achevres

I make pastitsio about twice a year and freeze it in "logs." I (mostly) use James Beard's recipe "Pastitsio for a Party," which gives an indication of the huge amount it makes. Also I make bolognese and chicken pot pie filling to freeze.

I have seen this preserve and always wondered why it was so much more expensive than the other Wilkin's preserves. I must try it soon!

Ours has needed repairs twice in 7 years which is unheardof for a (less expensive) refrigerator. In the next house I think I'll block out the space for a Sub-Zero but I'm definitely not getting another one. I know this does not answer your question, I'm confirming what you have heard.

I would give Dean & DeLuca a call. I was there recently and they had every preserve I had ever heard of and more. (The website is limited, the store is endless).

For Almond Roca, try Chinese grocery stores, when you get back to Australia. Here in Phlilly, that's where I can always find Almond Roca, even times when it wasn't available other places. The Almond Roca website specifically mentions Australia.

What flavors do you like, because I haven't cared for any of the ones I've tried? ← I buy the Costco mega box of Crystal Light Lemonade. It's far cheaper there than what I can get at the regular grocery store. To alleviate boredom with just the one flavor, sometimes I mix the Crystal Light Lemonade with either ice tea or a little bit of juice (blueberry and pomegranate taste great with it and you don't need much to "kick it up a notch"). ← I like the Crystal Light lemonade and I love the Sunshine Ruby Red Grapefruit. My husband and I both love grapefruit but can't have any significant amount due to medications. This has been a great find and has come calcium to boot. On the main topic of this thread...if I remember correctly the "8 glasses" came from a (single) study that found that the human body needed that amount of fluid, but not only from water. Fruit, veggies, almost anything moist has some water in it. But, really, we are the only country where so much water is consumed and recommended. Somehow the rest of the world is surviving on less water a day. I was in Italy a few months ago and no one walks around drinking water or with bottled water. Their life expectancy is higher than ours. I mention Italy because I was actually there recently. My advice? Drink when you are thirsty and watch the calories. I also have my own theory that all that water gets the stomach used to always having something in it and our mouths used to always be ingesting something and this combination may be actually counterproductive for weight control. At work I have an article from The New York Times that addresses the research on water and health (actually, the lack of). I'll post more info later.

Mary, on post #37 of this thread Wendy DeBord writes about baking the apple pie without freezing first and the suboptimal results she got. She freezes all pies. I'm new to the freezing pies, as detailed in my previous post, and I don't make apple pies until the fall, so I haven't tried it yet with apple. That said, my favorite apple pie filling recipe, from Food & Wine, cooks the apple slices in butter and brown sugar prior to placing them in the dough. This way whatever shrinkage is going to happen to the apples already happens and there is never any pocket between the crust and the fruit. Also, I like to add slices of one raw apple to the cooked ones. One other variable is the type of apple. I like to use several kinds of apples. Granny Smiths turn to mush to me also, which is not a bad thing if there are enough whole slices from other varieties. My favorite apple is Stayman Winesap (tart) and I usually use half them and the other half a mix. If I ever see Northern Spys I'll try them. Many swear by them, but I can't find them in PA.

I am resurrecting this thread because it's summer pie season and this thread has probably the best info on general pie baking (that I could find -- searching egullet is not as easy as I would like it, whether google or "regular"). I just baked my first fruit pie from a frozen state. I've baked many pies, and even placed them in the freezer for 20 minutes or so first, but this was the first frozen solid. The crust kept it's shape much better and it's so much easier to put a frozen pie into the oven. I'm sold. I have a few questions for Wendy (or anyone else). Do you change the recipe of the fruit filling at all? The recipe I made is a cherry-raspberry one where the juices, sugar, thickener and cherries are cooked on the stove to thicken, then the raspberries are added and poured into the crust and baked. I got more boil-over than expected, but I was scaling up the recipe from 9-inch to 10-inch, so it was probably my mistake, but I was wondering anyway. If you are not using a glass pie pan, do you still bake at 375 deg all the time? I use glass for myself, but if I'm giving or selling the pie I use the disposable aluminum pans. It seemed to me that the juices were bubbling a lot and the crust wasn't done yet after 1:40. I increased to 400 deg at the end for 10 extra minutes. Is there a temperature for the filling that would indicate it's done (as long as I like the crust color)? Thanks!

I know. I learned something every time I re-did a recipe. Thanks for all your help.

