Jump to content

curls

society donor
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    1,882

  • Joined

  • Last visited

 Content Type 

Posts posted by curls

    Chocdoc - Checking out Chocolate in Belgium

    in Food Traditions & Culture

    Posted

    Thank you for all the pictures!

     

    Glad you found that electronics shop. Everywhere you go, you provide exceptional customer support for the EZtemper.

     

    Very nice to see the menu -- now I know that at least one place in Belgium has ice cream desserts like they have in the Netherlands! I'm surprised to see them selling bloomed chocolates. So many beautiful and yummy looking things! Did you pick up anything at the cheese shop?

     

    Hope you are enjoying yourself on this trip. I'm sure Anna would like you to enjoy a few more plates of mussels.  ;-)

     

    • Like 2
    • Haha 1

    Confections! What did we make? (2017 – )

    in Pastry & Baking

    Posted

    1 hour ago, minas6907 said:

    Just wanted to say hello. Its been a few years since I"ve been able to get the time to come on the forums, this was always my favorite thread. When I get a pocket of free time, I'll sort through my photos and post what I've done. It's nice to see this topic lives!

    Would be great to have you back on eGullet and to see what you have been doing.

    Dinner 2017 (Part 6)

    in Cooking

    Posted

    Recently purchased a small raclette grill -- gave it trial run for dinner tonight. Served raclette cheese, grilled onions, tiny potatoes, and cornichons. Enjoyed with a nice glass of Sauvignon Blanc. For dessert Instant Pot cheesecake and homemade raspberry sauce. I think I am good on a calcium for a few days!  :laugh:

    • Like 5

    'Ruby' the Fourth Chocolate frontier?

    in Pastry & Baking

    Posted

    Interesting! I did not know about Valrhona's passion fruit and strawberry varieties -- will have to check them out.

     

    I do like their hazelnut chocolate, Azelia, but haven't found it to add much more havelnut flavor to my gianduja & feuilltine bon bon -- maybe because I am already adding additional hazelnut paste. The  Azelia is wonderful for munching & would be very nice as a bar with hazelnut inclusions.

    Gardening: (2016– )

    in Food Traditions & Culture

    Posted

    Not a great tomato harvest but far better than last year's. Last year I had a visiting squirrel that was in love with tomatoes and ate most of my crop.  :-(

    59ae06d86c22f_IMG_5026-lowres.jpg.7b6fe9ef8be036de01eb320eb2194322.jpg

     

    So, I augmented my harvest by visiting a local pick-your-own farm. They had tons of tomatoes to pick at $1 per pound, delicious raspberries, and some sweet white corn.

    59ae06d7858b2_IMG_5024-lowres.jpg.f117bb516b14ea567f2974b9ff75aa65.jpg

    • Like 7

    Videos about Italian baking traditions

    in Food Traditions & Culture

    Posted

    @Franci I like the way things are set up on your website and am enjoying your videos. Best video watching experience is from your website (as it should be). If you watch the videos from your website you can see the ingredient list while your are watching.

     

    The only things that I would add to your website are a link to all your videos (keep the recipe link with the embedded videos) and a printer-friendly version of your recipes.

    • Like 1

    Has L'Epicérie Closed?

    in Kitchen Consumer

    Posted · Edited by curls (log)

    Does Chef's Warehouse or Albert Uster carry the supplies you need? Perhaps you can find out who is supplying your local bakeries and see if they will setup an account with you?

     

    Have your tried freezing your hazelnut pastes and pistachio paste? I freeze all my nuts and nut pastes and have not had any problems with them going stale or rancid.

     

    If you are willing to come into the DC area upon occasion... I could possibly split some of my stock with you. PM me if you want to figure something out. @lebowits may also be able to help.

    Kicking back in Manitoulin

    in Food Traditions & Culture

    Posted

    Butter & sugaring the molds and using technique 2 might get you a good crust & custardy insides. I think the idea is worth a trial. 

     

    They are fabulous when you get all the textures right. I have never made one but did buy a perfect one once and it was amazing -- that is when I finally understood what all the fuss is about.

    :-)

    • Like 2

    Troubleshooting Tempering

    in Pastry & Baking

    Posted

    1 hour ago, Jim D. said:

    During the summer I have the AC on most of the time but turn the temp down when I am preparing to make chocolates. As I said previously, I have the temp no higher than 70F and the relative humidity around 45%. I use the airbrush in the basement and have a window AC that I turn on when I'm doing this work, so the environment is about the same. Yes, I do decorate most of my molds. There is no question that adding colored cocoa butter adds a level of possible difficulty, but I do actually make sure the c.b. is in temper (if I heat it too much, I get the temp down, then add some EZtemper silk, and I test it every time, though I know most people don't).

     

    So you try to get all the shells to release from the molds before filling them? I am impressed. I have tried that, but sometimes a shell will break, so I mostly gave up on that. Sometimes it is easy to tell that they are not stuck to the cavity wall. In general, I find that if one piece comes out of a mold satisfactorily, eventually they all will--though it may not be a pretty process.

     

    All in all, we seem to follow mostly the same procedure, except that, like Kerry, I resort to the freezer for a few minutes if necessary.  As I always say, chocolate is a mystery. For example, why will one chocolate release perfectly from the mold and the one next to it will be stuck?

     

    I am concluding that the issue that prompted my original post arose from some shells that would not release from the mold, and when I put them back in the fridge repeatedly, they picked up humidity, thus no shine. Here is where one of those cooling cabinets made for chocolate, which supposedly recover quickly from humidity, might have come in handy.

     

    Thanks for your response and your ideas.

     

    To clarify one point -- I am not removing the shells from the mold to test that they will release. I use clear polycarbonate molds & look at the bottom of the molds for indicators that the chocolates have contracted from the molds.  

    Troubleshooting Tempering

    in Pastry & Baking

    Posted

    @Jim D. I am puzzled by your summer chocolate making issues. I too am making chocolates in Virginia in a home kitchen with a home fridge (with glass shelves) and have thankfully not experienced the issues you are having with unmolding. I shall share my process in the hopes that it may help you with your troubleshooting.

     

    It is not clear to me if you run your AC all summer or just while chocolate making -- I run the AC all summer at 73 F. If it looks like the chocolate is not setting up quickly enough, I lower the AC anywhere from 68 to 70 F. I put the molded chocolate shells in the fridge for ~10 minutes after they have started to crystallize. I check to see if the shells have released from the mold & only remove them from the fridge if 95%, or more, of the shells have released. I do not put filled & uncapped molds in the fridge -- I let them set up (usually overnight). They set up in the kitchen or my chocolate room in the basement. After I cap / close the molds, they spend ~10 minutes in the fridge and are unmolded. The difficult to unmold chocolates go back into the fridge for another 10 minutes (repeat fridge cycle as necessary).

     

    I don't think that this is the cause of your problems but I should mention that I do not airbrush my molds with colored cocoa butter -- I think this is your preferred decoration method. Most of my chocolates are unadorned. The few that I decorate are either a swipe of colored cocoa butter, colored cocoa butter splatters, or transfer sheets.

     

    Wishing you the best of luck in solving your summer chocolate issues. Hopefully you don't need to purchase a commercial cooling / refrigeration system.

×
×
  • Create New...