Tri2Cook

I decided to go all out this year so I bought a six of Hoegaarden and stuff to make nachos. I know, I know... I do too much.

That's as good a reason as any. Maybe try dark corn syrup? The molasses note in that isn't very strong. Maybe a really mild honey. The lighter agave nectars aren't aggressive in flavor so that was a good suggestion as well. I don't find Lyle's golden syrup to be all that aggressive either. Or you could go creative and make your own syrup with sugar, water and a little glucose or corn syrup and infuse it with herbs, spices, chiles, etc.

Yeah, I was going to check it out too.

Thanks Kerry. I think I'll mix some into some fondant tonight and see what it looks like over the next day or two just to be safe but that sounds encouraging. I intend to order some anyway but I have something I want to work on early this week so any I order won't be here that quick.

Might be worth a try if you don't need shelf life as part of the formula. Spherifications, "regular", "reverse" and even the cold oil/agar type seem to quite often suffer from syneresis. Not sure what a layer of liquid between the chocolate and sphere would do to quality and shelf life but probably nothing good.

If you don't have an objection to the corn syrup other than it doesn't taste good on it's own and you don't want to sub in anything that does have a bold flavor of it's own why not just stick with the corn syrup? Did I misunderstand your post? If so, ignore this. If not, this seems like a poster case for "if it ain't broke don't fix it".

Could be. Depends if you want to go with the popular or the literal definition of the position.

They taste peanut buttery to me but I don't really eat them. I just had a request at one point for a butterfinger cake and wanted to make a filling I could form in a pan then place between cake layers because I'm too stubborn to do the smart thing and just cover the cake in butterfingers.

Jeff learned that if you're going to go out on a limb, you better have a solid tree. The problem with getting artsy and creative on a show like this is that a plain grilled pork chop done well is better than a cutting edge dish done half-assed. The creative dishes at top restaurants are great because of the chefs that create them and their commitment to making great food, not because they look cool and are super complicated to do. If you dumped an Alinea dish in a bowl, stirred it into a big mess and ate it, it would still be awesome. That said, it would be cool if they had a few risk takers with the skill level to hang in there for the duration. Something to balance the drama and product placement a bit so I could feel less wanker-ish about watching every week.

I have a bottle that I haven't used in a while, I have no idea exactly when I bought it but I haven't used it in at least a year. Does it go bad/quit working properly and need to be replaced or is this one of those rare "good 'til it's gone" items?

I wants me some collards. Seriously. Can't get those where I live... at all... ever. I miss 'em. Dammit. Actually, you can't even get frozen or canned collards here but that doesn't disappoint me as much as the lack of fresh.

Hmmm... I'm going to have to try that. The only thing with the type I make that I wasn't completely happy with was textural. I'm not trying to make a butterfinger bar, I use it as a filling, so I'm more after the taste and texture than complete accuracy.

I use this one: 1 c. sugar, 2/3 c. corn syrup, 5 tbsp. butter on high to boil, reduce to med-high and boil 5 minutes. Remove from heat and add 1 tsp. vanilla extract. Mix 2 1/2 c. powdered sugar, 1/3 c. nonfat dry milk and 1/4 tsp. salt and stir into syrup. Cool to just warm to touch and mix in an equal weight of peanut butter (I usually mix it in a processor). I keep meaning to take the time to convert this to weights and temps instead of measures and times but haven't got around to it yet. It's not perfect but it works well for what I do with it. One of these days I'll get back to playing around with it again... maybe.

Chef Rubber has them in plain and chocolate coated. I keep the plain ones on hand all of the time. I haven't tried the coated. Probably won't. Pop rocks are fun. I starch mold invertase-treated fondant with boozed cherries, sit them on discs of ganache with pop rocks and feuilletine then dip the whole thing in chocolate. I call them Cherry Poppers, they always go over well.

Haven't seen it yet but I'm already ordering a couple of books so maybe I'll toss it in the cart and check it out if it's that good.

Bacon can't jump the shark. It's bacon. Even when that 10% that consider themselves the harbinger of all things cool in food decide it's no longer cool, the other 90% of us will still love it. In fact, so will that 10%. They'll just have to pretend they don't in public.

I already decided I couldn't live without one (I was actually leaning towards the ACMC before this deal came along) but I'll probably have to try to for now. I really hate to pass on it though.

My buttermilk biscuits aren't as good as... pretty much any I've tried from anyone who makes them. I've started doing all of my biscuits with larger pieces of fat and a couple turns to laminate the dough a bit and I get light, flaky biscuits every time but they're not the same critter as those big fluffy things you get when a little old country lady makes biscuits for you. The light and flaky biscuits just don't work the same when you drown 'em in sausage gravy, they go instantly soggy.

Nope, never seen it. I was assuming it would be like cocoa puffs cereal or something so I searched it in google. I was wrong.

I think they both work at the local strip club. Actually... cocoa booty.

There may be a ton of "not if you use" or things of that nature that others can contribute, I'm not a cake decorator, but most colors I've used for fondants and icings when cornered into doing cakes have left taste-testers with tongues and/or teeth to match the decor. Since I don't love decorating in that manner in the first place, I don't worry about it too much. If they ask for a red cake with black trim that's what they get. That makes some nice looking teeth.

Yes.

Some really nice stuff folks. It's been a busy week at work and I've been fighting off a bout of flu for the past couple days so I haven't done much besides work and sleep but I've been watching what everyone else is doing. Rob, nice one! I've done all of the development/testing for my entry into this round of the challenge. I'll take the time this week to do the actual dish so I can get it submitted on time.

The show is Top Chef but the challenge was Restaurant Wars. FOH/schmoozing is part of the restaurant business so it should be part of the judging criteria for the challenge. Radhika blew it. Carla had a bad dessert night. I knew it sucked so I sent it out with a big helping of love ala mode is crap. She stated that she's quite good at pastry but she was doing a lot of pinch-and-dash-not-measuring on that cake that nobody liked. Leah's "I don't care" comment during her pout session over the raw fish would have sent her out the door if she worked for me but she was on the winning team and the judges didn't see it anyway. As for the love-and-drama crap, I'm not home when the show airs so I usually watch a recording and just skip through those parts. I still don't feel the intense hatred and resentment for Toby some here seem to have, I just find him a lot less interesting than the network probably hoped. I think maybe they were picturing their very own on-staff Bourdain. That they didn't get.

Yeah, starch molding wouldn't really work for what I have in mind. I'm picturing basically a mini cocktail in a chocolate shell. Completely liquid, relatively high in booze, not overly sugary.