Jim D.

The filling sounds delicious. I imagine the lime helps balance the coconut's sweetness.

Thanks for pointing out that pistachio paste available on Amazon. I just noticed that my source, L'Epicérie, has it only on special order (I guess the price scared customers off--though it is a bit lower than the item on Amazon). I also make Dubai bonbons, although (as I have stated elsewhere) filling the cavities is a real pain--I put foil over all the cavities except the row I'm working on so as to limit the mess. But I don't want to reduce the crunch, which is what it would take to get the filling out of a pastry bag or (the otherwise indispensable) confectionery funnel.

I purchased pistachio butter from Fiddyment Farms. It is simply ground pistachios, no sugar added. I put it in my melanger and added some ground up hard caramel to make pistachio praline paste, which (I think) adds a lot of flavor to the pistachios. But to cut the sweetness I also include plain pistachio paste from Sicily. I know this all sounds counter-intuitive, but the Siciian paste has a wonderful flavor, and I do want the caramelization taste as well. And yes, I add white chocolate, making a gianduja. If you add any water (making a ganache), the general principle is that anything crunchy will (eventually) get soft. And since the whole point of the Dubai bar is crunchiness, I want to preserve the texture of the kataifi (for more crunchiness I also add some crushed feuilletine, plus some chopped pistachios). I don't add a lot of chocolate because I want to preserve the fluid texture that the Dubai bar seems to have.

Good idea about reducing the sweetness. I use pistachio praline paste plus plain pistachio paste (no sugar) to reach that goal.

@RWood, I'm interested in your comment about tahini improving the Dubai bar. I followed a recipe that included tahini (most recipes do, I think), and I did not detect any sesame-y taste added to the filling. The next time I omitted the tahini paste and tasted no difference. What do you think it added? I've never thought that tahini had a lot of taste on its own; in my "sesame crunch" bonbon I add lots of toasted sesame seeds, which do give it some flavor. The tahini paste I use is from Soom, and the seeds used are toasted.

I know this is a very old post, but I do know @JeanneCake is still alive and kicking, so I'll ask: I make Rose's biscuit for the bûche cake. After I turn it upside down onto a towel (I know you don't use one, but often I've had the cake crack horribly when I rolled it) and then remove the parchment (now on top of the upside down cake), the parchment sticks to the cake, removing the best-tasting part, the outer browned part. Would using the spray prevent that? And do you mean something like Pam?

Christmas 2024 assortment: 24 different fillings, including crème brûlée, sesame crunch, apple crisp, pecan pie, cinnamon bun, tiramisù, pineapple caramel, orange with habanero chili, carrot cake, and baklava. Credit must be given to @Rajala for the ideas behind some of the bonbons: the crunchy layer of crème brûlée (which I have now figured out to make even on a humid day), carrot cake (my new fave), and cinnamon bun. I especially want to thank him for his clever idea of how to make a ganache that tastes like custard and thus makes a crème brûlée very close to the baked custard of that dessert.

@Kerry Beal is the gingerbread cookie ganache the one in Greweling's book? He enrobes it and drops a little turbinado sugar on top. I am always amazed at how close to gingerbread it tastes; the "secret" ingredient is anise liqueur (I use Sambuca).

@Pete Fred I always enjoy your experiments (usually successful I have noted) into the world of sweets. I was struck by your recent comment: Do have you any ideas as to why this happens? I tried buttering the pie pan, and that resulted in an unpleasant fried look and taste to the crust. I suspected I might be patting the crust into the pie pan too firmly; changing that technique seemed to help some, but not consistently.

I do toast the kataifi. Recently I saw someone making a Dubai bar and he "fried" the kataifi. That gives it more flavor. You have to use clarified butter or ghee; otherwise some of the crunchiness will be lost. Basically the Dubai bar is a gianduja.

I have done Dubai bonbons. It's very tricky to spoon the filling into the cavities (It's too chunky for a pastry bag), but it's very popular--alas, the chocolatier has a difficult time not eating all of them. I add some feuilletine to the kataifi and toasted pistachios for even more crunch.

I have a Chocovision Delta tempering machine and have recently switched to using silk for tempering. I found it difficult to use tempered chocolate as seed. If I used the callets from the bag, they didn't entirely melt--a real nuisance. To my surprise, I have found that chocolate tempered with silk seems to take longer to get in an overtempered state, and with the Chocovision machines and their constant motion, overtempering is a significant problem. It doesn't take much silk at all.

I agree with Kerry; the pieces are enrobed. There are square magnetic molds, but they have sharper edges.

@Becky R, interesting information. Can you provide a link to the Oxo squeegee you use?

You know far more about this stuff than I do, but I have had that "dusty" look with bonbon shells, but on the inside of the shell. My best theory is that the chocolate is over-tempered (it happens after I have been using the chocolate for a while and have not taken steps soon enough to deal with it). In my case, eventually the dusty look doesn't show, and it has never seemed to do any harm. I assume you are doing all the usual things, such as chilling the bars as they are crystallizing. And I assume humidity is not an issue in your kitchen.