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My supplier decided that cocoa butter is now special order so I had to buy a case. And now I have an excessive amount of cocoa butter, anyone need any? Cacao Barry cocoa butter pistoles with a best by date of April 2021 $66 for the 3 kg tub or $22 per kg plus shipping.

Has anyone used Valrhona Absolut Crystal neutral glaze particularly to thicken a coulis or to glaze a tart? If so, how did you like it and is there another glaze you think worked as well but is less expensive or can be purchased in smaller quantities?

A mistake was made with my Albert Uster order this week and I received it twice. Since it's shipped from CA, doesn't go bad, and I'll use it eventually, I'm not going to mess with trying to return the second delivery. But now I have a huge amount of inventory so I thought I'd see if anyone here was looking for Felchlin by the bag. Each bag is 2kg (4# 7oz) in the following varieties and prices: Maracaibo Creole 49%, $48 Sao Palme 60%, $30 Arriba 72%, $46 As for shipping, I can fit 2 bags in a medium flat rate box for $14 or 3 bags in a large box for $19 to go anywhere in the USA. If you'd like some, PM me with your selection, email, and shipping address. I'll invoice you via Square and you can pay securely online with a credit card. Thanks for reading!

So, what is everyone doing for the pastry & baking side of Easter? I'm working on the following chocolates: fruit & nut eggs, hollow bunnies, Jelly Belly filled bunnies, coconut bunnies, dragons (filled with rice krispies & chocolate), peanut butter hedgehogs, and malted milk hens. Hoping to finish my dark chocolate production today and get started on all my milk chocolate items. My father-in-law will be baking the traditional family Easter bread a day or two before Easter. Its an enriched bread and he makes two versions -- one with raisins and one without (I prefer the one with raisins). And I was lucky enough to spot this couple in the sale moulds stock at last year's eGullet chocolate & confections workshop in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario. These love bunnies help so very much with Easter chocolate production! ;-)

Anyone have a favorite recipe for chocolate cake using semisweet chocolate? My usual chocolate cake recipe uses cocoa, but I have some samples of chocolate I want to use up for a workplace party. Yes, I could make brownies or ganache frosting, or chocolate mousse or chocolate chunk cookies, just feeling like cake this weekend ...

@Smithy Your request gave me the imputes to finally word-process the recipe. My DW use Excel, which drives me to distraction. Mom's Apple Raisin Walnut Cranberry Pie 4 baking apples, peeled, cored, and sliced 1 cup golden raisins 1 cup walnuts 1 cup fresh cranberries 1/4 cup flour 1 cup sugar 2 tablespoons margarine or butter 2 pie crusts to fit a 9- or 10-inch pie pan Heat oven to 425F. In a large bowl, mix the first four ingredients. In a small bowl, mix the flour and sugar together. Sprinkle the flour/sugar mixture over the large bowl, mixing lightly with fingers. Place first pie crust into pie pan, pricking with a fork. Pour the fruit mixture into the pie shell. Dot with the margarine or butter, then cover with second pie crust, crimping edges together and making sure top crust is vented. Bake at 425F for 15 minutes, then turn down oven to 350F for about 45 minutes. *** I use Braeburn apples ***

Posted 6 hours ago Dear EGulleters, ResearchBunny here. I've just found you today. I've been lolling in bed with a bad cold, lost voice, wads of tissues, pillows, bedding around me. I spent all of yesterday binge-watching Season 2 of Zumbo's Just Desserts on Netflix from beginning to grand finale. I have been a hardcore devotee of Rose Levy Beranbaum since the beginning of my baking passion -- after learning that she wrote her master's thesis comparing the textural differences in cake crumb when using bleached versus unbleached flour. I sit up and pay attention to that level of serious and precision! While Beranbaum did study for a short while at a French pastry school, she hasn't taken on the challenge of writing recipes for entremets style cakes. That is, multi-layer desserts with cake, mousse, gelatin, nougatine or dacquoise layers all embedded in one form embellished with ice cream, granita, chocolate, coulis. After watching hours of the Zumbo contest, I became curious about the experience of designing these cakes. Some of the offered desserts struck me as far too busy, others were delightful combinations. I was surprised that a few contestants were eliminated when their offerings were considered too simple or, too sophisticated. So I'd like to hear from you about your suggestions for learning more about how to make entremets. And also, what you think about the show. And/or Zumbo. Many thanks. RB ps. The show sparked a fantasy entremet for my cold. Consider a fluffy matzo ball exterior, with interior layers of carrot, celery, a chicken mince, and a gelatin of dilled chicken broth at its heart!

