Ling

About a cup's worth of gingersnap dough...

Run quick to the store and get an orange creamsicle...............you'll feel SO much better ! Maybe two........... ← You're so right! That's what I've been craving!

ANTM is my secret guilty pleasure...though this season isn't grabbing me as much. (Still...I've been rooting for Bre since Day 1). Season 2 was still the best though, imo. So...I had fresh red snapper with tofu, and this homestyle Chinese dish of sliced beef, tomato, and scrambled eggs. (I love the latter with fermented bean curd and hot rice.) And a few pieces of baby bok choy...to avoid scolding from mother.

Patrick and Foodman: I made dacquoise for the first time back in September and I loved it! I crumbled an extra disc and used it to garnish the top of a cake (and the pieces are great for snacking on too!) Today's dessert was mint chocolate and a Dagoba chocolate bar.

I'm so bloated today. I have a strange "smell" craving--I can "smell" something in my mind, but I can't put my finger on what sort of food smells like that. I'm imaging something creamy, with a very strong artificial vanilla and orange smell. I've been thinking about this since yesterday! I just rummaged around in my kitchen and I have a package of cream cheese, sugar, some oranges, and vanilla extract. I'll thinking about mixing this stuff up together, and smearing it on white bread. Or eating it with a spoon. Oh god, I have a date tomorrow night. I hope don't bite his head off. Or cry during Harry Potter.

There's a donair place on S. Granville...I think it's in the same complex as Mr. Pickwick's (but I could be wrong). Has anyone tried that place?

500 calories for a dessert is nothing. The things I must eat every Thanksgiving or Christmas is sausage stuffing. You can keep the turkey (but I'll take the skin).

Thanks for the pictures...Brian Bradley's dessert entry was very creative. I love how he presented the "deconstructed soda", and it looks like the team had a lot of fun plating the desserts too!

Thanks so much for the pictures! I'll echo BCinBC and single out the lobster terrine, and the cannoli as two of my favourites. I also love the bold presentation of the Matsutake mushroom/Russian fingerling potato dish.

^Well, the proportions aren't too far off from the Hershey's Black Magic cake, but the Epicurious one should be less sweet and contains proportionally more chocolate/cocoa. It does look a little drier than my cakes, though. I hope you weren't terribly disappointed! (And happy birthday to your spouse! ) The recipe above that we "tweaked" says to bake at 300F for 60-70 minutes, but I check my cakes at 55 minutes and they are always done by then, so that's when I take them out. (I use the 9" pans too.)

^Speaking of mix, do they use mixes there, or bake from scratch?

What a great write-up...I feel (almost) as if I were there. Well, minus actually getting to taste all that wonderful food!

Thanks for your help!

Yesterday: a dozen oysters (the Chef's Creek were quite nice), and lobster, with a nice glass of Chardonnay Today: Shanghai "thick" stir-fried noodles

I would like to buy 2 kg of Valrhona Guanaja wholesale, but I still have a few kilos of various chocolates (some of it Valrhona) that I need to use up first. How long can I keep bittersweet chocolate on hand? I think I've read that it doesn't go bad for a long time...but thought I'd check with you all first.

The signage is cute, and so is the store. I've never had one, but my friends who have had them also think the cupcakes are too sweet. It's a good "date" place though, apparently.

I've seen the secret recipe already...dun dun DUN! *cackles nefariously* (But I'd love to do a pastry shift at HSG!)

Yes, it was an amazing opportunity! I loved working there, and the pastry chef said I could come in anytime. She was wonderful to work for, and super nice. I learned so much from her! I hope Les doesn't mind me hijacking the thread for a moment, but this is what I did at Feenie's: -I rolled out tart dough, and lined tart molds -I picked out every perfect, whole "seed" from a pomegrante (dessert garnish) -I made a huge batch of espresso creme brulee. I cracked 72 eggs and separated them. In went 3 L of whipping cream and 3 L of half and half. It's the same recipe I use (in a much bigger batch, of course, except I use all whipping cream.) -I made a huge batch of pancake mix (cracked another 72 eggs)... -I rolled out biscotti -I packed a bunch of containers full of yogurt -made the hot chocolate for the dessert menu -helped the pastry chef during lunch service by wrapping/slicing cheeses, getting the ice-creams, running items back and forth from the convection oven This is what I sampled: -caramel / fleur de sel ice-cream -egg nog cake with egg nog cream -chocolate and stout ice-cream -Irish whiskey and Bailey's creme brulee -Weiss chocolate (57% and 70%) -a chocolate chip/espresso biscotti -cassis sorbet -the best vanilla ice-cream ever! -some Shropshire cheese, b/c I told her it was one of my favourites

That's just CRUEL! If I had a mom like that, I would've grown up to have serious anger management issues.

I didn't have dessert after dinner...I had it for breakfast. It was a pan of caramel corn.

Another one of my favourite doughs is the Chez Panisse gingersnap dough. I'm making 14 dozen of these for the cookie exchange this weekend, but I'll have to make extra dough for snacking. I'm planning to cover the gingersnaps with orange dark chocolate Cacao Berry.

No problem! That was a pretty big breakfast, even for me!

OK...I'm going to have to estimate everything though b/c I've only made it twice, and I didn't measure today or the first time! I just eyeballed everything. The reason I did this was because I looked at a bunch of recipes online, but they're all so different, so I decided to just make a quick caramel (with less sugar than the online recipes call for) and go from there. *Pre-heat oven to 250 degrees. 1. I microwave a bag of popcorn in the microwave. As it's popping, melt 5 tbsp. of butter over medium heat on the stove, and stir in about 5 tbsp. of brown sugar. 2. When the sugar dissolves, add about 2-3 tbsp. of light corn syrup, stir. (Today I added a few tablespoons of whipping cream too and perhaps only 3 tbsp. of butter, just to see if it would make a difference. The caramel corn ended up being softer--I liked the all-butter version better.) 3. Remove the pan from the heat, add 1/4 tsp. salt and 1/4 tsp. baking soda. 4. By now your popcorn should be finished popping, so just dump the bag into the saucepan and stir to coat. 5. Put the popcorn on a foil-lined, greased pan, and bake for about 15 minutes. (Be careful the caramel doesn't burn.) The popcorn is a bit soft when you take it out of the oven, but it will crisp up in a few minutes. (I ate it while it was still warm and soft, and a bit crunchy.)

I use rice flour sometimes too. But the cornstarch is already on the counter, whereas to get the rice flour, I have to hunt around in the pantry...so I end up using cornstarch 90% of the time.

Leftovers from dinner...my favourite was the deep-fried pastry filled with minced meat and onions. I crisped that up in the oven. The 2 rolls you see here are sticky rice rolls with a deep-fried Chinese donut inside, and there's "pork fluff" (dried, shredded, heavily-seasoned pork) surrounding the donut. (It is an old picture...I only ate 1 of the rolls the other night, with my Shanghai noodles and gyoza.) And another batch of caramel corn (so quick and easy to make!) And yes, I ate the whole pan.