Wendy DeBord

Simple syrup and or plain h2o.

I might be mistaken........but I thought there already was discussion on the concorde further back in this thread? Have you read thru the whole thread Laniloa?

Perhaps my response isn't exactly what your looking for, but I'd like to discuss this alittle to perhaps explain why you may not see these items more on menus. Hopefully that in turn will let you address these issues that I find as obstcles. I personally love meringues from crispy to chewie. But working as a pastry chef in a very average professional kitchen I'm very handicaped to make meringue based desserts. Lots of issues handicap me from making them: 1. I don't have the spare time in my production (shedule/day) to loose one or more ovens to a low temp. (in the 200F and under range) to properly bake off meringues. I need to crank out items quickly. If I leave items in my oven overnight to dry (which would seem most convient) I run the risk of someone ruining them before I enter the building. I've left notes on oven door only to have them disapear or not be understood by the hot side staff. I don't have ovens that are totally dedicated to my use only. 2. I don't have skilled assistants who will follow my exact dirrections. They don't reseal the container I've stored dry meringues in......so they become exposed to moist air, ruining them quickly. I don't have assistants who have the patients or time to properly cut a meringue composed dessert. Typcially the salad person is plating my desserts and a cold french knive is all they have at their disposal (no sink, no serated knives). I don't have time or equipment to make individual portioned desserts to avoid the previous problem mentioned. 3. Meringues used soft........are the most complicated for me to use in daily service. They require being made fresh daily and sometimes more then once daily (although they are easy to serve unlike dried meringues). Meringue used as a frosting or topping weep in time (usually before 10 hours of being made)......shortening your shelf time, creating more work for the pastry chef. (I unforunately usually turn to instant meringue powder or egg white powder instead of using fresh whites to extend out my shelf time. Because those "instant" products are more stable over time. Then I'm losing some taste and texture.) Again, I have a hard time getting my assistants to cover these properly and a moist meringue takes on off flavors from refridgeration very quickly. 4. This limits me pretty much to making daquiose or cake like meringues to be used in cakes or tortes. These types of meringues don't require drying in a low temp. oven. These types of meringues hold best in the freezer. Once I take the torte out of the freezer containing the daquiose I've only got 2 days before it becomes too moist and sticky where it's becomes unmanagable to slice. That happens because of the typical high humidity in our coolers. In an ideal world I'd love to make every dessert item fresh daily and have skilled help to plate nicely composed desserts. Unforunately that only happens in the highest end restaurants and bakeries. Customers (in general) don't understand nor want to pay for the skill and ingredients involved with high end baking. I don't have assistance in my job, I have to cover myself being ready for unplanned happenings and events that constantly come my way. I have to keep what I do and how I do it scaled down to an art to survive in how demanding my job is. But then I consider myself lucky to have a job because of how few there are now a days. HTH Oh and your right. Cheesecakes and anything gooey chocolately sell far better then a meringue dessert. I sort of think people are no longer exposed to meringue desserts and aren't familar with them or the different types of meringue. Therefore they don't order them enough to keep them in demand and on menus. That could be said about much of what Americans choose to eat and not eat. The American diet seems to be alot different then other cultures.........for lots of reasons....mostly bad ones. American kitchens cater to whats profitable as far as sales with little concern for anything else.

Thanks for posting those recipes. I'll definately try them when I get a chance and post my results.

Owwwwwwwwww, that's not inexpensive. Have you had a chance to view the DVD yet? If so or not, will you reassure us that it's as good as you thought his class was (you can comment on this later when you return home)? Hearing a review from someone who owns this will be very influencial. Thanks.

Theres a huge difference between adding gelatin to stablize whipped cream and cheeses or other flavorful ingredients. Yes, you can "stablize" whipped cream. To do so, it would involve using stablizing types of ingredients, like gelatin or pectin..........or cornstarch, etc. ingredients that are thickeners and not used or eaten on their own. The list of ingredients one can use in conjuction with whipped cream to make it hold thickly is very long. Some examples as sited are: chocolate, pudding, cream cheese, marscarpone. The use of those types of ingredients can not be labeled as "stablizers", because those ingredients aren't stablizers even though they will thicken or incoporate thinner ingredients. The point is: Correctly whipped cream doesn't need any stablizing ingredients. If you would like information and help on whipping cream please look at this thread.

Can someone post the Cooks Illustrated recipes please? I'd like to try them. They can be posted if you adapt the recipe and put it into your own words. P.S. Please enter your best recipes in RecipeGullet. Then link it back into your post in thread. Thanks........

