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I have finished my side trips and made it home safe and sound. Will sort through my photos in the next day or two and see if I can add to the photo documentary. I think can add to the photos of our Saturday night dinner extravaganza. Kerry, thank you for organizing this event! It was great seeing everyone that I met last year and meeting so many wonderful new people too! I learned something everyday and had a great time. I will echo dhardy123's comment that it was amazing that tabling the ganache made such a difference in flavor. I would not have believed it if I had not had the chance to taste the difference.

Another single for Casa Mia. Thanks for arranging the chocolate pick up PlusOne.

Also at the Hilton and checking in Thursday evening. Riding with RobertM Friday but will have a car and can help out with carpooling Saturday and Sunday.

Sounds good to me too.

Erika, I really like the idea of a swap/market. Will bring the moulds that I am not using. Hope that others participate and that I can pick up some transfer sheets!

Selmi enrobing and panning are good. I would also be interested in learning how to paint/decorate and fill large 3 dimensional molds. If Brian can demo confectionery work too, I am interested in learning how to make sponge toffee or those peanut filled candies (where there are layers of peanut butter & candy).

No objections from me, sounds delicious!

Kerry, Thanks for organizing this! Great to see the plans coming together. Any idea yet on pricing for Saturday's dinner and for the conference? Also, do you think we might get a discount on purchases at Tomric?

May I ask who that is and where? Or should I already know? Rather sure Edward J is taking this class with Derrick Tu Tan Pho. The same Derrick who will be presenting at the 2011 Chocolate & Confectionary Conference!

Two suggestions: Replace the canola oil in your recipe with butter. That way you have a fat that is solid at room temperature. Try the recipe without any canola oil at all. Just make 1 1/2 times the recipe so that you have enough glaze to cover your cake.

Happy Birthday Robyn! That cake looks delicious.

The At Home recipes do use ingredients that you are more likely to find at home (marshmallow fluff instead of frappe, corn syrup instead of glucose, etc.). There is some recipe overlap but there are quite a few new recipes and different variations in the At Home book.

AmritaBala, both the chocolate cupcake and the vanilla buttercream recipes can be found on Chockylit's blog (I used the recipes from her February 2008 entry. The vanilla buttercream is of the rather standard butter, powdered sugar and milk variety. I like this one because it is not super sweet.

Cupcakes.

My vote would be for the wonderful sushi place but if the majority would like Italian that is fine by me too.

Thank you for the information Lapin. I figured there must be an "official" way to connect the molds together but could not find those types of clips on the Tomiric or Chocolat Chocolat websites (thought they would have them since they sell Chocolate World molds). When I get a chance to try out the molds, I will try the chopstick solution. If that doesn't work for me, maybe I'll try out the clips you linked to.

Thanks Kerry, I'll look through my chopsticks and see if any of them fit.

Just got a Chocolate World double mold, CW1513. How do I clamp these together? It is not the type of mold that will clamp together with binder clips. I suspect something goes through the holes in the middle of the mold to tie everything together... but what should I use? Thanks for your help! If it will help, I can take a picture of the mold and post it.

The 2009 menu sounds delicious (I remember those fabulous dinner photos that were posted) but I'll bet that anything the chef makes will be wonderful. Does the chef want to experiment with something new this year? I'm up for just about anything for the Saturday dinner.

Hilton Garden Inn sounds good to me too.

Thanks for the information Kerry. If we don't have an equipment demo with Tomric, I will definitely phone an order in to them for pickup. Looking forward to the conference!

Does Tomric have a retail store or is it all catalog sales? I would like to get some more molds and thought I could stop in at Tomric to get them (and avoid shipping fees).

Meant to post this sooner but better late than never. Baked Dorie Greenspan's World Peace cookies and Rose Levy Beranbaum's Spritz Butter Cookies (from Rose's Christmas Cookies cookbook).

Finally baked the World Peace Cookies this past December, they are wonderful! Baked them again for a New Year's Party. This weekend I made the butterscotch pudding (with Oban single malt), quite delicious. I sampled the pudding before adding the scotch, also quite good. The audience will determine which version I make in the future.

dystopiandreamgirl it is all lovely. I especially like the vanilla orchid. Happy New Year to you too!