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I'm looking for any dessert suggestions for feeding 200 senior male golfers in the end of Sept.. These men travel and golf at every country club in the region........so I'm looking for something that fits this group of people plus something that probably hasn't been served to them a zillion times at other clubs. They're a fussy group. It has to be something easy to eat and rather familar. My first thought was apple cobbler ala mode. But I bet every chef that doesn't have a pastry chef on staff has made that for them. I'm stuck using salad plates-so the plate design will be limited. I'm also limited with equipment and it can't be a last minute plate up situation. What do a bunch of senior men really want for dessert?

I've seen in one of the old cookbooks I've inherited from my dear grandmother a presentation suggestion for some sort of bread being baked in a small, clay flower pot. Thought about that for the holiday baskets I put together for friends, family and coworkers.... (Is July too early to start thinking about holidays?! ) And while browsing Surly Table yesterday I found PaniMold poplar wood "pans." Anyone have experience with these?

We recently visited Parallel 33 in San Diego where we had the most gorgeous peach pie. Could anyone recommend a recipe? I was enjoying it so much that I didn't stop to consider the ingredients. It was definitely a pie rather than a cobbler. It's not something we make here in Scotland usually! All suggestions very welcome.

So...my mom has asked me to make her wedding cake. She wants a traditional white cake layer, a red velvet layer, and a marble layer, all with a really nice buttercream frosting. Is anyone willing to share recipes? Also, she would like mums made of icing around each layer (the woman loves icing). Any tips, books, websites that can help me make icing mums? Any pictures of cakes with mums? The wedding is in the fall, and she would like rich fall colors - dark burgandies, reds, rust, orange, and golds. How can I make the icing colors really dark and rich without looking...fake and cartoonish? I really need a good how-to website or book for this stuff! This will be the first wedding cake that I have actually stacked. The wedding cake I made before was on a tiered stand. Oh! And her husband-to-be would like me to make upside down cakes for his groom cake. I have a stand that will work well to hold three different sized cakes (16, 12, and 8 inch) and I figured I would make a pineapple, peach, and cherry, but I thought I might see if anyone had any other ideas! I would love to do rhubarb, and I've made a tasty rhubarb upside down cake before, but it wasn't very pretty. I've also made a pear and gingerbread upside down cake that was really nice, but the groom doesn't like gingerbread. Thanks in advance!

Click for pic! A client would like me to do a cake similar to this, and I know how to do all of it except for those little chocolate branches that are sticking out. Actually I'm not even sure about the branches at all. The main part of the trunk and the branches that are adhered to the sides of the cake are dark modeling chocolate (I'm assuming). But maybe not. If the branches that are sticking out are modeling chocolate, then they must be formed over wire, no? Dark modeling chocolate would not stand up on its own like that. I can't imagine those little branches being straight tempered chocolate either.....they're just so delicate and I could see major breakage happening.....especially since there is little sugarpaste buds attached to the ends of them. My best guess is dark modeling chocolate over wire. Anyone have any other guesses?

I have been on a kick lately exploring different kinds of seafood croquettes: Salmon cakes Crab cakes Shrimp cakes While I wouldn't wage that these are uniquely Southern, I was wondering if y'all had any distinct memories of Southern Style seafood cakes/fritters/croquettes. Are they an acceptable breakfast food? Do they go with grits best, or what best accompanies them? Can they be improved upon? I know Louis's in Pawleys Island, SC does a pretty nifty Shrimp and Mushroom Burger which is a similar entity.

Damn it, I just wrote the best memory and description of my favorite cake that I have seen no where other than New Orleans. My finger grazes the ESC key and GONE. Its all Gone. Bullshit Give me your memories on the greatest cake ever and any history you might know of the cake. Thanks When I compose myself I will rewrite it.

Hi Folks, Anyone have a good and fairly painless chocolate mousse recipe? Wedding cake number 2 is next week and I am preparing all my stuff recipes etc. so I won't be overwhelmed. Now that I have my first one under my belt I feel like I can conquer almost anything The cake itself is simple, click here to see what what the customer has requested: Becerra Wedding Cake Three cakes as pictured with the following changes, cake 1 and 3 will have chocolate mousse, cake 2 raspberry filling. Royal frosting spirals will become roses on outer bottom edge with a hint of light blue on the edges of the roses. Side spirals to become string work only done with pearls and top edge will be very small white flowers with a hint of blue. White candles encircled by white roses. Delightful I think.

