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No prob emmalish...yeah you should deffinately try them! Kerry, Under the cinnamon stacks is a very thin layer or marzipan that is backed with chocolate.

Today was butter ganache day in class. I made Raniers. I really liked the texture of the butter ganaches better than cream ganaches, never really had them before. The strawberry balsamic was my favorite. I posted more pics here on my facebook album at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2090...295&id=50313279

Rhubarb is my favorite dessert right now, the sumac sable, rhubarb ricotta, pickled rhubarb and cherry leather are an AMAZING combo. I also love the Rhubarb noodles with the hibiscus rose soup, greek yogurt and palm nuts....the texture of the noodles and palm nuts were similar, yet different and complementary and the soup was cut well with the rhubarb and greek yogurt ....

Its hard for me to comment on your recipe itself as I am not used to using volumetric measurments. Also I haven't been heavily into bread making in a little while. What I do notice is that your method is somewhat short and incomplete. After you mix the dough, you need to let it bulk ferment or "rise" till it approx. doubles in size then you fold it and scale it into what ever size loaf you require, after scaling and cutting the dough you pre shape it into a ball and let it rest some covered by a damp towel. after bench resting for 20 or 30 minutes, you shape the loaves and put them in their pans the proof them in your proofer. once they are proofed sufficently you score and bake.

Kerry, the anise sticks are made using the piped ganache technique. Bring cream and glucose just to a boil then pour over unmelted, tempered chocolate, let sit for a minute the emulsify. Stream in pernod and mix till combined. Pour the mixture into a hotel pan, wrapped in plastic wrap, and let sit at room temp till it has pre crystalized some and thickened (about an hour or two). Once it is thickened, pour out onto a marble and spread out once very gently and slowly and bring back in, wait 2 minutes, spread out once more and bring back in. Place into a doubled up piping bag since the ganache will be very thick. Using a number 3 tip, pipe lines across the back of a sheet pan on parchment. Allow the ganache time to set (20 minutes, but an hour is better). brush them with a light precoat of tempered milk chocolate, once set, roll over and precoat other side. After precoat has crystalized, cut into 2 inch pieces. Set up dipping station with cut sticks on left bowl of tempered milk chocolate in middle, sheet pan with glazing screen on right and sheet pan with parchment on far right (if you are right handed...lefties just reverse this order). The technique used in the finishing these is called chardon. It is imperrative that the ganache be precoated. First dip the sicks in the chocolate, it doesn't have to be a perfect coat since they will be rolled anyway. Then place them on the glazing screen and allow them to set till the chocolate will hold a peak. Gently roll them across the screen and remove them to the parchment. The amount you roll them is a personal thing, some people like the look ov heavily rolled, some like a lightly rolled, I prefer the lightly rolled as there will be spots inbetween the spikes that are nice shiney smooth tempered chocolate. As far as the whole tabling ganache thing goes, I had never done it till I got to this class. After asking chef about it and listening to a few of his lectures, I am convinced that it is worth the extra effort. First reason is that in pipped ganaches it is important to have a ganche that is firm enough to work with. The anise sticks or cinnamon stacks are example of pieces that would work much less effectively had they not been tabled. 2nd reason it is important is for quality reasons. When you start with a tempered, unmelted chocolate in a ganache, even after emulsifying with boiling cream, you still have some seed crystals remaining if allowed to set as is, unstable forms of cocoa butter crystals will form, the agitation of tabling the ganache promotes the formation of stable form V cocoa butter crystals. If you ganache sets and is untempered, it will leave a grainy texture and be difficult to work with. A tempered ganache sets firmer with a more pleasant, creamy mouth feel (although pipped ganaches will have a shorter texture than slabbed or molded ganaches). 3rd reason to table your ganache is actually an increase in shelf life. If your ganache is made up stable cocoa butter crystals, it will remain at a higher quality than one that is made up of unstable crystals that are constantly in flux. A 3 week old tempered ganache will still taste smooth as a 3 weeks old untempered ganache will have a noticable compromise in flavor and texture. As long as you work on a sanitized marble, shelf life will be increased. These reasons are also the reasons when making slabbed ganache one should start with melted but in temper chocolate at it's maximum working temp and the liquid being added should be at 105 F....that way you end up with a slab of tempered ganache that doesent need agitation. Is all this nessecary for the casual chocolate maker that will eat their pieces in a week or so, maybe not, but if your going through the trouble, why not do it right?

What I know about water ganache: In formulating a dark chocolate ganache recipe for use in bon bon and truffle applications a good rule of thumb is that the chocolate should be 2 parts to 1 part liquifier when using cream, 25 percent (of the liquifier) glucose or invert sugar to help with texture and lower water activity. Liquid flavorings are optional ,but need to be considered part of the liquid total. Alcohol is optional and doesn't count as a liquid and butter is optional and should be added at 40% of any non cream liquifier. Using this formula I would assume that the following recipe would work well as a water ganache and have a decent 3-4 week shelf life, 500g 60% chocolate 150g water 100g butter 75g glucose syrup 20% Alcohol (optional) Liquid flavoring (optional but adjust butter and chocolate accordingly) (may need some tweaking depending on the fat content of your particular chocolate) I would think that if you only used water and chocolate, the shelf life would be very short and the texture would be hard and waxy since cocoa butter as the only fat would be lacking in meltability and mouth feel. Butter fat lowers the combined melting temp and gives that velvety smooth mouth feel....(which is why cream is the liquid of choice in ganache to begin with) This is my understanding so far, I could be way off...

