[Pineapple and Pineapple Juice]

I prefer the Lakewood brand of pineapple juice over Dole or other brands.

[Understanding Rum]

I like Gosling's Old as well (once I was able to get the bottle open).  Do you mix with it or just drink it neat?

Both. But if I mix, I try to keep it simple.

I hate that I have to travel to Delaware to get my supply though.

[Understanding Rum]

My favorite rum by far is Goslings Old Rum. Pricy but worth it.

[Korean Cookbooks]

An introductory series with some American influences would be the PBS series, The Kimchi Chronicles.  We enjoyed the story, food and video travelogue aspects of the show.

 

The recipes in the cookbook reflect Korean influences but consider what's available in the USA.

[Meeting-friendly snacks to bake]

How about mini quiches?

[Drinks! 2014 (Part 1)]

Oh I am jealous Hassouni. I love going to St Michaels. How would you use the rum in a cocktail or straight?

[The Iced Tea Topic]

Tammi - I like to get the citrus flavor from zest and infused with the tea so that the hot water draws out the oils. I find that way I am getting the tea flavor in front with a hit of floral citrus versus creating an Arnold Palmer style drink.

That's a good idea. I will definitely try that out.

Last summer I successful made a better version of the berry tea at Wendy's.

[The Iced Tea Topic]

I tried to make a citrus ice tea this week.  Just with regular black tea and fresh squeezed grapefruit/orange juice.

 

Need to find a decent green tea to do a honey version.

[Serious flaws in the Google restaurant rating system]

I've taken to simply scanning the reviews to see how fairly I think the individual rating ends up. I discount those "I didn't eat there cuz I hated the under/over priced menu...so I'm giving it all zeros.." type reviews. The overall ratings on many of these types of websites tend to be off kilter IMHO. So I find it impossible to take the number at face value.

[Ice Cream Machines]

America's Test Kitchen recommends Whynter SNÖ Professional Ice Cream Maker Model IC-2L, at amazon.com for $210. It is self refrigerating and makes 2 quarts in 40 minutes, ready to eat. It is also the most quiet of all the machines they tested.

Read the reviews on Amazon. They are not kind. I checked ATK and found the review was done in 2010.

[Best/Favorite Food Magazines]

Fine Living?  Do you mean Fine Cooking?  Or is there a new magazine out there that I haven't discovered?  

Lol my bad. I'll just blame autocorrect on my iPad.

But yes, Fine Cooking.

[The Food Saver/Vacuum Sealer Topic, 2011 to Present]

I'm on my third Food Saver in 15 years. I've found they tend to last for about 8 years before the seal function breaks down. My only reason for purchasing this new one is for the pulse vac function.

[Best/Favorite Food Magazines]

I was partial to Cooks Illustrated mainly because the recipes were more reliable than other sources but after years, it's not only repetitive but an expensive habit. I dropped the print mag for the website but I think the website will be the next to go simply for the price.

I used to follow Southern Living mag, but too many hit or miss recipes follow by lots of "semi homemade" recipes made me lose interest.

I just bought a year of Fine Living for my mom, so we shall see.

[Storing, Tracking, and Accessing Favorite Recipes]

I have a mix but I haven't cracked open an actual cookbook in years. Many of the recipes can be found online now, so I use a Chrome web clipper tool which clips ANYTHING into Evernote. I have a note book for all of my recipes. I like that you can tag each recipe as you see fit and it keeps the URL address of the page in case you want to go back later.

You can definitely import Word and PDF files into Evernote. The only caution is, if you import it as a PDF, your device has to be connected to the internet to "open" the file. I've started avoiding PDFs for that reason. If you have a number of PDFs, I would suggest copying that file into another format before uploading into Evernote.

All of this can be done using the free feature of Evernote. It does have a limitation on the number of files you can upload for free, but I've found it to fairly generous. You can always purchase one month of unlimited uploads if you need to upload more than normal.

[Jacques Genin Caramels]

I would love to try the Genin caramels. Thanks for the link.

[Your Daily Sweets: What are you making and baking? (2014)]

Thanks everyone!

 

My goal is to produce desserts that look "professional".    I will try to post pictures as my decorating skills improve.  it did make me wonder how professionals work with sticky dough like the cream cheese cookies which were supposed to be roll out cookies.  I know the recipe was a riff off of the Polish kolacziks which seem to be simply creamed cream cheese, butter and flour.  Any suggestions or recommendations?

 

Since I am new, I am limited to two posts a day, so if I am slow to respond, it's because of this limitation.  

[Your Daily Sweets: What are you making and baking? (2014)]

Wow after looking at these desserts, I feel sad saying my humble attempt last night was cream cheese cookies.  The cookies were a bit of a pain because they stuck to everything as soon as the dough warmed up.