Tri2Cook

I'm drooling over all of these fruitcakes. I'd gotten so used to getting at least one from somebody every year that I guess I made the mistake of taking it for granted... I didn't get one this year. A perfect opportunity to finally get around to making one for myself you might think. Ummmm... well... I bought one.

I use a 5 qt. bowl lift (350w or 375w I think, I'd have to check, it's at least 10 years old) and it does fine. I did 6 batches right in a row yesterday with no trouble or overheating. To be fair, they were actually half batches. I'm using Nightscotsman's recipe halved for each flavor (I have about 18 flavors in total I'm doing and plan to get them all done in the next day or two so it should be a good test for the mixer).

Hey! That's a good idea! And good information as well, I didn't have to find out the hard way. Thanks!

I went on a marshmallow kick today. So far I've done a pan each of passion fruit, raspberry, strawberry, morello cherry, chocolate and vanilla. I plan to do a few more tomorrow. I'll snap a picture when they're all done but they're just your standard marshmallow, square and fluffy. Nightscotsman's basic recipe/formula rocks. It lends itself well to a lot of different flavors without adjustments being required so you can whip out batch after batch without too much mucking around. I had people whining about my lack of holiday baking this year so I decided I'd do something but wanted to keep it easy and fun. This was the perfect answer. And no, I'm NOT tempering chocolate and dipping any of them. That was a thought initially but I quickly stomped on that idea. 'Tis the season to be lazy...

She can cook and she's a heck of a lot nicer to look at than any of the other iron chefs... as tv personalities go (since I don't actually know her), she's more of a sweetheart than the intentional "sweethearts" the food network tries to force on us. I don't care about the average scores, it's just a tv show. By the way, does anybody else remember the from last year? I still laugh every time I think of it.

There is a restaurant a few hours southeast of where I live (in the closest fairly big city to here) that serves pancakes that I really like. It's a Finnish restaurant and the pancakes look like thin (but not as thin as crepes) standard pancakes but the texture is entirely different than a standard pancake and different than a crepe as well. They're not the least bit cakey or fluffy but they're still tender and not rubbery or eggy. The folks at the restaurant won't budge at all on the recipe, not even hints or general ideas. I've searched Finnish Pancakes and found quite a few recipes but they don't seem to measure up to what the restaurant makes. Anybody know anything about these pancakes they'd be willing to share? Edit: Forgot to mention that I've done quite a bit of experimenting on these on my own and haven't had much luck with that either. I'm beginning to wonder if the big secret is that they use some kind of commercial mix (although I really don't want to think that).

I pretty much stuck to my guns on this one. I made two 500g aerated milk chocolate bars that I sprayed nice and velvety with 64% and decorated with white chocolate ribbons and bows for a couple of friends that really like the aerated chocolates I make (I'm a grinch but I'm not good at saying no to the ladies as a general rule... grumble, grumble, grumble). Anyway, that's all I did and I've already been hearing about all the things I didn't do. Merry Fishmas!

I did classic steakhouse tonight and it seemed to make everybody that was here happy so I'm happy. Caesar Salad Steak (tenderloin) Baked Potato Mushrooms Caramelized Onions Potato Bread the 250+ year old mushroom ketchup recipe Heston Blumenthal riffed on in his book... they knew what they were doing and he was smart to pick up on it, that stuff rocks with beef my mom's chocolate pie (I'm sure it wasn't her recipe but she made it frequently when I was young and I got the recipe from her)

Sorry to hear about the crash Rob. Glad to hear the buyer was cool about it, especially since it was for a good cause. You guys did an awesome job.

I stumbled across a recipe (paraphrased below) for a passion fruit liqueur while looking for another recipe and I'm wondering if it sounds like it would actually be good to those who know more about making liqueurs than I do (which is pretty much anybody). I like passion fruit but I know nothing at all about making my own liqueurs (although I have a bottle of vodka and cocoa nibs going that I threw together just as an experiment, it was an idea that came up in the "make your own vanilla extract" thread and I just happened to have a lot of nibs on hand so I decided to see what happens). Anyway, the recipe is... 500g passion fruit puree 400g sugar 750ml vodka Mix all. Seal in jar or bottle. Turn weekly for a year. Also, what happens to it during that year that makes it better than waiting a week or two? As I mentioned, I'm a newbie to this stuff.

I wish I could help but I have to confess that one of my culinary guilts is not doing the bechamel mac 'n' cheese. It's the one and only place where I use one of those loafs of not-cheese (velveeta) combined with cheddar, a little cream, a spec of nutmeg and plenty o' black pepper. I know I should be ashamed... but it be tasty.

