SethG

That looks great, Patrick and Thornado! Thornado, who were the lucky recipients of those plated desserts? Was it a special occasion, or just a dinner party?

Okay, I failed at this simple test of reading comprehension. I misread both the recipe and your very clear post, and only when I had my 9-inch tart pan filled with beans and blind-baking did I glance at the picture of the completed dessert and realize that I was stupidly using the wrong pan for the job. That's what you get for whipping up pate sucree while feeding the kids breakfast and then rushing to blind bake a crust after getting home at 9:45 p.m.! But I recovered well. I cut the recipe for the filling in half and it fit my crust perfectly. And the tart was super! I liked the almond sucree and the creme fraiche custard with the rhubarb. I also thought the technique for softening the rhubarb had delicious results. You just put the cut-up rhubarb in a saucepan with sugar, turn the heat to medium and stir every now and then for about seven minutes. I could see serving some of these pieces by themselves as a garnish to the tart or another dessert.

Maybe they just don't realize what you're talking about. If you ask for unglazed ceramic tile at Home Depot, you may find them, in gray or in red. They're half an inch thick and six inches square.

I was out of town last week and returned home on Sunday to find that my book had already arrived! I'm making the rhubarb tart tonight. I quickly put together the pate sucree this morning, and I'm a little concerned because it seems like a lot of dough for a 9-inch tart pan. I also found it difficult to get it to come together and added about a tablespoon of ice water to get the dough to hydrate. I used the metric weights in the recipe so I don't think I made an error in measurement. I didn't have time to check the recipe against other recipes I trust, so we'll just wait and see what happens tonight after I get home. Anyway, the book is full of beautiful pictures. When I have time I want to do a detailed comparison of this book and Paris Sweets.

Just bought it, Ludja. Thanks. Sounds like a bargain for $10.39 (the current price on Amazon).

Well, it isn't January, but the new Bouley Bakery has been open since last week. If you ever took note of the deli that used to stand on this corner of Duane Street and West Broadway, you can't help but be impressed at the rapid transformation of the building from a dumpy "taxpayer" structure to the gleaming white beacon it has become. I stopped by today and purchased a croissant and some coffee. The prices are slightly higher than those of the local competition (Ceci Cela and the Duane Park Patisserie), but still seemed to me to be within the realm of the reasonable. I'll reserve comment until I've tried more of the items-- there are several morning pastries (mostly in the $2-3 range) and a selection of desserts (in the $5-6 range) -- but I am excited by what I saw and tasted. There are also breads, of course, but I never buy bread so I forgot to take much notice. Cooking classes and demos are going to start in a few weeks.

Looks good, Mette! Glad you liked the Pave, doc. I gotta get back to the book.

Congrats, jgarner! I almost bought that book right when it came out... I've wondered about the bakery behind it ever since. I hope you'll share some photos of your product with us, if you're allowed. I also hope your commute won't be long given your start time. When will you finish each day? 1 pm? That part will be nice, right?

Then one Pave cake is plenty.

How many servings do you need? Others on this thread have done more of the cakes than I have, but I thought the Pave came out really great. There are a few components, but they aren't difficult, and can be done in advance.

You're looking at it. Really all we've found are a couple problematic conversions of volume measurements to metric weights. The rice pudding thing is a conundrum wrapped inside an enigma still awaiting resolution.

The point, for me, is to try new restaurants. Giving ourselves a "challenge" like this will help my husband and I break out of our rut of the same handful of places over and over. We just moved to NYC about 9 months ago and we want to discover some new places to add to our list of favorites! Faced with a decision on where to eat among the thousands of restaurants in the city, we frequently retreat to a place we know is a sure thing. ← Fair enough, although you do end up limiting yourself to new restaurants that begin with particular letters. Hey, I just thought of another one: this is a fun (although expensive) way to go about learning the alphabet.

None, sorry.

I don't mean to be a killjoy, but what exactly is the point of this exercise? Whatever the point may be, I approve.

Those fougasse breads look great. I've never made that shape from BWJ (although I have made the foccacia dough), but I use Nancy Silverton's fougasse recipe a lot. It's a very impressive shape to bring to a party or present to guests. Today I made the BWJ pita breads. These were actually somewhat similar to the matzohs, in that you roll them out and throw them in the oven, leaving them to bake for just a few minutes. Because they contain yeast (unlike the matzohs), they puff up in the middle. I never really thought about it before today, but pita is really a bread that's all crust, no crumb. And you remove it from the oven before the crust hardens, so it remains soft. These breads came out great, they were fun to make, and they were a big hit at the Kentucky Derby party I attended today. The recipe uses a sponge (unlike most commercial pita breads, I suspect), giving the bread a flavor boost and also improving its keeping qualities. Unlike packaged pitas, you could leave these breads out in a basket on a table all afternoon and they didn't get stale. I was a little concerned about the fact that almost half the flour in the recipe is whole wheat, but that too adds to the flavor of the final bread. They didn't taste like "whole wheat" pitas-- they just tasted really good.