I spent 35 days in Siena in 1991, 21 in 1994, and returned for a short visit in 1998. I love Siena, and I love panforte! For those of you who haven't yet had the pleasure of tasting (and chewing on) panforte, it is a dense confection of flour, powdered sugar, almonds, candied citron peel, candied melon, I believe honey, and spices. It's so dense that it's sold by the etto (centigram or .100 kilograms). I love almost every type of panforte - margherita, tipo marzapane (in which the almonds are made into a paste instead of kept whole), tipo cioccolato (to which chocolate is added). (There's another type I find less good though certainly acceptable, and I forget its name, but it's spicier [by which I don't mean it has any pepper in it!].) As some of you no doubt know, panforte is made according to a secret formula known only to artisans in Siena and their diehard allies in the wars with Florence in the 14th century, the small walled town of Monteriggioni. All panforti in existence in the world come from either Siena or Monteriggioni. Do you like panforte? What other Italian towns produce unique desserts whose secret formulas have been closely guarded from generation to generation? Please share!

Today I made a wonderful dessert, and the idea was entirely my own! It was a layered confection of pears, sponge cake, nut crumb crust, and goat cheese. The nut crust was a mix of pistachios, almonds, butter and brown sugar, ground finely and baked until crisp. The pears were thin slices glazed with pear liqueur and butter and baked until soft. The goat cheese was, well, goat cheese. The sponge cake was a simple chiffon cake with pear liqueur in place of water. I made all the parts in thin layers, then layered them in a circular ring mold: crust, pear, cheese, cake, cheese, pear crust. Delicious. Here are some pictures, but unfortunately the middle is a bit washed out. This is the cake before eating... and with a chunk cut out of it: If you guys want specific recipes for any of the components, let me know.

For a week. O.k.?

I would like to rebuttle a fellow eg members view on pre-made purchased desserts. I am a small wholesale company in Long Island NewYork. I supply 15 restaurants on mine own and others through distributors. My desserts are hand crafted using molds and the latest techniques, but still remaining true to the dessert form and flavor. My desserts are neither over sweet or overly done, quality ingredients and not to much foo foo. I dont wish to replace my fellow pastry chefs and artisians. We all get in a bind once in awhile so I offer a convenient aid to the ever increasing hard ships we indure in the enviroments we work. I do however wish to replace those huge hunks of cakes on dessert plates of the presence, cut down the portion size and intensify the flavor, the whole time retaining the integrity of the product and respect for our craft. I also wish to replace desserts that are made by chefs (Exec) just so they can have desserts to offer, what a slap in the face!

At a Seattle-area gathering last night, FWED's contribution was an Exotic Orange Cake he learned at the World Pastry Competition. I have to say that it was one of the best desserts I've ever had in my mouth. FWED, please post the recipe so I, and all of our fellow cake-lovers can try it and swoon!

I am looking for suggestions for a dessert that would go with a Pennsylvannia Dutch meal. Something traditional may work best. What do you guys think?

The Jewish New Year is approaching and I am looking for a moist honey cake recipe. I have tried a number of recipes and they are all dry. I am very careful not to overcook them; I just haven't been able to find the same moist cake that I buy at my local bakery. I would like to make my own and give them as gifts.

I am what is certain to be a stupid question - How do you select fruit flavors that complement cheese in a cheesecake? I have tried Mango, Strawberry and they work well ( I have also tried saffron with success) However we ate a guava cheesecake at a friends and did not care for it much - perhpas its personal taste but it was a bit strange What other flavors would work? which ones dont.. is there a rhyme or reason to select certain flavors

I need it. Who's got it?

Tonight a friend mentioned that he doesn't know where to find New York style cheesecake in the Dallas area. I decided to bring his quest here, but to open it up to the best cheesecakes in the state of whatever style your heart desires. I have had a pumpkin cheesecake during the holidays as had my friend, commercially made and pretty good, but I had to agree with him that it was a different breed of cheesecake than New York style; it was airy and light compared to that dense, dense NY style that I used to drive 20 minutes through the swampy woods to get at the Lakawana Diner in Morristown, New Jersey many years ago. So, whate's your favorite and where can we find it?

I remember liking the cupcakes I had when CakeLove first opened. Hadn't been back lately, but stopped by the new Love Cafe (across the street from the original CakeLove store) last night. Nice digs, but man were the pastries we had bad. I had a 'sassy' crunchy foot (a mini-bundt cake with mango, cayenne and supposedly something else I'm forgetting), which was rather dry, pretty much without any discernable flavors and had a very slight hint of cayenne on the end. The cupcakes ($2 each) were also dry and topped with a buttercream icing that was, oh... 98% butter (so rich, I thought it was repulsive). Don't know if the cakes were just sitting out too long, I was there on the wrong night, or what, but you could easily whip up something twice as good as these.