My chocolate's Facebook Album Sorry about the quality of these pictures, I use my camera on my phone while I'm in class...

I ate there friday night and had an AMAZING meal. Bone marrow, Lamb tenderloin, pork belly, coconut dessert, jasmine dessert, white chocolate and beer dessert, cherry covered chocolate dessert. The pork belly was the single best pork belly plate I have ever had, the lamb dish reminded me of "all that is man"...meat potato, pretzel, beer, mustard....Every dessert was spectacular with the coconut being my favorite and I normally hate raw coconut. I have never had Mr Mason's desserts but Mr. Stupak's are borderline flawless....his kung fu is strong. Over all, one of the top 5 meals of my life!

The Chai Tigers are exceptional. I did the truffles over the weekend, and the ganache was so soft it was hard to work with. Probably because I didn't table it sufficiently, but the consistency would be perfect for a molded piece. ← I made the Chai Tigers today in class....the key with working with a milk or white chocolate pipped ganache is that it must be allowed to get out of the intermediate temperature zone before it is tabled or else it will usually seperate. What we did was made the ganache, poured it into a hotel pan and let it sit covered in plastic wrap for about 2 hours till it firmed up. Then we emptied it on the marble and "tabled" it. I use this term loosely because tabling a ganche is nothing like tabling to to temper. Tabling a ganache should be done very gently and slowly. What we do with chocolate and white ganaches in particular is that once they have ben allowed to pre crystalize somewhat in the hotel pan, we lightly spread them on the marble, bring them in, and let them rest for 2 minutes by the clock, then we repeat once more then into the piping bag. Dark ganaches are tabled directly after being emulsified, but again it is very slow, pretty much like if you pushed a slow motion button on normal tabling. Dark is usually ready after 3 rounds of tabling. It is important to not agitate it too much, or else you will get a very short texture.... Lior & Kerry, I will ask chef...

I started Chef Greweling's chocolate and confections class at the CIA today....will post pictures from the class as we finish product.

Is challenging food pleasurable? Yes....yes it is... I had one of the most amazing meals of my life at WD-50 Friday night,very pleasurable experience. I find that people that have issues with "challenging" food are people that have misconceptions about it, have never had any, or have only had poor examples of it.... Then there are people that have had great examples and it's just not their thing. Some people also don't eat pork for the same reason, does that mean that eating pork is not a pleasurable experience? For me, eating pork is one of the MOST pleasurable experiences out there, but to each their own...

Valhrona Ivoire is my fave, callebaut and dgf are okay cheaper brands....Guittard makes a decent white too...

Doing serious royal icing work like string work or extensions is impossible with cakes that need to be kept in the fridge. Classically the heavy royal icing cakes done in england are done on fruit cake so that it can be kept out.

Article in the NYT today about the trouble brewing at the CIA. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/07/dining/0...html?ref=dining I am a current student and the tension on campus right now is palpable

very small amount of xanthan gum will keep cocoa suspended....but too much will make it taste like slime.......0.01% or so by weight should be enough......

What else would you expect for 17.95 prime rib? Your not getting prime at that price, maybe not even choice...

you could make a stack of gluten free buckwheat pancakes and then butter cream them up like a multi-layer cake..... Bob's red mill makes a good gluten free flour blend and buckwheat flour is gluten free...

While Shake Shack is very good, I personally prefer Burger Joint in the Parker Meridian....

I would think that a communal towel for everyone to wipe their hands on after washing would probably be a health code violation. Is there not a paper towel dispenser by your hand sink?

To be clear, I fully believe a CIA degree is worth the money. I did my externship at Jean Georges and I'd estimate that 75% of the cooks working there were CIA grads and yes, the could definately cook their way out of a box. All but maybe 2 or 3 of the other cooks were trained at various other schools. I'm planning on returning there after I graduate in October, not sure if that would be possible without a major cooking school degree...chances are that my application would get a once over at best if I were fresh out of a community college culinary program. Yes it all boils down to motivation and drive and hard work, but if you have that work ethic and a CIA degree, you will start off with the odds stacked in your favor, the rest is up to you.

HOT SUGAR!!.... people practically dive out the way for that one...

the CIA has a great financial aid dept (at least in my experience, some of my classmates do have a less that happy relationship with them though) and there are tons of scholarships available to come here. That being said, you might want to think long and hard about it first. The CIA is going through a transitional phase right now, it seems to me that they are trying to move away from being a cooking school and turn into a corporate restaurant/hotel management school. (which might not be a bad thing if you know that up front) Classes are being rearanged and they are moving to a trimester system that focuses on the bachelors program instead of the associates. I personally think it is not good, but it doesn't affect me since I am already here and the changes will affect the new incoming students starting next year I believe. I think the CIA has the reputation of being one of the premier cooking schools in the country and if they get away from that the value they put on their degree will shrink....but thats my opinion. That all being said, I do love it up here and am glad I made the decision to come here.

never tried the sosa gel, but ascorbic acid works way better than citric acid for preventing oxidation.....we used to make a granny smith apple juice, with citric acid it'd be brown in an hour, ascorbic would keep it bright green till it was used up.

There is a wild strawberry liqueur from Italy called Fragoli.... www.fragoli.com It looks pretty interesting...contains whole wild strawberries

Raw apples, yes......citrus with pith, no...... I think that instead of a fan, I would brunoise the apples though and hide them under other fruit for a nice suprise crunchy apple texture and flavor, but thats just my opinion. The most important part of a fruit tart is the pastry cream and crust, if those are great you can pretty much put any fruit on top.