Mary Elizabeth

I just want to thank raagamuffin for posting this pic, and the incredible e.gullet brain trust for their their ideas which are such a pleasure to read.

Glorified Rice with Pichet Ong's carmelized pineapple.

Tri2cook--I usually use half and half, at 11% butterfat, which books say is similar to Italian whole milk. But for the ice cream below, I used a mix of whole milk (3%) and cream (33%) that totaled 13% butterfat, and the ice cream had a definate fresh cream flavor that the half and half didn't have, and that I don't think can be attributed to a difference of 2% butterfat. Just to throw that into the mix. I'm not a food scientist. paulraphael--I use Rosle stainless steel containers, 2.5 liter, cynlindrical. trekflyer--Rose Levy-Barenbaum recommends Cobasan. I used it for years, then stopped, and I noticed the ice cream was grainier, so started again. Contents are glucose, emulgator(?!), water. Sold by Albert Uster Imports. For this ice cream I use a Musso 3 liter.

Kim Shook and Vanilla Guerrilla--Thanks!

Turnovers with Pichet Ong's carmelized pineapple: Apricot tart:

MelissaH--Great idea about the individual freezing! Thanks! Prasantrin--I agree about pitting before you freeze, although I've never done it after.

Regarding cherry pitters, www.sausagemaker.com makes a great cherry pitter. Well worth the money if you are doing lots of cherries. And it doesn't splatter cherry juice all over. Also, they make a great stainless steel (better than tin-plated iron) hand grinder for grinding sprouted grains. They are a very nice company to deal with.

I slightly cook the cherries, then freeze them in 400 g bags, just enough for tarts like this:

My ideal chocolate cake is the "Just Desserts" devils food cake that is/was? sold in San Francisco. My favorite devil's food cake recipe is from the CIA Baking and Pastry book. It is the closest I have come to the "Just Desserts" devils food cake. It is very black, with a shiny crumb. The Just Desserts devil's food cake had a more open crumb. I wish I could get a little more open crumb in the CIA recipe.

Suzysushi--Wow. That coffee mousse pie sounds good. Could you share the recipe?

Thanks for responding gap! Very well put. I guess I was hoping for a presentation more like that in Duncan Markham's blog syrupandtang.

Pastry chef central used to carry two mesh sizes of a drum or tami type of sifter. I think their fine size would be great to use.

With sponge cakes made with separate yolk and white foams, that use melted butter, recipes always say fold melted butter in last. But to me, that deflates the foam. So I whisk the melted butter in at the end of beating yolks and sugar, because yolks contain fat. Then fold stiff whites, then dry last. Does anyone else do this?

The blog "Cookie Madness" has a Scotish vanilla fudge recipe I have made and liked.

Has anyone seen or bought Stephane Glacier's new book on macaroons? The ingredients page says: "Powdered sugar, also called granulated sugar", otherwise it looks OK. Way too big, though. It has 3 or 4 non-Parisian macaroon recipes. I was hoping for more. Anyone bake from it?

I think Cooks Illustrated has the best oat/date bar. I've been looking for the cake-type date bar. Here's the epicurious recipe from Gourmet, Dec 2003:

I finally found a mold for my black bean moon cakes:

Here are the peanut butter chocolate chunk cookies, recipe 48532 at Recipezaar, mentioned upthread:

When I make whole wheat yeasted bread in a pan, I use it. After the final shaping, I roll the loaf in a jelly roll pan covered with wheat germ. Then put the loaf in the oiled pan. When it is finished baking, it has a crust with texture and taste. I have also used it to the same purpose with quick breads that have nuts and fruit in them. I butter the mold, then use wheat germ to coat the mold, as you would use crumbs or flour.

I looked at 6 classic peanut butter cookie recipes: Betty Crocker Cooky Book, San Francisco Baking Institute, Village Baker's Wife, Joy of Cooking, and 2 from the internet that were mentioned up thread. These 6 recipes broke down into 2 ur-recipes, which I express in baker's percentages: #1, #2 flour: 100, 100 sugar: 110, 150 butter: 60, 80 peanut butter: 70/80, 100/150/200 egg: 28, 35 Group 2 is higher sugar, higher fat, with more egg for body, and should be chewier. I baked the Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookie, which is in group 2, and have pictures, but I can't figure out how to get pictures here. I can't figure out how to get the numbers to stay in columes, so I hope can see the 2 groups.

Lisa2k, I made the Boucheron nutter butter cookies, with their cream filling. The cookies spread and flatten to about 3-4 inches wide, 1/4 inch thick. When cool they are very rubbery, and stay that way for 3-4 days. They fall apart when you bite into them, so they don't squish the cream, which is very soft, out the sides. They would make good ice cream sandwich cookies.