The high-hats are a mini chocolate cupcake with piped Italian meringue. You put them in the refrigerator to set and then dip them in chocolate so that no meringue shows. I used a ratio of 4 oz bittersweet chocolate and 1 TB non-trans fat Crisco (the original recipe called for oil). They are 2 inches high. They 'officially' last 3 days in the fridge, but my friend just had one (9 days old) and said it was good. I was just saving them to show her. The recipe is on the Martha Stewart website. I don't have time now, but I do have my own instructions, which are clearer, and can post the recipe later next week.

Well, the tea was last week and they loved all the pastries . I was just happy I could actually deliver. I am so grateful to everyone in egullet, especially those who gave me advice. My photos are not good, but I’m posting them anyway, since I enjoy seeing pictures rather than just descriptions. I did a lot of work at night and there’s no way to take a good picture at home at night. It makes me admire even more the good food photography here on egullet (like Patrick S). Anyway, here it goes. These are the high-hat mini cupcakes, first with just the meringue and then dipped in chocolate. I used Trader Joe’s Pound Plus Belgian chocolate. The hostess had liked the cupcakes with Baker’s, so I knew this would be better. My daughter agreed. Tip: Put the cake batter into large pastry bag and pipe it into the paper liners. Don’t know why I didn’t do this before. These are the lemon-coconut tarts, which were not burnt like they appear here. The high hats are from Cupcake!, via Martha Stewart. The tarts are also from Martha Stewart. I have better directions for both, so let me know if anyone is interested. These are the Korova cookies. I put the Korovas on the menu based just on the many posts on egullet about them, since I had not made them before. They are really good. I used Maldon salt. I took the advice of Patricia Austin and did not roll and cut them, but instead patted them out to 1.5 cm and cut them out with a fluted cutter, moistened the tops with water and dipped the moist top unto sanding sugar. This way I had control over the shape and the sugar looks very nice. She used egg wash, but I didn’t like the whittish color of egg wash. I forgot to do it on the final batch, but, if I were making them for me I would also add Maldon salt to the sanding sugar for the tops. How not to do poundcake sandwiches: I know there are more efficient ways, but I only had to do 20 and at 8am the day of, this is the best I could do. I am glad I bought the square cutters, so it was one less thing to worry about. I piped the filling on the cake slices, put 4 pieces of strawberry, toped with the other frosted cake slice and finished the sides with a little spatula. As you see, I added a rosette on top and left it at that. The pound cake recipe is adapted from Cook’s Illustrated (quick, easy and foolproof and delicious). The strawberry buttercream (neoclassic) is straight from The Cake Bible (well, except that I used the sweetened strawberry puree, since I think that RLB’s buttercream recipe needs a little more sugar). I loved this buttercream. The alfajores: The “ugly” one in the front was quickly eaten by my daughter. I dipped half in white chocolate and sprinkled teeny hearts that I had. That really dressed them up and the white chocolate added that extra over-the-topness. I trimmed the "feet" with a knife. These are soo good. I used the cookie recipe from Betterbaking.com (the cookbook) which has almond flour in addition to regular flour and cornstarch. I used already-made dulce de leche by Nestle. I’ve boiled the can of condensed milk before, but I happened to have pre-made already. Put the dulce de leche in a pastry bag also. I don’t have photos of the scones. I cut them with a 1 ¾” round cutter. I was really hard to get them to rise evenly. The main problem was getting the scone out of the cutter evenly. If they get mangled in the cutting process they don’t rise correctly. Now I know why they cut them in triangles here in the USA. I tried flouring and also oiling the cutter, but that sticky dough always stuck. I wounder what they do in England, where I've only seen the round ones. I make biscuits a lot with no problems, but scones are very picky. I made 3 recipes and all tasted great and had great texture and were light, but the ones that rose most evenly and most reliably were from baking911.com (the cherry scones without the cherries). I did not follow her mixing directions exactly, but rubbed the butter and flour with my cold fingers added cream etc. I baked the scones until just starting to brown. Froze them and finished baking them the morning of the party, as suggested here. I really enjoyed doing all this. It was a lot of work, especially because, since I’m not professional, I had to re-do several things and also because I don’t know (yet) production techniques. Some things you learn as you go and you don’t know that you can do it until you do it, such as doing desserts for 15 people. I ended up pricing the items similarly to a nearby bakery. In retrospect, my only mistake was not charging extra for delivering to her house. I didn’t mind because she’s a good friend, but will not forget if there is a next time. Three women asked for my number, but right now, I’m just enjoying the free time. Thanks again for all your help!!

