aprilmei

I remember this: it was in Bernard Clayton's book of pastries (can't remember the exact title). I like that book (the recipe for Danish is wonderful) and wondered about the baklava recipe - but didn't try it. So thanks for the report; I'll give that recipe a miss but might try Chef Crash's way using butter.

Hi Fanny, I've enjoyed reading this on your blog. If you get the chance, could you please find out how Anna prevents the canneles from rising from their moulds? I've eaten the canneles from PH and love them, and am using the recipe from the Patisserie de Pierre Herme book. I've made them about 25 times and each time, they rise in the moulds - which is so frustrating! Thanks.

When I've eaten them in Vietnam, they used extremely thin rice paper wrappers. I've never found them outside Vietnam so I buy heaps of them whenever i'm there (they keep for quite a long time). The ones I've bought outside Vietnam (both by Thai and Vietnamese producers) are much thicker and need to be soaked in water to make them pliable enough (here's a hint, dip them in cool water rather than hot, no matter what the recipe advises). I don't soak the type I purchased in Vietnam - you can fold them in half and make a crease - they won't break. When fried, the wrappers are very delicate and shatteringly crisp.

I remember reading somewhere that if you want to increase the fat content of cream, to add unsalted melted butter. It makes sense since butter is about 80 per cent butterfat. I think it was Rose Levy Beranbaum who suggested that but I don't remember if it was in one of her books or on her website.

Are the recipes in weights or cup/teaspoon measurements?

At some noodle shops and hot pot places in Hong Kong you can buy small bags of fried fish skins. It's intended to be eaten after being dipped briefly in the hot broth so it absorbs the flavour of the soup but still stays crunchy. I sometimes buy it just to snack on. I'm not sure if it's unhealthy, but I tell myself that I'm getting a good dose of Omega-3 fatty acids which balances any bad effects of eating deep-fried food.

Oh, sorry! I was clicking on the wrong link.

Check out the price now; it's gone back up to $157.50 (a little cheaper than the "normal" Amazon 30 per cent discount). Thank goodness I ordered it when alana first posted - thanks for that.

Wow, thanks for this. Is this the English version? I have the French one but I know I'd use this book more if I didn't have to translate.

I love chicken hearts. I used to stir-fry them with soy sauce, rice wine, a bit of sugar and salt, white pepper and cornstarch. When my aunt makes steamed chicken my cousins and I try to snag all the innards, so maybe you can try that - skip the chicken and just steam the hearts.

There's only one tasting menu at dinner and it's about HK$1,400 (or it was last time I went). It's a really good deal. The three course tasting meal is about HK$500. It's not something to eat every day, even if you can afford it, but it's a very good deal for the quality, amount (it's not really just three courses, since with PG's food, there are several different plates for each course) and most importantly, the effort that goes into making the food.

The pastry chef I worked for in New York (Michael Hu - he's well known for his pulled sugar work) made his own set up. An open-fronted box made of heavy, clear - was it plastic? - not quite sure what it was. The top of the box had a hole that the electric cord went through, hanging into the box was a heat lamp. He had some kind of clamp on top so the heat lamp could be raised and lowered depending on how hot he wanted it to be inside the box. It wasn't pretty but it worked - and I'm sure it didn't cost much.

If you want to order it, ask for loh bok goh (for the turnip cake) and wu tau goh (for the taro cake).

Oh, I forgot to mention, it's plain radish/carrot cake that's used in this dish - the radish/carrot cake itself doesn't contain any meat or seafood.

No, the stir-fried turnip cake is a Malaysian/Singaporean dish (don't get into a discussion between Malaysian and Singaporeans about whose cuisine it belongs to; let them fight it out!). It's usually listed as fried carrot cake because the daikon radish is known as "white carrot". You can have it as "black" (cooked with dark soy) or white. I think it's more common as black - at least that's how I've usually eaten it. It's cooked with egg and bean sprouts with seafood (such as prawns and fish cake) and/or meat. This dish isn't made with rice cakes - that's something entirely different, and char kuay teow (made with rice noodles) is also something else, although cooked with similar flavours. Oh, and when I say dark soy, it's this really thick, dark soy that isn't very salty. It's commonly used in Malaysian/Singaporean/Indonesian cooking but isn't easy to find.

