Wendy DeBord

Ah, sorry I missed this post. Well......to the best of my knowledge I don't know of any instructions you could just copy for making these objects. I do believe that Colette Peters did a purse cake in one of her books, if you need written instructions. Have you made multi-layered cakes before? So you know how to put supports under these objects on your cake right? Mainly you need help in what: designing this or how to make a cake shaped like a purse? If you haven't done this before its best to choose a designer bag that lays down and has a easy pattern to copy. So the first thing I do is go shopping online and find a photo of a purse I want to copy. Do you know what purse you want to copy? I like to use rolled fondant or chocolate or chocolate plastic to imitate my purse. I think you get a more realistic look then using straight butter cream (although if your good with butter cream-stick with the media your most comfortable using). Can you post some details, design or photos of what your trying to do with more specific questions? That will help us help you. We need something to work off of to be able to talk specfics in 'how to'.

Thanks everyone, you've given me some really good ideas to work with! I do need to try Sherry Yards curd. No one else hates the seeds? The seeds in raspberries pass, but the ones in the blackberries we get are impossible, you can't chew them at all. I've never been a huge fan of them because I've never gotten any that were sweet, they are always tart as heck-with huge seeds-not my favorite fruit. Anyway I discovered that their tartness balanced really well against whipped cream in my fools. So I'm rethinking my dislike for these berries..........if only they had a seedless variety. But thank-you I now have several dirrections to explore!

Well.........I've made several fudge recipes.......I have one I like-but I don't know that everyone else would like it as I do. Who's recipes have you tried already, and wasn't crazy about? I'm not sure I understand-how do you used fudge with your petite fours? Interesting additions.......how advanced are you meaning? Do you mean add in's or different types of fudge?

I'd put groites in my mousse ....then I make petite fours with it. Just a black forest cake is nice. Think of them as any other fruit and use them that way (pitting them first, of course). Cherry napoleons, cherry sauce for a almond cake, cherry muffins, I use them in my danish filling, add them to other fruit and make a cobbler, cherries jubilee, blinzes with cherry sauce, cherry turnovers,etc..... I take those cheap canned (I have a bucket of it, pie filling) cherries and mix it with my groites and dried cherries...the 3 together make a nice cherry combo. Add a little cinnamon and almond extract to compliment.

I use the two words interchangably. I've never seen a written defination decribing them as two different things.......or anyone using the words to mean different things. I could put forth an argument why I might want to name something an icing and not a frosting...........but to me thats splitting hairs over something I don't think you could find documents to support.

Anyone have a recipe they've already made that they could highly reccomend? I haven't made one in ages.............. I recall seeing some great reviews on RLB's orange chiffon cake (although I haven't made it myself)......I was wondering if anyone here had made it and if so-any reason why I couldn't switch out the orange and make it lemon? Thanks

I make my own cookie cutters and forms all the time. I bought some copper flashing at a hardware store.......getting the right gauge is hard to find cause you want something thin-yet not too thin that it flexes when you use it. I cut my own stips from the sheet to the length I want, then bend it. My only draw back is I use duct tape to hold my two ends together and that doesn't cut as clean as I want. I need to soder them together but I usually don't have enough time to do so. If you cut your own, draw out the width/length with an oil pencil so your sure to cut it straight and even. If your not straight then you'll stuggle more after it's bent getting a level cutting edge. P.S. Welcome!!!

I inherited a box with my job and I'm not a huge blackberry fan. Everytime I attempt to make something with them the seeds just drive me nuts and I can't sell an item with blackberry seeds still in it. So, I do know of a million and one things I could do with this puree-but I've never done any matching with it. What other fruits, nuts, flavors etc.... do you like with blackberry? And do you sweeten to taste or leave it tart? I turned what I had into puree and need to pair it with other items to use it up. Any suggestions? Tommarow I'm doing a blackberry fool with shortbread cookies (the vanilla shortbreads from Claudia Flemmings book is to die for) for a ladies luncheon. But thats a safe combo. What pairs/matches well with blackberries that isn't quite so safe? Thanks in advance