Bravo bravo Fat Guy for this great topic. I go to New York about twice a year, and no matter what else I do, eating well is the main activity. I trust egulleteers' opinions the most. This is a most welcome thread!

From the New York Times review if April 7, 1999 by Eric Asimov (an egullet member):

Thanks Pan! I need another stomach! No, I just need to make it to NY more often. Hmmm bitter melon. I've never had it but I'm going to try it (my new favorite vegetable is broccoli rabe, and the bitterer the better). Anything you could compare the taste to? I've looked at previous posts and the jellyfish sounds interesting too. How would you describe it?

I know, and I did not intend to sidetrack this thread. Unfortunately, and as per usual, my time is limited in NYC, so I have to do the best I can. My initial question was about chicken and vegetables. It seems I can't go wrong with any fresh chicken dish... What vegetable would all of you recommend?

OK, I'll print out your previous posts on GSI. As for the dumplings, I know they are Shanghainese...and I have not had any others...but I think they are delicious at GSI. I my mouth waters to think of even better ones, and I do trust you. So would it be Joe's Shanghai, Moon House, New Green Bo or Yeah Shanghai Deluxe or some other one? These are the most mentioned on egullet for soup dumplings.

I’m going next week for lunch with a friend. I can finally order spicy things without worry (usually I’m with my daughter and can’t). The main reason I’m taking my friend is for the soup dumplings and the fresh chicken. I like the Au Zhou chicken, but would like to branch out. Also, I know the vegetables are supposed to be amazing. Most of the recommendations on this thread are not too current…but maybe they still are good? I would really appreciate recommendations for a chicken dish and a vegetable dish. Also, has anyone taken out the soup dumplings uncooked and steamed them at home?

I was just at Otto with my daughter. I had the pizza if the day, Capriciosa, which had tomato sauce, buffalo mozzarella, prociutto cotto, artichokes, mushrooms and capers. I would've never come up with that combo, but it was really good. Every bite different. I added the arugula from my daughter's pizza and it was even better. She had the pizza with prociutto and loved it. For dessert (and the reason I'm posting) I had the olive oil gelato copetta, one of the best desserts I've ever had. It had the gelato, chopped strawberries, passion fruit granita, basil syrup, olive oil (minor amount) and Maldon salt (also minor amount). The olive oil gelato is as good as everyone says on this thread. It has depth and roundness of flavor, without being heavy. The combination in this copetta is inspired. Passion fruit doesn't normally do anything for me, but here it was a perfect tart foil. Just go and get it .

Bond Girl, Thanks for the review! Oceana is my favorite restaurant and I'm going next Monday and taking my best friend (her first time). I can't wait.

JFLinLA: Thank you so much for the prep and transport advice. That's the kind of information I can only get on egullet .

I got them locally for $6.95 for each bottle. The cheapest online would've been around $6 and I couldn't risk not getting them in time. They are a separate charge, so it's no big deal. PM me the scone recipe or post it here and thanks. Never too many recipes for me!

Thanks!!

I met with the hostess today for the final choices. I made up a price list with some extra choices. I ended up using as guideline prices from a nearby OK bakery and priced cookies by the batch and the others by the piece. The winners are: Alfajores Korova cookies Lemon coconut tarts Mini high-hat cupcakes Poundcake strawberry sandwiches Plain scones Clotted Cream & Raspberry jam I've read so much about the Korova cookies on egullet that I showed her a picture and she wanted them too. I need to practice those, the sandwiches and the scones. For the sandwiches I'm following advice from this thread. For the scones I'm trying first the recipe from Baking With Passion -- an English book. They look like glorified biscuits (which I make all the time from scratch). I'm taking the goods the morning of the shower. I figure I'll be making the sandwiches that morning. Can I make the scones the night before? The bride-to-be is bringing her favorite tea from London. I will probably make the raspberry jam. Any extra advice is very welcome. I also want to add that it is because of egullet that I'm doing this at all. After a couple of years of reading of so many egulleteers cooking & baking just for the fun of it I decided I would also bake for any occassion, or no occassion, because I love it (and the compliments ). And the hostess is one of my friends who often got samples. Thanks again!

Thanks! I saw part of your Bat Mitzvah thread last year, but had not seen the pictures. You did a great job. The pictures help me a lot to see how things similiar to what I'm planning would look. And ideas on transporting the goods.

You are absolutely right about the cookies! I think just the alfajores and the raspberry squares. And thanks for the pricing advice. I'm doing that tonight.