was in school we weren't given lunch, we paid in the cafeteria same as regular folk).

"Pay up or we will indirectly cause your child a great deal of distress!" Yikes.

When you spot a thread titled "Phyllo Dough", read it, and fantasize about making every dough/pastry known to man. Then your heart breaks a little when you remember that you don't have a stand mixer, and therefore no dough hook. Then you think about working out a bit more so you can do it by hand.

Oh, this thread is on the second page! And consecutive desserts from me. I made some carrot cupcakes for a friend's study group, also because I had extra cream cheese frosting tucked away. Let me add to what I said about an assistant to wash dishes-- I also need them to grate carrots! Was manually grating them so there was a lot of slippage. This is Ina Garten's recipe. I omitted the walnuts because I don't like them that much (read: if I bake it, no nuts, if others bake it, it's fine). I omitted the raisins because my friend hates raisins. I didn't add crushed pineapple because it's risky (not a popular addition). They were very moist despite this. Also, that is not the photographed color of the carrots, I had to manipulate it on the computer. I wonder what I was thinking when I bought a bottle of creamy peach. Duh. It came out a creamy peach, not orange. Also, it's warm as usual so the leaves I piped with a leaf tip might as well have been spooned on I should have taken a rest and chilled everything.

Thanks, Elie! All I need to do is whip cream properly and I'm on my way to a Black Forest Cake. But we don't have griottes here, the only widely available cherries are Maraschino cherries (but I love them, so I may use them). Rare but find-able are canned black cherries and some kind of red cherries in syrup. I actually gave away my frozen Pave and my recipient now wants to buy 2 loaves! I wonder how much I stack on top of the price

Suddenly I'm picturing Marjorie Dawes from Little Britain. I'm sorry for your bad experiences with doctors, Steven. I'll try to keep what you said in mind, it's really something to think about. (Although I've never given a PPI to anyone but those who need treatment for dyspepsia.. Plus, because this country is so poor, we try to push for exercise prescriptions, stop smoking, drinking, lifestyle modification mostly.) Sorry about your friend, Michael. I'm thinking about the culture here, and I have to say that there's nothing inherently harmful about being a foodie-- in fact I'd have to say that if I prepared my own food and cooked at home all the time, I'm more likely to lose weight. Tying together what Steven said to your friend's situation, empathy and understanding are more important than drilling someone.

It's been really great reading your family customs. I can't remember when we stopped eating as a family-- we seemed to start getting hungry at different times, plus traffic meant my mom couldn't come back from the office in time (my father did the cooking when I was younger). It didn't affect me much if at all I think, but I'm hard-pressed to find a 20 year-old who has never tried alcohol. (side story: I had a reunion with my high school friends, and since I'm the one who hates the inebriation that results from drinking, I was less likely to drink. Even at 25y/o they still treat me like I'm 15-- pushing shots on me. I said, "Peer pressure? Really?"). But there has been a lot of talk when I was in college of being "boarders in your own home" (I can't remember from where I heard that). I think if the guilt is starting to get to you but the hectic schedules can't be avoided, cooking for your family in advance (instead of the cookie/ pizza/ protein bar route) would be a step towards alleviating the guilt. Even if there's no good memories about sitting together, there'll always be memories of Mom's/ Dad's awesome cooking. I can tell I sound naive.