minas6907

Watermelon taffy, inspired from something I saw while at the grocery store.

The finished Cherry Lips gummies.

Heres todays project, gummies! Specifically, Cherry Lips. I'm working on putting together a tutorial on gummies, everything from making the plaster forms to depositing and finishing.

'Food For Fifty' is a book for caterers.

Check out The Professional Chef, the recipe servings are for 10, so those can be easily scaled up or down. Also, look at Food for Fifty, that may be what your looking for.

Heres some items from recent times. Just got done with them yesterday, 100 macarons for a wedding, filled with peach buttercream. And a 15 day project, candied kumquat.

Youd flavor a hard candy with an oil, I use LorAnns, which offers a wide range of flavors, but I'm sure you could easily find a citrus oil, I personally would just stay away from extracts. About the liquor, its not something I've tried, but I would assume it would have a negative affect on the hard candy. Being acidic, the liquor would invert the sugar during boiling, making it more hygroscopic, aside from not really knowing how much of that flavor boils off. Hardy candy really is best left to being flavored with an oil, and if you want liquor flavors, you can find candy oils that range from burgundy wine to a lemon drop martini. Also, on the funnel, its again not something that I would recommend. The sugar will clog, even gummies will clog, being as soft as they are. Thats why when doing depositing you typically have a pot of boiling water to dip the funnel in to warm, which works fine with gummies and fondant, but absolutely none of that water can touch the hard candy. If you want to do sugar pulling, just give it a try, get some thick gloves, its quite fun, otherwise if you want to deposit candies into the silicone molds, I'd stick to a metal pitcher. And as Lisa said in the above post, a nut brittle doesnt sound bad, perhaps a sesame brittle with a cardamom or something, you could easily have fun with that. Let us know what you decide on, and we want pictures!

Marshmallow is a good suggestion. You could pipe them, I think that would look nice presented with the check, also you'd have alot of flexibility with the flavors.

I would be inclined to stay away from caramels, they would get very soft with the heat unless you boil to a higher temp to compensate. If your familiar with hard candies, I would give those a shot. After they are pulled and cut, toss with a little confectioners sugar and/or starch. It will keep them from sticking together so bad, and seems to make them considerably more resistant to humidity. Something else would be to try making pillow mints, you can find the formula in C&C 2nd edition. They are a pulled candy, but because of the higher water content, they crystallize in a day, making then extreamly resistant to absorbing moisture. As for your gummies, I'd stick withe the gelatin and boil to a higher temp. But, actually, now that you mentioned agar agar, why not make a jellie with that? Easier to work with then pectin in making jellies. I'd look also at other crystallized candies, like fudges and the like.

That is embarrassing! And hilarious! I have a few veggie friends, but I could hardly say they are snobby. One of my best friends is vegetarian, and occasionally goes vegan for a time, and he's totally cool with whatever restaurant we go to, he just chooses accordingly off the menu. Of course, with him being so reasonable I'm more then willing to go anywhere he wants also, haven't yet met any of the bad veggies mentioned in the rest of this thread!

I think it may be a little bit different for me then the work that your doing. For the candies that I do, as soon as the candies cool, they go into an air tight container, whether its a large one or individual packages. If your sugar seems to be picking up alot of humidity, it may be the room that your working in. But assuming thats not the case, you can take a look at your formula for pulled sugar, if it contains too much of an acid, that will make the sugar more hygroscopic, thus absorbing the humidity more readily. I think its just going to be something you sort of have to play with. Otherwise, its pretty standard practice (and I know you would know this) to store the individual pieces, such as your flowers, in a sealed container with a dehumidifying agent. Really, I'm probably not the person to ask about serious sugar work, I have played around with blown sugar and such, but making the pulled hard candies is a bit simpler then the show piece that your dealing with, its just colors and flavors :-)Btw, as far as flavoring the sugar candies, I generally use the flavors from LorAnn Oils. Theres others I've used, such as from getsuckered.com, which are good (and shipping is cheap since I live nearby), but mostly stick to LorAnn. I also dont add the flavor to the boiling pot, I add the flavor to the largest piece of the candy after its been colored. While its in a semi solid state, I'll just make a dimple, add the drops, cover it so its get somewhat encased, and proceed with pulling.

Heres a batch of recent work. A sheep lollipop, which includes optional accessories, for the style conscious sheep. One I'm quite happy with, strawberry sodapop candies, which includes a powder center that will fizz in your mouth. Next is a money shot of some solid pieces from some new polycarbonate molds I ordered. I put them into a container and covered them with food grade silicone, and you can see the resulting mold, this will get filled with plaster. Lastly, you can see the plaster shapes I made today, I got pinwheels to make Grewelings orange pinwheels fondant based candy, and bottles as well as bonbons for cordials.

Ganache is always chocolate based, so you might be looking at something at more along the lines of a caramel or fondant.

Bo Friberg in The Advanced Professional Pastry Chef says to use the confectioners sugar, I just sort of assumed it was an old school thing to do. I'd go ahead with it if you having trouble, just dust it off, and gradually any small amount seems to soak up any moisture, so the pieces don't look dusty or anything. Nice nougat btw :-)

Thank you!

I sort of wonder how it would be without the added fat. I've done nougat that didnt include a fat at the end, and it came out nicely. That's one of those things I've been meaning to do! Also, for the stickiness try some confectioners sugar, I pour press the nougat into a frame dusted with the sugar, then after it sets ill just brush it off and cut, seems to work nicely. Here's something I made today, pb&j pillows. Its a grape hard candy with a 100% peanut butter filling.

Haha, I love the name 'haute dog!' Never heard that one!

Heres a some things of the past few weeks. I made a citrus confit using the technique from Couture Chocolates, came out nicely, note the beautiful transparency of the peels. I havent tried Grewelings method in his professional book, but was not pleased with the results obtained from his At Home book. Next is the citrus confit pieces dipped in chocolate, which tasted much nicer then I was expecting. Then we have some kumquats, they are on day three of the candying process, I just wish I had gotton a refractometer earlier, I love this thing! Lastly is some sugar work, licorice scotties, and apple flavored rose lollipops.

I sort of have a hard time thinking 5inch cookies can't be baked in a convection oven. It does sound like, though, you may need to lower the temp. How hot are you baking anyways?

Thank you for that insight.

Yes mam, I got a set of cutters from Ateco, just made a small amount of jellies to try them out!

Strawberry blackberry pate de fruit.

Definitely didn't cut with cutters, that doesn't work as well as you might imagine it to! I stuffed the pulled candy into the mold, it releases easily, then shove a stick into it!

Thank you! I certainly did use a mold, just cookie cutters.

Heres a few things recently. Macaron pops, just to see how they would turn out, and pig and zebra lollipops!