teonzo

I'm curious about the maturation point of jujubes. Jujube trees were imported here in Veneto about 1 century ago. They became pretty popular, almost every home had a jujube tree. This only in a part of Veneto (Venice, Padua and Treviso), they are almost unknown in the rest of Italy. Then in the last few decades they went out of fashion, now they are considered a "forgotten fruit". I have a tree at home, I've been taught to eat them when they just turn fully brown and are still plump, when they taste more like apples than dates, because "when they wilt they are bad". But from what I see people in China eat them when they are wilted and taste more like dates and medlars. So my question is if Chinese people eat them only after they turn wilted, or if they do just like here and eat them when they are still plump. Next year I need to remember to let some of them wilt on the tree and make some experiments. Teo

Thanks! I have some questions. Can you give the price range for some other teas like tie guan yin please? There are a handful of importers here, the cheapest pu-er I can find is sold for 50 euro/kg and it's loose leaf, so I think it's safe to say it's lower quality than the pressed one in your picture, which is sold at the equivalent of 2.70 euro/kg. This price difference seems astronomical, even considering shipping costs and import duties. How is tea viewed by the millennials? Are they interested in the traditional ceremony, or do they only care about modern fads? Is rose + lychee a common pairing in China, or is it just a recent flavor? I'm curious about this because Pierre Hermé (now considered the best pastry chef in the world) made his big breakthrough with his Ispahan cake, which flavors are rose + lychee + raspberry. It seemed like an alien combo here, so it would be fun if he just copied something traditional that no one here knew about. Teo

Welcome! Are you entering with a red barchetta? Teo

Beware that there are good and bad immersion blenders not just about sturdiness, but also about geometry. Some blenders add lots of small air bubbles to what you are blending, others do not, it's a matter of the geometry of the blades and the rest of the mixing unit. For chocolate making you want to avoid added air bubbles like hell. So ask beforehand to someone who has the model you want to buy, or try it first hand before spending money. Teo

Cream is a fat in water emulsion, butter is a water in fat emulsion. The base for caramel is caramelized sugar + cream, so it's a fat in water emulsion. Then you add butter, which is the other kind of emulsion. So you need to reverse the phase of the butter, transforming it from water in fat to fat in water. This takes a good amount of mixing, which you get easily with an immersion blender, but takes a lot of time by hand. You don't see by eye if you reversed all the butter. If you left a part of not-reversed butter (still water in fat) then this will separate. Teo

I suppose she is good at baking, not at mechanical engineering. I've seen many top chefs making this mistake, doesn't mean it's not a mistake because they are top chefs. A michelin starred chef I worked with was adamant in mixing his bread at speed 5 on his KA. He kept wondering why he had to buy a new one every year though. Teo

Problem is that MB is sold all over the world, not only in the USA. Specifying those brands is totally useless for people outside the USA. Giving the required values for the flour (W and P/L mainly) would be much much better. That's what happens in all technical books, that's what a self claimed scientific book should do. That set was made with a Discovery Channel approach, not with a Scientific American approach. Those kind of mechanical wears happen in the long term, not in the short term. You are not noticing it now, but you are shortening the working life of your machine of some years. Teo

I can't say anything about the possible difference in protein content in the USA and Europe, I have zero experience on it. But "all purpose" flour is the one used by default by people who make cookies at home, at least this is what I understand reading books and websites. If you use a baguette flour for making a cookie, then you are preparing yourself for some unpleasant surprises. I would steer far from what was written in the English edition of "Le Gout du Pain" and give credit to what the US home bakers are doing nowadays (the home baking scene is much much more advanced nowadays than when "The Taste of Bread" was released). Besides that, you need a flour with the correct ratio between glutenin and gliadin. You can get pretty different results with flours that have the same protein %. If you try making a baguette with pizza flour (which is skewed on the extensive gluten, meaning more gliadin) then you end up with a ciabatta, not a baguette. This is something people should pay more attention to. Here in Italy we can see on the packages the values that are really important for baking: W and P/L. Especially P/L is important for what you are going to do. I was able to give a look to some scans of Modernist Bread pages, these values were not specified in any recipe, each time it was a generic definition for what flour to use, even for panettone which calls for specific values otherwise it's going to be a disaster. Here in Italy even the amateurs would consider pure crap a recipe that does not state what P/L you need. This to say that reading about your experiences and looking at your photos it's pretty clear that you are using the wrong flour. Try changing and looking for another producer. Some quick google search should give you a good idea of what flours that are available in your store are considered good for baguettes by other US home bakers. It takes some time for the dough to form a ball on the hook, but your times should be enough. Beware about one important thing: never go over speed 2 for bread making and similar doughs, otherwise you will ruin your stand mixer. It's stated in the instruction manual. Teo

