Darienne

Is there a reason why I could not throw a couple of handfuls of pecans into the mix at the last minute? Thanks.

Thanks for that information. Sorry about the credit cards woe. Alas, it is something that Canadians traveling (or in Canadian = travelling) to the USA have had to live with for years.

Thank you for all the useful replies.

On google, I found a couple of caselaw definitions of UHT cream. Could you please provide me with a simpler one? Thanks.

Quick question: where would would be the best place to buy a couple of grates like the one in Andie's photo? Nothing like this is available where I am. Thanks.

Thanks to both Kerry Beal and Prasantrin for suggestions. I went to the Cocao Nibs thread and there was Kerry Beal's caramelizing recipe. And lots of other suggestions. (I had tried to access the usual eGullet search engine, thinking I would get a couple of pages and then find any nib thread, but I kept getting a Google page. I see that the regular search format is back.) Thanks.

For tomorrow's lunch out, I am bringing an old stand-by: lemon cheese pie topped with chocolate ganache. Yesterday I bought my first ever package of raw cacao nibs. Taste good to me right out of the bag. Very bitter chocolate, but then I am a Canadian. What about putting some nibs right into the warm ganache? Or would that work? I am here with only Shotts and Greweling and can't find any nibs used as inclusions in the index. Any other nib uses would be nice to know. I know of topping ice cream, rolling truffles, etc. Desserty uses. Thanks.

Thank ye kindly, faire ladye, for the gode receipt.

Thanks everybody for all the ideas. And thanks for that fascinating website: Historic Food, although I don't think I'll be making a Palpatroon of Lobsters soon. Thanks again.

Dear Kim, Please post the link to your recipes. It took me forever to find it, but I perservered and in the end I did. I am not a computer whiz and that might explain it, but I think that you should post a link. So there. Thanks!!!

I have never made a granitas. Could be a start. Or marshmallows. I like making marshmallows and ginger marshmallows, dipped in dark chocolate sounds good. I had not thought that the syrup would make marshmallows, but after looking at a recipe, I can see that it would. Thanks.

With the help of the 'Ginger Lady', Andiesenji , I have now made my second wonderful batch of candied ginger. The first batch, coated in chocolate, is all gone and we are moving on. I planted the leftover knobby bits and am hoping to harvest a crop of ginger in about nine months. The first leftover syrup was cooked into little hard ginger candies. They taste gingery, but not overwhelmingly so. And Andie generously gave me other uses for the ginger syrup: candying other fruit or citrus peels or even chestnuts, topping gingerbread or cookies, glazing chicken or other meats, sauces for rice, etc. My question is can this syrup, a boiled down simple syrup; 1 cup water to 1 ½ cups sugar, be used as the base for any other confection? A brittle with nuts? Candy-coated nuts? Crystalline or non-crystalline confections? Add more sugar? Or corn syrup and then? All ideas are invited. Thanks.

I went to Kim's website noted on her post and ended up in a place I couldn't use. Can you help me find this recipe? Thanks. I hope.

I can't speak for the confectionary trade at all as my partner and I are not professionals...heck, we aren't even competent...and we give all our stuff away. However, my husband and I are professional artisans and our experience has always been that the larger cities will strike a much harder bargain with the supplier than the smaller or more remote ones. We have never had a 'fight' with the smaller galleries, but, oh, the larger and more important galleries can be unpleasant sometimes to deal with in their drive to wring every cent out of their business. Should add, that the largest gallery we deal with is also one of the nicest, so it is not across the board. Just expect a possible harder bargain to be made by a larger retailer.

Loved all the recent (and earlier) makings! But I would LOVE the recipe for those almonds.

I suppose it could work, but it seems like an unnecessary step, don't you think? ← I was of course thinking if you could not get unsalted pistachios. Once we needed unsalted peanuts and couldn't get any where we were, and so bought the salted ones and rinsed them thoroughly and dried them. It was not for anything like confections, but it worked nonetheless.

Is it out of the question to rinse the salt off and redry the nuts?

Please, someone come quickly to the house and take away these coated almonds before I eat them ALL!!! A-1 recipe, Highchef

Thanks for the additional information, Chris. I'll get it right sooner or later.

I put the foot on with a silicone brush and very gently, so perhaps that's why it set so firmly. Of course, I had no idea of when you were supposed to cut it. Learn, learn, learn... Thanks, Kerry.

I don't have enough experience or knowledge to be sure that I understand what you mean. Is it the working of the chocolate which makes it become overcrystallized? I will look in the Wybauw which I have on ILL right now and see if I can find out there. ...... Just read through his section of over-crystallization and must admit frankly that I don't understand it. ........I'll simply try your method and go from there. Thanks for trying.

In one recipe, you have managed to include just about all my favorites. Pecans are the best. And oranges. And ginger and cinnamon. And sugar. Perhaps they should then be dipped in 70% dark and you would have them all!!! Today for sure. Thanks.

Thank you both for the information. Would that you two were writing the instructions!

Today I precoated some Divinity and some ganache before dipping them. My first time ever. However, I guess I let the chocolate get too set because when I cut the precoated slab with the chocolate bottoming on the top, the chocolate shattered at the cuts. I turned it upside down and the same thing happened. I looked bottoming/precoating up in Greweling and the other books I have with me. Tried various eGullet threads...found a wonderful one by Trishiad, a demo on basic molded chocolates. No one talks about cutting the precoated ganache. Please some information.

Michael Recchuiti has a recipe for sugared hazelnuts which are then dipped in chocolate in his book, Chocolate Obsession. I don't have the book but have used it.