Hallelujah! I loved your two books, read them lingeringly, limiting myself to as essay a day like really good pieces of chocolate (OK, so occasionally I binged and read five at a time), and I even conducted a long drawn out campaign to get my office - I write for a financial newspaper - to subscribe to Vogue, arguing that it was next to impossible to report accurately on international business trends without regular reference to Vogue. I got unexpected support from an editor who, I think, was more interested in the lingerie models, but I wasn't complaining. And the magazines arrived and it turned out they'd got us British Vogue.... But yes, sitting here in Bombay, it hurt bitterly to read your comments on Indian desserts, and I cried silently into my kulfi, wondering if there were Mexican fans somwhere choking down sobs along with their fried grasshoppers. I can't entirely blame you though. The very few times I've eaten in Indian restaurants out of India the desserts have been generally unspeakable - stale sugary barfis, kulfis that were more crystals that creamy, greasy halwas, and above all, really leaden heavy gulab jamuns, a dessert that is served everywhere, but VERY difficult to get right, even here in India. Added to that, there's the problem of the extra-sweetness and intense milk flavours, and here there's nothing much that can be done - either you're one of those people who go for it, and such people tend to really trip on Indian desserts, or just hope you get used to it. I note that when people do take to Indian desserts they tend to be things like phirni (rice pudding) or, as you mention, ras malai, which are somewhat less sweet & milky than the average. The biggest problem though is that food writers, particularly in the US, very rarely seem to try Indian at all, so the chances of them eating good Indian are pretty low (of course, with eGullet's own Suvir in action at Amma the odds for should be rising rapidly). Has Alan Richman ever eaten an Indian meal? After years of reading his stuff in GQ, I've never read of the merest morsel of tandoori chicken passing his lips. So too with many other food writers, which is why it was great to read you've done a trip here and April is too long to wait to read about it. I only hope for two things. One, you didn't just go to that awful city up north called Delhi and eat north Indian Punjabi-Mughlai food in the course of the Delhi-Agra-Jaipur quickie which is what too many Americans mean by visiting India. That food can be good enough - though not the debased form of it that's the staple of most Indian restaurants abroad - but there's lots more interesting stuff in the regions, so please tell me you went to the south, or came here to Bombay (even Indians don't go to the east, which is a pity, since Bengali food can be fabulous). And second, if you did get out to the regions, I hope you got out of your hotel room and ate around a bit. It amazes me how many food writers finally come all the way to India and then don't seem to have the guts to get out of their hotel room. A.A.Gill comes and nominates Kandahar at the Oberoi Hotel as the best Indian restaurant ever. R.W.Apple says the best Malayali (not Keralan, you can read my rant on this in the Indian room on this site) food is in the restaurant at, surprise surprise Brunton's Boatyard the hotel he just happens to be staying in. These aren't bad places, but honestly doesn't it seem to suggest a certain lack of motivation somewhere? I certainly wouldn't expect it of you.... remember, we have ways of reaching your rasmalai... Vikram

Recently I have been playing allot with food influences from the subcontinent of India. There are of course a wide array of spices, and fruit that are used there (all which are very interesting). I have had some success with infusing chocolate with whole toasted spice, by letting the chocolate sit in the same airtight container as the spices. I have also experimented quite a bit with adding yogurt to ganaches (on a 1 to 1 ratio) and have had some excellent results. Just was wondering if any one had some creative ideas in the way of flavor combinations?

My shop will be throwing a big party at the end of April, and I want to commission an elaborate cake -- probably in the shape of a pile of books (since it's a bookshop) -- for about 200 people. Anybody have any recommendations in the NYC area? I'm looking for something beautiful, yummy, and (ideally) not so expensive that I have to ummm...toss off motorists on the West Side Highway to pay the freight (with apologies to Tony).

Does anyone make Black Cake for Christmas? Or know any great places to buy it? Or have any good recipes. I am trying to complete a history on it ... and want to find out how it's made and finished in different areas and homes. Theabroma

I'm teaching a class for a group of women in a couple of weeks on asian cooking. I was wondering if any of you had any ideas. I am not allowed to use alcohol or tea in anything... So can you think of something relatively simple with an Asian flavor? Edited to correct my hideous punctuation - I think. Ellen

Hi, Just wondering if anyone has ever prepared or eaten Tres Leche Cake? (It's a popular Mexican cake soaked in 3 milks). It's my first time with these and I want to make some individual portions as a dessert special. Apparently they are commonly topped with browned meringue or whipped cream. I'm thinking things like caramel, coconut, rum, vanilla, chilies etc. could be used in the accompanying sauces or garnishes. I'm thinking I could make them in small ring molds or in triangular terrine pans. Any suggestions welcome. Have a nice day! BB