Lucky you. I've never actually gotten enough at one time to ever make something out of them. Personally, I love to give my extra homegrown goodies away and share with freinds that don't garden............thats my first way of handling obscene amounts of food. Then I proceed to the lazy way and freeze fruits whole (cleaned and diced) but not processed into anything, freezing in heavy weight zip lock baggies. That way I can take it out and use it all through the year. Granted you'd need a good sized freezer for you hull. Your list of things you can make with these is pretty much endless. It could be used in countless applications. What do you like to eat? Sorbet, granites. souffles (hot or cold), upside down cakes. muffins, coffee cakes, sauce, napoleons, truffles, gellies, cobblers. Are you in need of specific recipes........ is it helpful to explain how you can treat it as anyother berry and switch it into any recipe? Or are you just bored and looking for something different?

If I'm not mistaken I think I use: (it's a wilton recipe) 3 whites 1 tsp. tartar 1 lb xxxsugar I ditto using real eggs instead of meringue powder or egg white powder as Keith mentioned........and don't over whip. Keith have you worked with that new product that's flexible, for piping details? I forgot the name at this moment-but I sure am interested.

Several years ago I was working at a club that bought in danish sheets......then I was supposed to shape, fill and bake off. I asked around about it because it didn't work for me regardless of advice followed...........anyway I never could get issues resolved. But I think I've learned more about it thru that process. I really think it's handling in the shipping process must be a major factor in it's future sucess. Most of our suppliers don't ship in refridgerated or freezer trucks and I believe alot of problems begin with this issue. Since it's a heavy fat dough I think it gets too wet from defrosting and refreezing or you get it too dry with freezer burn and it cracks when you proof. It's not the same as shipping puff pastry and given it's aready filled I think some of the moisture from the filling leaches into the dough too. I make my own danish dough and freeze it all the time. I've held it for 6 months with-out any real neg. effects. It doesn't require a special yeast, but I do think you should add extra yeast to allow for some of it to dye off in the process of freezing. When I've used purchased danish it was a struggle to get it defrosted and proofed properly. There would be soo much condensation bleeding out when you defrosted it. Then I couldn't ever hit the right temp. to proof it. I didn't have a proofer and just used room temp., most days it leached out fat as I proofed (regardless of my kitchen temp.)......so that would lead me to under proof....yuk. Today I'd handle it differently. I'd proof it totally in the cooler, even if it took days. Then take it out, just bring it to room temp. and then bake. I noticed when Albert Uster was doing his personal push of their new line of danish thats pretty much what they did when they did a sample baked off in our ovens. They walked in the door with defrosted cold danish and threw it straight in the oven, no proofing. Baked on high heat, high fan with a steam injection. As far as the packing date.............I don't think you can determine if thats the issue or not or if it's one of several factors. Maybe once you get this product mastered you'll know.......

Meringues, fruit and whipped cream = pavlovas, to me. Anyone make blueberry shortcakes? I have a small group tomarrow for lunch that requested this. I can't say that I do much with blueberries.........and I thinking it needs some sort of contrasting component to wake it up. What do you like with blueberries? I'm expanding on my sb shortcakes making them a little closer to a napoleon. I love pistachios with strawberries so I'm going to play with a pistachio pastry cream layer on top caramelized with sugar, layers of pound cake, sb.'s and sb sauce, whipped cream.......... and see if anyone else likes it.

So basicly, if you want to enrobe something completely in chocolate your getting into a more intricate process then it appears at first glance. The chocolate doesn't know or care if it's enrobing the finest truffles or a store bought cookie. You have to understand how to use chocolate regardless of what your covering. You could read all our posts on tempering chocolate and making truffles and they all would apply to what you want to do Abra. Theres alot of different methods and ideas about how you can do this-everything from tempering chocolate to using a microwave to melt coating chocolate. There are shortcuts (such as using coating chocolate), which you may or maynot like the results and the long method which involves a fair amount of tech. knowledge (to temper couveture). It's up to you to deside how much effort you want to put forth to learn how to dip your cookies-are you a perfectionist or are you just looking to solve the problem quickly?

