Tri2Cook

I smoked some tomatoes tonight for something I'm working on and the smoke was still going so good when I took them out that I hated to let it go to waste. So I cut some oranges in half and tossed them in for a while then wrapped them and tossed them in the cooler. Tomorrow I'm going to collect the zest and juice from them and then, assuming it doesn't taste like a really bad idea, try to come up with something to do with it.

Mustard ice cream is actually quite tasty so caramels might be tasty as well. I've made Sam Mason's version of mustard ice cream from his Banana-Cocoa Raviolis with Mustard Ice Cream and Coffee Soil recipe. I didn't do the entire recipe (yet) because I didn't have the LM gellan for the raviolis but the ice cream is good. I ate it with sliced bananas and chocolate-coffee sauce just to get the feel of the flavor combination he was doing. Good stuff... eventually I'll do the entire recipe as it is supposed to be.

...and wow again. They just keep coming.

Wow. Just wow.

Beautiful Kerry. I would really like to attempt to learn to do molded chocolates well someday. I've played around with them enough to know that it's not a skill that's going to come easily to me and I'll never be at the level of most of the folks who post here but I still would like to give it a serious go at some point.

Thanks Lior, that's really nice of you but I wasn't fishing for compliments. I've posted a thing or two here that I've been really proud of but I know I post some strange stuff sometimes.

I know what you mean Lior, everybody does such great stuff here that I always feel a touch hesitant to post my (often weird) stuff but it's all in fun so I do it anyway. Rob: "Mr. Tangerine Flan". I love it! That's too cool. SanaaSol and Sif: Thanks for the kind words. That's Sam Mason's creation and I'd be glad to post the recipe but I haven't completely figured out the rules for posting other people's recipes yet. Don't want to create more work for the mods, I've done too much of that already.

Thanks for that information. The PA&D site doesn't have any information on ordering back issues and several differently worded searches here in the forums didn't yield any information but I'll keep looking. I'd like to give it a try a compare it to the Sam Mason version which I've already done.

The recipe for Sam Mason's version with carrageenan and locust bean gum is readily available but has anybody managed to work out the Alex Stupak version with agar and gelatin sheets?

We have a couple regulars who spend quite a bit of money each week with us that do it. We'd lose a lot more than we'd gain by saying no. They just prefer a certain tea, it's not anything to do with being cheap. People who order water and lemon slices then add sugar and make free lemonade are the cheap bastards.

Awesome stuff everybody. I finally got a few pics together. Most of the 20 lbs. of danish dough I made went into variations of these... ...this one is caramel apple. I also did lemon curd and strawberry/pastry cream versions and made a couple pans of cinnamon buns and sticky buns with some of the dough. A recent thread here on firm citrus curds inspired me to play with the idea... ...sliceable grapefruit curd w/ honey gelee and caramelized buttermilk bread pudding. Finally, straight from the brilliant mind of Sam Mason... ...kalamata olive cobbler and almond ice cream. Since it's his recipe exactly, I don't think I'm being immodest by saying it is a thing of beauty. Absolutely delicious.

Nice! I haven't had that book out in years, I may have to flip through it and find some of the things I meant to try and never got around to.

I haven't tried cookies but I did the same for a batch of rose petal ice cream I made. I blitzed rose petals and sugar together, cooked it in the custard, then strained it and I got a nice rose flavor and aroma. I used the ice cream with almond milk anglaise and a raspberry-lychee puree to make Ispahan Sundaes. Not as classy as the P.H. creation but inspired by it. The rose flavor stood out in the mix and, several weeks later when I discovered a small container of leftover ice cream in my freezer, it was still fragrant and flavorful. I don't know if the difference is the fresh petals instead of rosewater or the fact that I was dealing with a frozen product but the flavor definitely didn't suffer much from time.

"Who are you gonna ask? That girl over there. Summer Wheatly? How the heck are you gonna do that? Build her a cake or something." Just kidding, those look great. I wish I had the patience to do things like that.

Food that makes the plate irrelevant. Just kidding, I wish I was that skilled... but I don't use anything specific for decorating plates for any occasion. I just use whatever I think works best with what I'm serving. I don't and, hopefully, won't use writing or scenes/images on plates. I don't think there's anything wrong with it and I've seen it look really nice but I don't like to do it.