This seems kind of ironic. Wasn't Grange forced to drop the "Hermitage" part of their original name?

Expensive items - like what? There's already things like black truffles, white truffles and caviar on the menu - at least there were white truffles when we first went there. It's such as shame you missed the uni. It used to be on the tasting menu. I'm glad to hear they no longer make the whole table order the tasting menu.

No, you're not crazy. The wrappers can be made of pounded meat - they're sort of a grayish colour, and I believe they can also be made of shrimp. But you might be right about them also containing flour.

Can you give details (including recipe), please? A pictoral of you making them would be much appreciated, too!

Yes, he's chef of the Derby Room at the HK Jockey Club. Ate there a couple weeks ago - it was very good.

Apologies if this topic has been covered; I did search the Japan forum. My cousin is living in Tokyo and is coming to visit me in Hong Kong. She's going to bring food treats such as strawberries, mochi, rice crackers and prawn crackers. What else should I ask for? We don't have customs regulations in Hong Kong (well, they're not really enforced) so she's able to bring all kinds of produce, fresh meats and seafood and even live plants - but I'd like to make it easy on her and ask for things that won't require an ice chest. Any suggestions on special ingredients that are hard to find outside Japan? I'm interested in yuzu products because that's one thing I can't find here - what's the best form to buy it in, other than fresh? Are there bottled yuzu sauces that actually taste of yuzu? And I'm interested in other products such as special Japanese salts, sugars, flavourings etc. She doesn't mind filling her suitcase with stuff for me because I expect she'll return to Japan with her bags filled with new clothes. thanks in advance.

My boyfriend has a microwave-convection oven and when I first started baking at his house, I was doubtful about it. I use it quite a lot now (we have three ovens for baking, a countertop model - what in the states is known as a "toaster oven", the microwave-convection, and a third "conventional" gas oven which I rarely use unless I'm baking large quantitites or pizzas - it's very large). I like it. It's not one of the combi ovens; the microwave and convection settings are separate. My one quibble with it is it doesn't have good bottom heat so the bottoms of breads and tarts aren't as brown as I would like. For bread, I usually take it out of the pan after it's baked and then put directly on the metal oven pan for awhile - that helps brown the bottom. For tarts, I start off at a higher temperature than usual - about 200 degrees Celsiuis, then lower the heat after it starts to brown. It's a Sharp - quite an old model. I rarely use the microwave part of the oven except for melting chocolate and sometimes to reheat stuff.

I went with a group of friends to eat at l'Atelier here in Hong Kong - my friend had booked a table for us and another table for her parents. Both our groups had extremely nice bottles of wine that were almost certainly not on the list (I didn't check). Both groups were willing to buy other bottles of wine and offered to pay corkage - but they wouldn't let us open our bottles; the sommelier said it was policy of all the Ateliers not to allow outside wine. Not sure if he was feeding us a line or if it's the same in New York.

Oh, I loved Sun Dau Kee. I haven't been there for ages. They have amazing pigeon with soy, fish with sweet corn and sweet and sour pork. Yeah, I know the latter two dishes are cliches - but the versions there were really well done. Here's the new address: G/F, 14-18 Cheong Lok Street, Jordan Tel: 2388 6020 I haven't tried it since they moved. It's been re-opened by the staff from the old place.

At most restaurants, 10 per cent is automatically added to the bill. It's listed as "service charge" but it's not a tip as most people would think of it; it frequently does not go to the wait staff. It's used by the restaurant for things like staff training, cleaning uniforms, staff parties etc. Yeah. So I usually add a small amount onto that, hoping (although not certain) that it goes to the staff. My Hong Kong relatives think I am a generous tipper because I often add HK$50 onto a bill - this would be for a group of about 12 for lunch or dinner.