I just returned from Rome and my wife and I made use of many of the recommendations here with generally very good results. We also made use of a few other sources, mostly the Gambero Rosso guide, translated into English in 1999 and I believe not updated since. We also used the May 2005 Bon Appetit feature on Rome and a NY Times feature on Rome from March 2004 that is still available on their website. We were in Rome for only four days, but we managed to eat a lot! I'd say we left feeling a little disappointed. The restaurants we tried on the upper end did not really impress us. We found the center of Rome and Trastevere to be full of very touristy trattorias-- it is very very easy in Rome to get yourself an indifferent pasta and a terrible espresso; much easier than I remember it being in Florence six years ago when we were there. That being said, however, we did have some very good food and some amazing coffee and gelato. Restaurants: We ate in only two real restaurants during our stay: La Rosetta (near the Pantheon) and Asinocotto (in Trastevere). La Rosetta has been mentioned here many times, and I felt like we had to try it. We found, contrary to some reports here, that the grand raw seafood appetizer was neither a particularly large nor particularly moving presentation. It really was just an appetizer. And for 55 Euros for each of us, it ought to have been a lot more impressive. The mains were even more steep, and the wine we ordered (we discovered later) was marked up two and a half times the retail price. I thought the fish was all well (although simply) prepared and impeccably fresh, but when I think of what we spent on this meal and what we could get for the price in New York-- either at a very high end French or Italian restaurant, or at a very good Sushi place-- I want to cry. Perhaps it isn't fair to compare La Rosetta to restaurants in New York, but it is my own frame of reference, and the comparison is pretty devastating in my opinion. Asinocotto was a much more modest restaurant, both in its level of formality and its prices. I haven't seen any buzz about it here at eGullet, but the place was recommended in the NYTimes article last year, and my outdated Gambero Rosso gave the restaurant a best value award, dubbing it a "gourmet haven" where "you really eat well." We didn't have any complaints about the place, but again something about the restaurant didn't really move us. The decor is rather fussy, aiming for whimsy but ending up a little depressing. Every single table was filled with tourists the night we visited. The dishes were a little hit or miss but we generally approved. My wife had a cheese ravioli in a pumpkin sauce in which the sauce, which really was almost a soup, overwhelmed the ravioli. But I loved my wide noodles with a duck ragu. My wife's steak was very good, but I found my rack of lamb overcooked and accompanied by a boring clump of barely cooked carrots. I don't think we'd go back, not just because we weren't wowed by the restaurant; we also found Trastevere to be a tourist sink-hole. After these two experiences we cancelled our reservation at Agata e Romeo. We decided we didn't want to remember Rome by its disappointing formal restaurants. Trattorias: I'd say we had better luck with trattorias. Right after we arrived we got a quick bite at Matricianella, at 3/4 Via dei Leone, which the recent Bon Appetit describes as "the trattoria of your dreams." I ordered a homemade tagliatelle special, which had a sauce based I think on parsley and very small pieces of fish. I'd tell you more about it but the dish wasn't translated on the menu and I don't speak Italian. Anyway, it was lovely: fresh, light, suffused with a hint of the flavor of the fish. I thought it was unusual (although for all I know it's a classic) and it set a high standard that was never repeated during our trip. I had no other homemade pasta this good. My wife's gnocci with parmesan was also great, and we had a generous plate of incredibly tender prosciutto and fresh mozz. Ditirambo, near Campo de Fiori at 74/75 Piazza della Cancelleria, was more mixed. They had the best pasta with cheese and pepper that we had on our trip. Large cheese ravioli were thick-skinned and tough, however. Nice salads. We had a fun experience at Monserrato, also near Campo de Fiori at 96 via Monserrato. (This is really a restaurant, but we had more of a trattoria experience there.) It was May 1, a big holiday and a Sunday to boot, and lots of places were closed. We had already had some indifferent food at a wine bar and were walking around the area when we saw that Monseratto, which has a bunch of tables out on a quiet square, was packed with locals who seemed to be having a very good time. We decided to wait out a table, which took a while, and once they seated us I started pointing at the plates we'd seen. Many of the people who'd been there had received (what I gather from the Gamberro Rosso guide to be) baked turbot with scalloped potatoes. When we tried to get it, the waiter went inside and found someone who spoke English to tell us that it was too late for them to make any more of that dish. But we did get some delicious swordfish carpaccio, artichoke ravioli, and pasta with clams. And a bottle of Falanghina. And had a splendid time on a beautiful afternoon. Our favorite trattoria was our last, Agustarello in Testaccio, 100 via G. Branca. We ventured out to Testaccio on our last night, and it was everything we'd wished that Trastevere might have been: authentic, traditional, still populated by locals. At Agustarello, I had a wonderful plate of gnocci in a mutton sauce and a huge portion of braised oxtail, in a wonderfully thick, gelatinous reduced sauce. There were tourists at one other table but otherwise the place was full of locals. And more of them kept coming and being turned away once the place was full. It is a small restaurant, and there's not much in the way of decor. But man, what good honest food. Lots of offal too, if you go for that. In Testaccio we also had a very good experience at Volpetti, where we bought cheese and a few different prosciuttos to eat during our plane ride home, and at a wine bar/beer hall called the museum of beer (or something like that) on the east side of Testaccio square. The street level floor has a wine shop and wine bar, and then downstairs is a raucous beer hall with a loud jukebox, full of locals living it up on a Monday night. Gelato: the usual. Il Gelato Di San Crispino is amazing. I loved the honey gelato, and the armagnac gelato too. For a more traditional place I liked Giolitti. I also tried the famous tartufo at Tre Scalini in Piazza Novona. It was rich and chocolatey, but nothing to write home about. And I had a truly miserable espresso there. Espresso: the usual. We really loved Sant’Eustachio. Pizza: We managed to try Da Bafetto, and I wasn’t impressed, I’m sorry to say. Maybe we were there too early, but I felt my pie was undercooked. Not much char underneath, and the crust had a decidedly floury, raw taste to me. The sauce also lacked seasoning, in my opinion. Not bad, though. We considered stopping for a quick pie at Remo in Testaccio on our way to Agustarella, but the pies looked about the same as Da Bafetto’s so we gave it a pass. Like many posters here at eGullet, we very much enjoyed the pizza bianca from Antico Forno Marco Roscioli, at 34 via dei Chiavari. It's a great snack on which to munch as you walk about. One other wine bar: Always popular, right in the center, but Cul De Sac is a really nice place. It must take a special dedication to quality to have a place just steps from Piazza Navona and not have it suck. We had a wonderful cheese plate and some delicious, spicy soppressata. And wine, of course. Thanks for the suggestions we got from this thread, and I hope this report might be useful to someone else.