I find that the strongest royal icing isn't the stiffest. In fact, I think it's just the opposite, the wetter it is- the stronger it will dry. Too much icing sugar weakens the binding properties of the egg.... and on the opposite side if it's too wet it doesn't hold shape well. So you want to reach a happy medium consistancy. If your's felt dry in 5 min. your definately too dry and that handicapped you, it would have been too brittle to handle. I haven't done this technique in so many years I barely can recall my efforts. If I remember correctly I couldn't get my icing to release from my form/bowl and I wound up covering my bowl with foil to aid in removal. That worked as I recall, but it doesn't give you as lovely of finished product. And you have to get the foil really smooth because the royal creaps under folds and will break when you try to release the foil. If I was to attempt this today (having more experience under my belt) I would follow Colettes instructions using the oiled bowl, just as you did. Then I'd place it near something warm to loosen up the shortening and I think it should slide off nicely that way. HTH.

O.k............beleive me I'm serious about doing this better and will take any help. This is this weeks desserts: I have two monthly specials: apple pie and strawberry shortcake. The pie should be offered a la mode, possibly melted cheese on top. The Shortcakes are a pound cake baked in a savarin mold, dollop of pastry cream, whip cream fresh berries and sb sauce, The weekly specials are: 1.Baklava-classic 2.Snickers caramel tart-sweet tart shell, ganche, layer of caramel, layer of snickers, caramel whip cream, chocolate and caramel drizzle, dry roasted peanuts and sea salt to accent. 3.Lemon cheesecake- on a dark chocolate crust, served with fresh rasp. and sauce 4.Budini- a warm baked chocolate pudding served a la mode-choice of ice cream or gelatos. Plus assorted gelatos and ice creams...........and a dessert wine list. The tricky thing is, nothing will sell if you take too much of a upscale approach. They like whats familar. They don't know was a budini is........I called it a baked chocolate pudding, etc... So I'm all ears-or eyes-however you'd phrase that using this media. I'm thankful for any help.

Payards standout recipes: One thats been hugely popular for me is his hazelnut tart that I reworked. I use my own sweet tart shell, fill it with his caramel and fried salted pecans, top with chocolate mousse then a layer of whipped cream. I finish it with a ganche and caramel drizzle, more fried pecans and a good sprinkle of sea salt. I use his caramel filling all the time in many other applications so I always have a huge bowl of it around. I use his frozen coconut souffle recipe as my all around frozen souffle recipe and just change out the flavors. His coconut tuiles, his pistachio-almond tuiles....terrific His tea cakes are very nice, both the apricot and the pinapple ones. I change out the fruits and add in whatever I have on hand-they always are good. I liked his apple cake but I cut back on the rum. It tastes best the second day or later. His coconut pineapple tart is good, so is the apricot almond raspberry tart. I also liked his rum raisin almond tart, caramel-walnut tart and apple financier tart. His pink chanpagne and raspberry granite was terrific. I recall recently reading someone that mentioned his gateau basque and said it was their favorite. Back to your search for glaze........I think the recipes containing gelatin probably give you the most shine, but I think they lack flavor and I do like a thicker coating.

Yes thats exactly it. I never really "got" english class and it shows! Everything in the job is going great, couldn't be better-sales are amazing. The only area needing real improvement is the weekly menu, titles and descriptions. I can't write a description that pleases me....or thats at least average. The offer to help me cheat is great-but I need to be able to do the task myself. I need to find a way to achieve this task, with my limited ablities. All my attempts stink and yes I'm frustrated with my inablities. So I just gave up and shut up about it because I can't solve the problem. Instead I pour all my efforts into baking............at least the people are happy with what my items taste like-even if I can't describe them well.

Welcome dexygus, I'm glad you desided to join in! I typically use ganche to coat cakes, but it does loose it's shine when chilled. I haven't found a chocolate mirror glaze that I like better then ganche. Some of them are a pain to make or too thin or lacking real flavor: where as my ganche is always on hand, easy and tastes good. It's sort of a trade off, which non-perfect product best fits your working needs. I haven't tried Payards glaze recipe yet, but I'd bet that its good. So far I can highly reccomend almost every recipe in his book, theres not too many left that I haven't tried. They all work perfectly and rather simply too. The recipe you mention is a ganche with corn syrup to add shine.........but I bet it does dull out when cold like other ganches. Have you made other glazes and ganches then the two you mentioned from Medrich? Ganche doesn't typically crack or set up too hard. I'm not that familar with Medrichs' recipes to be certain, but I would guess that those aren't the most ideal glazes for cakes which are flexible.

