curls

A teaser photo, the finished showpiece! Happy St. Patrick's Day.

Couture Chocolate: A Masterclass in Chocolate by William Curley

Prabha, not sure what time we will be at Albert Uster tomorrow morning. Why don't you PM me with your phone number and I can let you know when we are leaving the hotel. That should give you a better guesstimate of our arrival time. FYI we are just picking up some orders at Albert Uster, no demos scheduled for us tomorrow. Looking forward to meeting you tomorrow, another Northern Virginia eGulleter!

Sorry you won't be able to join us but thank you for reminding me about the cherry blossoms. Hopefully we will be able to swing by the tidal basin or Haines Point.

Do to a series of interesting events, the Friday pre-dinner event is a bit different from other years. Since it looked like we had a small group and one large SUV to travel around with, we put our heads together and came up with a tour of interesting sites to visit in Maryland, DC and Virginia. There are two more seats available in the SUV and others can follow along if they can provide their own transportation. Based on the interests of the group and the driving route that may be the most logical, we concocted the following plan: meet and pickup at the Woodbridge hotel (around 9:30 / 10am, start time based on traffic I encounter along the way) Albert Uster Imports Cowgirl Creamery Cheese Shop (it is next to Co Co Sala and has great cheese & other items) Co Co. Sala lunch somewhere in DC probably in the Penn Quarter area (near Co Co Sala & Cowgirl Creamery) Ace Beverage Artisan Confections around 4 pm begin return trip to hotel in Woodbridge So, who would like to join us? Either reply here or locate Kerry, Ruth, or Mette Friday morning to claim the last two SUV seats or to follow along. I can bring extra copies of the locations and their addresses if anyone will be joining us in a separate vehicle.

What is the address for the East Moon Asian Bistro?

Beautiful chocolates Chris and Robert! Looking forward to tasting them too.

Or they can get it while they are in Virginia for the conference. Wegmans has several locations in Virginia and Maryland! The closest one to our conference location is Wegmans Potomac in Woodbridge.

How does this book compare to his 2007 Fine Chocolates: Great Experience book?

Yes, that is a cake layer cutter resting over the tempered chocolate. Idea first seen here in a Chris Hennes eGullet blog.

Zeemanb, does povitica taste anything like strudel? The doughs look similar and the process for stretching them is similar. Wish I could have a taste.

Thanks for the tip Tikidoc. Alas, not every Michael's is running an airbrush clearance sale. I just checked the Reston Virginia store and they are still selling at full price. Can buy with the 40% off coupon but will wait and see if I can get a better deal.

Sounds good to me too.

Naaah... A little clever marketing ('hand-crafted!' 'exclusive, very limited edition!' 'heirloom style'), and jacking up the price to about 250% of the cost of the ones that came out right, would have these bad boys flying out the door. There's one born every minute... OK, OK, so you could sell them. That doesn't assuage the misery when, after spending hours making the damned things and thinking they were perfect, you go to pop them out of the mold and they leave behind the top layer of cocoa butter: believe me, I've done it, several times. It sucks. It's not over-perfectionism, it's failure. I throw them away. Wybauw would recycle them into caramels - Black Devil's I believe they are called. You could sell them at a reduced price as irregulars/seconds. I know at least one chocolate shop that does this and they seem to sell really well.

DianaM, so sorry you won't be able to join us this time.

Bob, have you had a chance to figure out the cost for Saturday dinner for guests of the conference attendees?

Once you get to the conference hotel there are probably enough eGulleters with cars that you will be able to get back and forth to the conference events but it would be quite complicated to get from BWI to Woodbridge via public transportation. I would recommend renting a car; I am guessing that the cab fare from BWI to Woodbridge (one way) would be over $100.

The brunch sounds wonderful as is but if you would like to add something I would suggest chopped liver or a noodle kugel. And definitely get the belly lox for Sig Eater. (The belly lox from Russ & Daughters is a favorite of my spouse too.)

I'm around Friday. Depending on the activity, I'll be there.

Kerry, please add the Geerts and Morato books to your piles.

Congratulations on getting the Selmi up and running! Rather sure that you now have a lock on the eGulleter with the most toys.

For a commercial seedless raspberry jam, I recommend Dickinson's seedless black raspberry preserves.

I can bring some molds too. I can also bring my mold scrapper (if we need some of those, the school may have plenty).

I thought Mycryo was cocoa butter just in powdered form. Checked the Callebaut website and it says Mycryo is 100% cocoa butter. So why are people differentiating between cocoa butter and Mycryo?

Playing around with various decorating techniques. Some far more successful than others. The chocolates are a yuzu ganache and a mango rum ganache.