I don't doubt that I'm missing out on some good eating but, for me personally, the only edible part of the head is everything behind it except the innards, fins and bones. I use that stuff (minus the innards which go straight to the bin) for stock.

I have a question about the pate de fruit recipes in Andrew's book. I noticed that every recipe is exactly the same except for the type of puree used. Same amounts of puree, sugar and G-pectin for every fruit. Does that mean I can use those ratios with any fruit puree subbed in for the ones in the book? Are there some fruits that don't work well for pate de fruit? Right now I have strawberry, raspberry, morello cherry, passion fruit and a couple types of apple purees on hand.

I thought that was the core curriculum of Management 101.

It's coconut milk that they dry by some spraying method with a bit of maltodextrin to keep the oil stabilized. It has a very intense and completely natural coconut flavor. It's available to anyone. I get it HERE but willpowder has it as well and there are probably plenty of other sources. I use it anywhere I want a hit of coconut (it has much more coconut punch than even fresh coconut) without adding liquid. I also use it to boost coconut milk to another level of flavor and I've rolled truffles in it before. I've also made a dry thai curry by adding all of the usual suspects in dry forms to the coconut powder and used that to dust things. It's a pretty versatile product that I'm always finding new uses for.

I've done two apps recently that went over very well. Both were out of my head and I don't have any precise measurements to give. I'm not claiming nothing similar to them existed, they're nothing particularly unusual and I know I've seen things similar to the first one, just didn't use a recipe or anything. 1. pork cubes coated in a mix of callebaut cocoa powder, cinnamon, black pepper, ancho powder, clove, nutmeg and salt, fridged them for a couple hours, cooked them and plated them with ancho chile oil and passionfruit reduction. 2. shrimp poached in butter and served on a slice of ripe plantain that was fried in butter, seasoned with a mix of sugar, salt, chipotle powder and smoked paprika and topped with a generous pinch of spray dried coconut milk powder. Both are better warm so that may not be what you have in mind.

So I'm still curious what people think about the original question. What if you really could not get reblochon and were determined to make something tartiflette-ish? What would you use? I've done it with stilton but I wan't trying to sub for reblochon, I was going for a whole different thing. What if that wasn't the goal, you were actually trying to get as close as possible without reblochon?

Planning and prep go hand-in-hand. You have to plan what you're going to do to prep for it and you have to prep to pull off the plan. A multi-course meal for a large crowd can't be done, regardless of quality, in a reasonable timeframe without planning and prep. I don't think any cook of any caliber would claim otherwise and I'm far from the upper level so good planning and prep keep my head above water if the ship starts sinking for any reason. I don't keep recipes/portioning/plating plans in front of me, I've tested everything and I'm comfy with all that in my head, but I do usually keep an outline of the overall menu handy for bigger jobs. I rarely look at them but it's comforting knowing they're there and my servers seem to like having them available. I have equipment for temperature control/holding so that's not a major problem at this point but earlier on there was definitely a lot of planning and engineering (and a bit of finger-crossing) going on for that task. On site stuff wasn't too difficult with a little planning, it was the deliver and leave it stuff that required the most creativity for temp control.

That's it! I knew I recognized those.

I have the book, I'll PM you the specifics but it's basically just sear, low and slow (very low and very slow), trim, cut and sear. Give me a few minutes and I'll send you the numbers.

I don't know if there are variations but the stuff I have can be seen HERE. SundaySous: Thanks for the link, cool stuff!

Gingerbread tiramisu sounds pretty cool. I don't know what you did for your's (which look awesome) but I'm picturing thick eggnog and mascarpone for the cream and a Maker's Mark flavored syrup for the soak.

I don't have any ideas for diabetic confections but it takes a pretty dedicated chocophile to munch on chunks of pure cocoa mass for a chocolate fix. I'm not one of those people, 85% is pushing it for me for just eating as is. I've never tried pure cocoa mass enrobed in something sweeter so maybe that would be the difference that made it work.

The opposite is very tasty as well. Low and slow, rest, slice in thick slabs, char quickly on very hot grill.

Well I decided not to do it this time since the dinner I was going to use it at turned out to be a christmas party and they don't really look christmas-y (although I thought up a solution for that, but not in time to try it). I still want to do this one, especially now that I have an official "go for it" from Kurt himself, but I'll save it for another occasion. I think the reason I had the question (and where the line was drawn for me) was not related to the dessert itself but due to the fact that I'd be using someone else's presentation. There is a difference between painting a picture of a clock to sell and painting a copy of Dali's Melting Clocks to sell. I wouldn't feel the need to track down the person who painted the first picture of some random clock but I would (if he was still living) feel the need to at least attempt to ask Salvador if it was ok to use a copy of his work for commercial purposes.