Try adding a pinch of baking soda to a small amount (couple spoons) of hot apple butter, mix, wait a bit, then taste what happens. Teo

If you are willing to make a cake that's 100% pistachio then you can afford to buy pomegranates that were harvested by a virgin daughter of a virgin father and a virgin mother, price is about the same. You can cut a pomegranate in half then use an orange juicer, just like you are juicing an orange instead of a pomegranate. It's the exact opposite of an elegant thing to do, but it's quick and effective (you'll curse at me when you'll reach the cleaning stage, but this is another story). This is a basic recipe for a pomegranate mousse: 200 g pomegranate juice 60 g sugar 2 g pectin NH (HM is good too) 6 g gelatin 200 g cream (35% fat) Prepare the pomegranate juice. Mix the sugar and the pectin, to break pectin lumps. Add sugar and pectin to pomegranate juice, mix with an immersion blender until sugar and pectin are completely dissolved. Reserve in the fridge for 2-4 hours, it takes some time for the pectin to act as cold thickener. You need to get something with the texture of a thick puree, since if you add a liquid to semi-whipped cream (or to meringue, which case goes even worse) then you deflate it. When the pomegranate "puree" is ready then heat about 50 g of it to 50°C, add the soaked gelatin sheets to diffolve it. If you use powder gelatin then you need to soak it in 30 g water in advance, then melt it together with the 50 g of the pomegranate puree. Add all this to the rest of the pomegranate puree and mix, preferably with an immersion blender to avoid lumps. Pour the pomegranate juice into the semi-whipped cream and fold it to make the mousse as usual. Teo

I don't remember the exact sources where I read these info. I started using essential oils in 2008 (I'm sure about this since it was during my stage at a chocolatier), at that time I searched for all the useful infos I could find. So I remember the infos but not where I found them. If you put a drop of essential oil on your tongue then most probably you end up ruining the taste receptors in that zone, due to the really high concentration. If you ingest a certain amount of drops (which depends from essential oil to essential oil, from person to person) you risk dying. It's the dose that makes the poison (there's water poisoning too), the lethal dose for essential oils is in the range of few drops. Essential oils are a great thing in cooking, since cold distillation is the best way to extract aromas, but they must be used with extreme caution, since those risks are pretty bad. Teo

If you are having sudden troubles with your bread, while you are making it like in the past (same recipe, same ingredients, same functioning brain), then it can mean that the flour is different than from the past. Which is something that can happen, producers are human too. We can't be sure that each time we buy the same ingredient then it's always exactly the same. It can vary due to some changes in the original ingredient (wheat can't always be the same month after month, year after year). Sometimes producers make errors and the "wrong" product ends in the package. With "wrong" I mean both something completely different or something similar (within the features required by the definition of that product) but different from the past. For example some years back I was making pate a choux using the flour from one of the best producers in Italy (flour specifically labelled for pate a choux), pastries were like a brick, it came out that the producer made a mistake and that lot was something completely different... even the best make mistakes. Or you can get a flour with the same exact gluten content, but different pentosans content (pentosans are the ones most responsible for water absorption). There can be a lot of reasons for getting a different product with the same package. Having said that, the book by Calvel is pretty old now, so things can have changed a lot in the meantime. From what I've read (Gisslen, Suas and so on, no direct experience due to living in a different continent) what is labeled as "all purpose flour" in the USA can change quite a lot and has changed quite a lot in the years. I remember reading in an old book (around 20 years ago) that all purpose flour had and average 13% protein and being surprised, since that value would be considered quite high here (our analogue of what you call "all purpose" has about 11% protein). 11.7% protein seems low for a baguette recipe, I would try looking for a flour with about 13% protein and which aimed purpose is for bread, since all purpose flour tends to have the weak kind of gluten while you need a medium strong balance. Teo