Never tried it with vanilla but I do it all the time with chocolate ice cream. I also do it with strawberry ice cream. olive oil and pink peppercorns instead of the salt. I'll have to give the vanilla a shot.

I guess it's all about perspective. I got the opposite feeling. I didn't view it as a lot of things going on, I saw it more as not enough going on. It's like a gathering of tasty garnishes with no focus point to pull them together. That's why I keep going on about ice cream, cake, meringue, etc. I don't see a lot of point to the sauces on the plate (no matter how tasty they are) other than appearance when the fruit is already in it's own sauce in a seperate glass, there's nothing to mop them up with. I just can't picture someone taking a spoon of fruit covered in sauce from the glass and trying to scrape some of the plate sauce into it before taking a bite.

I just saw the perfect thing to add to that glass of fruit. I was on my regular morning visit to Ideas in Food and right there at the top of the page it was staring at me like they planned it. Their latest creation, complete with recipe. Ritz Cracker Ice Cream!

Yeah, I'd reduce it or tighten it up a bit with some pectin or xanthan. I don't think it looks bad partly under the glass though, since it's clear glass the color shows through and is kinda a nice effect. Of course the judges may not agree.

Not entirely true. Working at fast food and chain restaurants may not teach a lot about good cooking but they're often busy places so, if you're actually there to do the job and not just skate along with the minimum required to get a paycheck, those places will teach you to move your ass even when you're tired and don't want to.

Great stuff everybody. David, that tart looks/sounds awesome. I don't have the pics to prove it right now but I've been working on a few things. Last night I made 20 lbs. of laminated danish dough. After closing at work I felt like playing so I locked myself in and started making dough. There are ten 2 lb. pieces that got 4 turns each so it would have been more fun if I had a sheeter but it was still fun. I love doing that sort of thing. Chase everybody out of the building, lock myself in, crank the music and see what I end up with. I think maybe I need to get a life. Tonight after closing I baked chocolate cake layers, made chocolate buttercream and caramel buttercream and made a batch of caramel which will all be assembled into a cake a coworker asked me to make for his mom's birthday. I also made a sliceable grapefruit curd topped with honey gelee which I'm going to plate with buttermilk bread pudding. I'll try to get some pics together in the next day or two.

Looks good to me. I don't know what's "too symetrical" about it. There are plates that look good with that super casual "I just sorta tossed everything towards the plate" paint spatter thing going on... but not often. Usually they either look like a train wreck or they look like they were very carefully arranged to not look like they were very carefully arranged. I still think some ice cream in that glass under the fruit and a piece of some sort of meringue/cake/biscuit or something taking the mango's place would be nice but that's just my opinion, not criticizing.

Tell the other member of the team to wipe that d@#n plate! Seriously though, grilled fruit in ginger glaze sounds tasty to me. I think I'd rather have it with ice cream than angel food cake personally but it still sounds good.

I don't get why there's so much hate for Cat Cora. Mario whips out the Italian, Flay does the Southwestern, Morimoto doesn't battle often but, obviously, leans in the Oriental direction. They all have their "thing" they do. I finally got to see the Cora/Stupak chocolate battle. Granted, Stupak is primarily a pastry chef but he's a damn good one and Cora held her own and came very close to beating him.

I worked on a hog farm. I worked in a poultry processing plant. I built houses for a couple years and then did 12 years with the power company putting in new power lines. Oh... that's not what you meant. You meant food-related. Ok. I did a year in a mom and pop pizza place. I did 2 years in a hospital kitchen. I've spent the past 5 years in a "family restaurant" type place. We do pizzas there as well. I make the sauce and dough from scratch, cut the fresh veggies daily and grate more cheese than I want to talk about in addition to the prep work/cooking for the rest of the menu. Most shifts are me and a server (we bring in an extra person on friday nights). It's a small place (22 seats) sitting right on the beach of a really nice lake so the view is good... in the summer anyway. We also do catering which allows me to get out my "fancier" side now and then. That breaks up the monotony of doing the same stuff over and over. I have no professional training whatsoever, I jumped in with both feet and managed to keep them under me long enough to learn the ropes. I'd like to expand my cooking horizons beyond what I'm doing now so I plan to talk to the people at one of the "fancy" local places and see if I can weasel a shift or three a week this summer (they're seasonal, they just open during tourist/fishing season) even if I have to do it sans pay.