jmacnaughtan

I'd say the colour is a good indicator. That and the size- if it's bright orange and pushing 5kg, I'd say it's ripe. Also, I don't think squash can be overripe- I'm pretty sure they just keep growing until they're picked, drain all the nutrients from the plant or collapse under their own weight.

While I love this, it almost always contains cinnamon (either the pepper or the ginger are not included). You could try it without, but it wouldn't have that great quatre épices aroma.

I love that. However, you cannot leave that sleigh empty. Where's the big guy?

I was wondering whether it might not be a good idea to let the coconut mix "dry" overnight to improve the texture and hold. This is often done wiith the coconut rochers before baking.

Thanks, I had a look at these threads but couldn't really see whether these hardware aluminium frames are actually suitable for contact with food. Unfortunately, hardware places around here are seriously lacking. I wasn't too thrilled about getting hollow ones as cleaning will be an issue, but for now they are (hopefully) better than nothing. I think I'll have to seal off the ends and tape them to whichever surface I need. I did find a source on-line which cuts solid bar to measure, with four 400mmx12mmx12mm for around 40€ (around $45). Apparently they do both aluminium and stainless steel, but I'll need to get a quote from them directly for the SS. Is this a reasonable price for them?

You're right. I would have preferred solid bars but there weren't any, and there aren't really any other DIY stores within easy reach for the time being. Do you think the film would be necessary? I'd rather not have to use it, I like being able to achieve flat, smooth surfaces

Hi, I've just picked up the most recent edition of Greweling's "Chocolates and Confections", and realized that I really needed confectionery frames to do most of the recipes. Being the cheapskate that I am, I don't want to pay a lot of money for them, so I went down to the local DIY place and picked up 2 x 100cm hollow aluminium rods, measuring 10x12mm, which I cut in half to make 4 x 50cm rulers: What I want to know (and I apologize if there is already a thread for this. My searches came up with nothing) is whether these are safe to use in contact with confectionery centres, whether I need to treat them somehow or whether I should just cover them in cling film before use. Also, are frames better suited for use on Silpat, acetate or parchment paper? I have all three and a horrible image of a wave of hot caramel bursting free and smothering everything. Any help and advice is appreciated, James

I haven't heard of using icing sugar to prevent a skin, but if you're out of cling film you can pass a piece of butter over the warm surface to form a seal. Then I recommend you upgrade to rice pudding. The skin is excellent.

Interesting. Where I live, unfortunately, the water is extremely hard, so calcium intake is not an issue. Is there any flavour, texture or visual reason to want to extract the calcium? I've read that for fish stocks, at least, one of the reasons for a short cooking time is to prevent calcium from leaching out of the bones.

Just curious- why would you want to extract calcium into your stock?

That seems a lot like the "moist" wet sand method everyone was talking about- when I need to cook a sugar syrup, I use 1/3 of the weight of sugar for the water, and that seems wet sandy to me. But admittedly, sand can get pretty wet. Admittedly, my syrups hardly ever crystallize. But it only takes one time (especially if you're doing a large batch) to realize how much of a pain it is to have your syrup crystallize...

Try cooking it to 105°C and weighing it, then doing the same with a batch of normal sugar + water. You'll be able to find out how much sugar you're dealing with by comparing the weight of the normal syrup with the starting weight of the sugar, and calculating your fruit syrups from there.

I was once advised to add any leftover Parmesan rinds to stock to boost umami. What a mistake. The stock just smelled and tasted of cheese, and was almost unusable.

I find that the flavour tends to be better with a dry caramel, and it's a lot faster, especially for larger quantities. Perversely, it's also simpler- you don't have to worry about crystallization. Stir it as much as you want, no need to wash down the sides, no need to add glucose (unless it's for Aw) or worry about knocking the pot and have the whole thing set up on you. Wet caramels are better for certain applications though. If you're making a pièce montée (croquembouche), you don't want to take the caramel very far anyway, so you'd use a wet one.

Boeuf bourguignon. Or, if you can do it, there are few things better than a properly made French omelette. That's probably the fastest one-dish meal around.

Soup, mostly.

Sounds like it crystallized. I doubt the sheet had much to do with it; next time add some glucose.

As I'm still working my way through the autumn squash, I thought I should really do a Hallowe'en Cake. Also, squash and orange go so well together... Orange Squash Hallowe'en Cake Carrot cake Orange confit Roasted banana squash mousse Orange curd Orange glaze Chocolate glaze

It's not the squash/pumpkin choice that irritated me about every pumplin pie I've ever tried, it's the heavy, stodgy filling and soggy crust. It just doesn't do it for me. Edited for spelling mistakes.

Squash season again, so I made another pumpkin pie, for people wo still don't like pumpkin pie. Orange Squash Tart Pâte sucrée Orange confit Banana squash crémeux Toasted almonds

Reduction. I always cook a Bolognese for at least two or three hours- I prefer a "dry" sauce that clings to pasta. I've never had a problem with a cardboard/baby food flavour, and over a low heat you don't have to worry about it scorching so much. I hate sauces like that which leave you with a pool of bland water at the bottom of the bowl.

Haggis is fantastic, but tends to be dry. Especially with the traditional accompaniments... Do you sauce it, or just lubricate it with whisky?

If you make a standard lemon curd (2 parts lemon, 2 parts sugar, 2 parts eggs, 3 parts butter), you can add 1% (total weight) of gelatin and 3% cocoa butter, let it set in the fridge overnight, then whip it, it will have a good flavour and texture, and be pipable.

That's interesting, I had no idea turmeric worked as an indicator. Unfortunately, it's harder to make basic food taste good and not soapy

There's a reason why almost nobody makes their own chocolate at home. Even with cocoa powder and icing sugar, you're still not going to get a product that's anywhere near as good as what you can buy. You just can't get the smoothness you need for chocolate without a wet grinder, and these will cost you at least a thousand pounds. Also, icing sugar generally contains starch, so I'm not sure what that'll do to your finished chocolate. You'll save yourself a lot of time and hassle by just buying some high-quality chocolate and learning to make good-quality chocolates with it.