I suppose that sealing your bedroom in a sous vide bag is a novelty even for these lands. Teo

Definetely this, I forgot about lemon juice which is pretty mandatory with blueberries (I copied a recipe for pomegranate curd, that fruit does not need added acid). Teo

If you have a Thermomix there's no need for that, that machine makes a great job for making a smooth pure that does not need straining skins and seeds. If you have a food processor that does not make a great job like the Thermomix, then yes, you need to run it through a food mill or a chinois. This if you want a smooth puree, there are people that appreciate some coarse pieces in it, it's just a personal taste as for everything. Teo

Definetely Middle East! That combo stood the test of time (centuries) for good reasons. Since pomegranates are in season, better going for top quality pomegranates than with frozen purees. Beware homemade pomegranate juice is a liquid, it's not thick like raspberry or cherry puree, so you need to thicken it before making the mousse, otherwise the semi-whipped cream will deflate. To thicken it you just need to add a bit of pectin and mix it, no need to heat the juice, pectin acts as a thickener even at cold temperatures. If you have xanthan gum that's good too. When I use rose in pastries I go for the essential oil, you can find it in health stores. If you use the essential oil then you need to add it drop by drop literally, it's really strong. Don't put pure essential oil drops in your mouth, you risk severe health damages (you risk even dying, not a joke), always mix it with a good amount of other ingredients before tasting. Rose water is easier to dose, since it's much less concentrated. In each case proceed with caution and taste after each small addition, as you know there's the risk of the "soap effect". Teo

Probably you had success because you used a variety with less fat content. Italian hazelnut varieties are considered the best for their high fat content. Only way I've been able to get a decent hazelnut flour was mixing whole hazelnuts with wheat flour, then running them in a refiner. Never had any success trying with only hazelnuts: refiner, Thermomix, food processor... each time they released oil before reaching a fine grain. Teo

Seems like it's a flour problem. Try changing producer, hoping you did not buy a 50 pound package. Teo

So, how did it go at the end? Can we see a full report please? Thanks! Teo

Come on, it's easy peasy for you, we are already waiting for the photos. Teo

I LOVE pistachio, but I think you are overdoing it: too many pistachio layers overall, the result will be heavy and cloying if pistachio goes over 1/3 of the cake. Try pomegranate, since we are in season. Rose would be great too with pistachio and pomegranate. Teo

I can give you this recipe: 500 g blueberries 100 g sugar 40 g corn starch Put blueberries in the Thermomix, blitz until you get a puree. Add sugar and corn starch, blitz, then cook to boiling point, still running the blades at low speed. Sugar amount is for average sweetnees, you can use less or more depending on your taste. You can use this curd in place of pastry cream, even for the torta della nonna. It pairs well with frangipane and amaretti. If you have frozen blueberries then you can use them in a cake made in this way: - thin layer of pasta frolla (say 3 mm); - layer of frangipane (around 1 cm); - cover the frangipane with frozen blueberries; - another layer of frangipane over the blueberries (around 1 cm even here). Optionally you can sprinkle the top with flaked almonds. Cook at 180° C. Teo

Personally I don't know about any book dedicated to this single subject. There are great explanations on Tony Conigliaro's "The Cocktail Lab". Teo

The problem is about how fast heat transfers in food. If you set the CF at 150 F then it will heat the pan to 150 F and keep it there. The pan will transfer some heat to the piece of meat, but it will be few in the time unit. Even if you flip the piece of meat it will take a lot of time to reach the desired temperature at the center. You can change the pan temperature, but you can't change how fast heat transfers through food. If food is heated by a vessel at low temperature then it will take lots of time to reach that temperature at the center of the food. With your technique it's like the top side is the center. It's nothing weirdo, just google "cuisson à l'unilatéral" (don't know the English term). It's a classic technique for cooking fish fillets, you just cook them on one side until the top is done. But it's done with the pan at higher temperatures, to get a crispy skin on the bottom. If you use your technique in a room without oxigen then it would be perfect. Teo

Not exactly. Lots of chefs in michelin star restaurants poach cod fillets in warm olive oil (can't remember if it's at 55° C or 60° C, around there) for few minutes. Best cod I tasted, almost no oil absorption. Teo