Are you (or anyone else) aware of how non-attendees can purchase Hitz's DVD?

What do you think of professionals talking about the negatives in the business? Is it educational, thought prevoking or just whineing?

I was surfing the net and came across this decorators work. You should be able to track her down thru this source:bride and groom cake topper

Thanks for the details...........sometimes ya never know. I was thinking either a chocolate cookie in the shape of a ravioli or thin chocolate sheets formed like a ravioli.....and both guesses were wrong.

What is a raviolis?

Place your cutting board with-in a sheet pan to catch the juices. Then set that ontop of the stack of pans and raise to a height that works for you.

For those of you not familar with this event look here.

Chefette, can I store a p display piece in the cooler for a couple hours? I've pushed gum paste into that and they'll hold for an hour or two, not much more..........would p hold a little longer then gum paste?

I know theres a couple cake decorators that make custom cake toppers that they sell independently of the cake. But something custom due in a couple weeks..........would probably exclude that option. But it can't hurt to check. For some reason the name Rebbeca Stubberly (I think I've got the last name spelled wrong) comes to mind as a decorator who makes cute cake toppers. Can someone help me out with that name and a link to her site? I think you might have an easier time hand shaping those figures then finding a mold and getting it shipped out to you in time. A couple weeks is last minute at this time of year for cake decorators........so you need to make some decisions now.

After reading a post last week (I thought it was Anne) who said that the cc cookies from baking911 were great, so I baked those. The job I'm currently baking for like soft chewie cookies (I personally don't, I prefer crunchy buttery ones) and they liked that recipe alot. I bake them from a frozen state. Anyone else try that recipe and can compare it to the AB or CI recipe?

Ohhhhhhhhh well, it's all about tiny adjustments. I haven't made these in years since my current jobs aren't into them. But if I recall correctly: I used fresh whites as in right after I cracked them. I think I added the dried whites all in the beginning. I've never baked them in a standard oven...............only convection. But the concept of resting would carry over to any oven method. Yes, they freeze very well. That's my prefered method for removing them from the parchement paper or silpats. Just speculating............I thinking either your oven wasn't hot enough (so you got less rise, less foot) or your meringue was slightly deflated (or slightly under whipped) before you baked them. You could half that recipe........but keep in mind how you need to modify or really know what your doing (method wise) so you don't over or under whip your whites, etc... That's Herme's recipe..........I humbly bow to him.

I use glass to store it (not because of choice) at work sometimes. It doesn't hold well in glass. It pools on the bottom pretty quickly.

I'd like to talk you into making individual cookies per-person. One large cookie won't be as impressive or personal. I can't say that I've ever seen anyone do that.........one large cookie to share......... It will look more femine to have them on a smaller scale.

I love to see/learn about other peoples jobs in the industry. I'm tall too. I find items to prop my pans up so I can change up how much I have to bend to reach the table. I'll use anything, a bus box, a stack of sheet pans, pan covers...........whatever and place the tray I need to work on, on that. Other cooks look at what I'm doing strangely, but hey it works so who cares. Any chance you could post some photos of your work..........tarts, breads, work area, whatever?

I'm suprised that you can use water instead of a faster drying alchol. You make this sound similar to watercolor painting and I find that very exciting! I don't quite understand how you did the black ribbon around the bonnet. I understand how you colored it but...............how did you make it? Did you form it over the bonnet and just lift it off to spray it in another location, let it dry and replace it?..........it appears to be remarkably thin and I can't imagine it not breaking as you moved it. Also that's mean teasing us with all your cake decorations and not showing us the finished cake.......... (hint, hint).

I'm confused. If it's 12" high does that mean 12" thick? Are you stacking many on top of each other to acheive that height?

I made Friebergs Swedish Profiteroles this past week. I really liked it. Typically I'm not crazy about whip cream filled choux puffs (boring).........but the addition of the crunchy super-sweet short dough makes these cream puffs very good. I didn't roll my short dough out, instead I pinched off pieces and flattened them in my palms then placed them on the freshly piped out choux paste. I haven't taken a photo of them (yet) but you can see the short dough on top of the finished puffs. Where the dough ends on the sides of the round puff. So I'm thinking if Papa Beard is doing similar you/I can't see if in the photo linked. The linked photo looks like a plain choux puff. Did yours look different too Neil?

Blueberrys have a natural thickener in them so they need less starch to help them set then other fruits. I wouldn't use that recipe interchangably.