I've done rises overnight in the cooler with unshaped dough and already shaped. Both work out fine. Typically you let dough rise the first time, then punch it down, shape and let rise, then bake. So which step you are at in the process determines what you do next. You can let it rise at room temp., punch down, retard and shape the next day.........or shape and retard overnight. You can do both your rises in the cooler too.

It is sad. I have an almost complete collection of the Pillsbury bake-off booklets (just missing #1 and I will inherit a beat up issue #1 from my Mom one day). I stopped collecting current issues when they totally switched to insisting you use their premade items as a component. They had a couple issues that were based on their convience products along time ago, but they were seperate from their bake-offs. Many of those recipes are obsolete because they no longer sell the same convience product. Now the bake-offs don't even interest me. The last one I made was the chocolate pear brownie cake the guy won the first 1,000,000. prize from .......I thought it was strickly o.k.. I don't know of any friends or neighbors that use the bake-off recipes in conjuction with the convience items. My non baking friends aren't looking to expand their recipe file and why bother if one day you won't be able to buy the convience product.

I think people in my area (Chicago burbs) think of strawberry shortcake as they see it regularly in the grocery stores.....you know those packages of yellow cake stacked right by the fresh strawberries. I like a biscuit myself. In my recipe I use flavored sugar. It's like: the zest of 2 oranges and lemons to 1 1/2 c. reg. sugar, I put it in the cusinart to blend. The sweet citrus undertones are auesome.......when you taste or smell the biscuits you can't quite tell what the flavor is........it's just sweetened fruit. Today (first day of the Month) I begin running a strawberry shortcake as one of my monthly dessert specials. But for the first time in my life I'm not going to use biscuits. I just don't have the time to bake them off daily and waste quantities of work. So I'm taking the liberty of doing my own thing, I hope it will be well recieved. I'm going to make individual poundcakes, layer with pastry cream, whipped cream and s. berries, sb sauce. I'm still debating this morning whether I should use a sponge cake or a pound cake.........I'm leaning toward the pound cake and using pastry cream to give this a little more texture and interest.

If I got an order like that I'd charge that amount at least. Then I'd farm out the structure to a handyman to build so all I had to do was place cake around each layer and frost. I'd always be cautious of business contacts that are made with letters verses a personal phone call. My experiences dealing with large corporations is they don't work too much different then anyone else. Typically an executive assistant would call you and discuss what they wanted and you'd give them a qoute and work from there. I just thought of something- you'd have to rent a cargo van with an electric ramp to move that thing. There's more costs involved here then meets the eye.......

Welcome bakerbabe! Long story made short-pretty typical.......... if I'm lucky, I'll have about 3 hours to make and tray whatever I can do color wise for this party. I still have a pool party on the 4th to do similar.........but it's got to sit under dirrect sun so thats going to dictate what I can make.

Wow you guys, those are some excellent ideas! Things I've longed to do, but haven't done yet. The ice cream balls reminds me that I've wanted to make cheesecake balls like that.....and haven't ever gotten around to it, maybe now is a good time. Ice cream is always such a huge hit and it would be so supprising if it could be served on mini pastry buffets.........in mini ice molded bowls or something cool.............we serve our shrimp cocktails in molded bowls with flowers frozen into it...........oooh-I'm going to have to find a appropriate party to do something like this, if not now I'll stick it in my ala carte menu. A light bulb just went on in my dark brain,....thank-you!!!! I'm going to have to ask with higher-ups for approval first..........some of these are more upscale then my clients might be familar with. I hope they'll let me play. I was also playing with the idea of doing my first "show piece" as center of interest. Something very simple to get my feet wet........ Thank-you everyone, this has me excited thinking about the possiblities.

Thank-you for taking the time to share the info. on this event. I really look forward to and seek out as much coverage of this event as I can find in print, online and now on TV. You've created a wonderful event Kerry!!!!! I wish you continued great success. You've made a noticable impact on this industry, thank-you for sharing.