Great work once again, Patrick. That looks delicious.

The Nutella tartlet looks really good. I'm also looking forward to seeing Partick's Concorde. I'm really interested to see a shot of a slice, if you're taking requests, Patrick! I want to see how the layers end up looking.

Two thoughts: 1. A pimiento pepper is just a red pepper. Are you sure you aren't supposed to just use a red bell pepper, uncooked and unskinned? This would make sense if you are also using a fresh, raw green pepper. 2. Maybe the recipe is calling upon you to make you own pimientos? Penelope Casas does this in her books. It's very easy; I've done it many times. They taste fresher than the jarred varieties, which I admit can be very good as well.

The weight measurements in the Chocolate book are metric (grams). The Desserts book doesn't give weight measurements, only volume.

I don't have that kind of time, unfortunately. I'm making a flurry of phone calls and sending a phalanx of faxes.

Dude, that is beautiful. You have obviously found yourself the perfect relationship. If only my wife would come home from work, find me cooking and drinking, and promptly fix me a cocktail-- an appropriately themed cocktail, no less!-- well, I don't know what I'd do. You guys clearly have it all figured out. Nice food, too. I might get that book and join this party.

Looks good, Elie! I'm dying to know what you did wrong. Did you make too little dacquoise? The cake pictured in the book is covered with quite a pile of the stuff. I've been wondering how the dacquoise would taste in the cake. Now that you've described it I really want to give it a try.

I don't own a pasta machine, but I imagine it would work. Perhaps with a machine you might even be able to get it too thin... you need to be able to pick it up and flip it onto a baking sheet in one piece. With the machine you'd also need to cut the dough into smaller pieces than the recipe specifies before rolling, or you'll get matzohs that are a few inches wide and way way too long. The dough is easy to roll out by hand. Each piece takes maybe a minute or two.

I made the BWJ matzoh for Passover again this year. (These matzohs aren't Kosher for passover, for a number of reasons. It's unlikely that any homemade matzoh would be Kosher for Passover, which is ironic and fodder for a different discussion.) I forgot how great these matzoh are! They are ten times better than any packaged matzoh I've tried (including the round ones I get from the Crown Heights folks near my home). I would encourage anyone who wants a tasty, crispy cracker with which to eat any kind of dip or spread to make these matzohs. Having made a dozen yesterday, I'd offer a couple tips: 1. Roll them out as thinly as you possibly can. The thinner you roll them out to be, the crispier they will end up being. They start to get chewy if they're too thick. 2. Use enough flour to roll easily, but try not to use too much. When you use too much, the matzohs come out a little white and they can taste a little floury. Don't get too worried about the dough sticking to your pin. I found it pretty easy to correct when the dough started to stick a little. It's a pretty stiff dough to begin with so it won't ever get too sticky. I'm trying to save the last two for my kids to eat tomorrow but I can't stop munching on them.