I'm very excited to share with you all a recipe that I developed for a double crust apple pie. I had been inspired a few weeks ago to come up with a series of 3-ingredient recipes that would focus on technique and flavor but still be simple enough for the unseasoned chef. I decided to make an apple pie as a challenge to myself--never having made one before--and as a way to show those who might find pastry intimidating how easy and adaptable it can be. Basic Shortcrust Pastry Ingredients: - 300g flour - 227g salted butter, cold - 2 lemons, zested with juice reserved 1. Cut butter into small chunks. Beat butter, zest of the 2 lemons, and flour together with an electric mixer OR combine with pastry blender OR rub together with fingers OR blitz in a food processor until it resembles sand. 2. Add just enough water to bring the mix together into a dough (about 20g for me). You'll know your pastry is ready when you can press it together and it stays in one piece. 3. Divide dough in two and wrap tightly with plastic. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours, or overnight. 4. When ready to use, roll out each portion to 13 inches in diameter. (I do this between two sheets of parchment paper. Don't worry too much if the parchment sticks to the pastry. I periodically placed mine in the freezer to help keep everything cold, and the butter will separate from the parchment when frozen.) 5. Take 1 portion of rolled dough and place it in a 9-inch tart tin with a removable bottom. Gently press into the sides to ensure even coverage. Place in the freezer for 30 minutes. Freeze the other portion of dough in-between the parchment pieces. Apple Filling (and Assembly) - 1 kg apples (I used about 7 apples for this recipe.) - 220g dark brown sugar, divided - 1 egg, separated Making the apple butter: 1. Cut and core 500g of your apples, but do not peel. Add cut apples, juice of the one lemon, about 100g or so of water, and 170g of sugar to a large saucepan. 2. Bring to a boil over high heat, reduce to a simmer and cover. Let the apples cook for 20-30 minutes or until tender. 3. Remove from heat and blend until smooth. 4. Return puree to saucepan and simmer uncovered over low heat, stirring occasionally, for an hour. Color should deepen and the mixture should thicken slightly, but do not allow it to scorch. 5. Remove from heat and refrigerate until cool. Apple filling: 1. Peel, quarter, and core the remaining 500g of apples. Slice on a mandolin to about 1/8th inch thickness. Place sliced apples in a large bowl of cold water while slicing remaining apples. 2. Once apples are sliced, drain water and add the juice from the remaining lemon, as well as the remaining 50g of sugar, over the apples. Stir to coat. Assembly: 1. Remove pie base from the freezer. Dock with a fork and brush on egg white. Place back in the freezer and allow to set for for about 5-10 minutes. 2. Pour the entire recipe of apple butter into the pie base and even out with an offset spatula. 3. Arrange apple slices over the apple butter. 4. Remove remaining pie dough from the freezer and cut designs in while still cold. Transfer to the surface of the pie and seal overhanging edges. Trim excess dough. 5. Brush top pastry with egg yolk (beaten with any remaining egg white) and bake in a 365˚F oven for 60-70 minutes. Crust should be shiny and golden brown. 6. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely before removing from tin. Some notes: The reason for using salted butter is I think the flavor incorporates a little better into the mix than if I were to use unsalted butter and added salt. That being said, you could do that instead, though your recipe would then have 7 ingredients The addition of apple butter here takes the place of the normal apple pie filling, which is usually thickened with cornstarch and is typically quite sweet. By using the apple butter, I push the flavor of apple forward beyond what you would find in a typically apple pie. Also, the apple butter acts as a glue of sorts so that my slices are always clean, so no need to resort to adding thickeners or extra sweeteners. I'm always looking for a way around blind baking, and using an egg white seal has worked out very well for me. The egg white creates a water-tight layer between the crust and the filling, so no matter how wet my filling is, the crust will always bake crispy and won't get soggy for as long as the pie is around. Feel free to change this up as you see fit. Obviously you can spices to this (I recommend cinnamon, clove, and cardamom) but the beauty of this pie is that it's really not necessary. Although at first blush it may seem one-noted, the harmony between the flaky, almost savory crust and the bright and refreshing filling is one that doesn't need any help, in my honest opinion. So there you have it! My 6-ingredient apple pie, sure to become a go-to for me, and hopefully for you as well!

After batting about .500 with my previous approach to macarons, I came across Pierre Herme's base recipe online. After two flawless batches of macarons, I've been re-energized to continue to work at mastering them. Specifically, I want to try more of his recipes. My conundrum is that he has, as far as I can tell, two macaron cookbooks and I don't know which one I should get. I can't tell if one is just an updated version of the other or a reissue or what the differences really are. I was hoping somebody had some insight. I have searched online and haven't seen both books referenced in the same context or contrasted at all. This one appears to be older. And this one appears to be the newer of the two. Any insight would be helpful. Thanks,

Hi all, Hopefully someone can help me with this? I really enjoy making tartalettes of sorts. When baking the dough rises a lot meaning that there is not really a lot of space to fill with something nice. I am using glutenfree flour (Peak's All Purpose) and have tried blind baking them. But from my first blind baking try, it seems that the bottom stays raw. Have put it back in the oven 'unblinded' (can i use this term? :)) but still its not the way i want it. Could sure use some tips on how to get these tartalettes nice and thin. Thanks in advance to anyone who tries to help, i appreciate it. regards

Hi I'm new to this forum and new at baking as well. I recently attempted my first Swiss roll. The recipe is from a book, I own and it is as follows... - 4 eggs - 100g caster sugar - 75g + 2 tablespoons self raising flour. ( I replaced the suggested 2 tablespoons of cocoa powder with flour) I also made my own self raising flour with baking powder and salt, but the measurement was a little off when the flour was weighed. The outcome: It turned out smelling of raw eggs and tasted like egg too. While I was whisking the eggs and sugar, I read how it should be beaten for 10 minutes, however, I didn't keep track of the time and probably overbeat since I started smelling raw eggs and the mixture would drop in blobs and then trail and blob down and trail. I thought the smell of raw eggs would disappear once it cooked. After folding in the flour, and baking it for 10 minutes, I took out and proceed to roll it. However, when peeling off the parchment paper the sides and bottom of the cake was really sticky. After unrolling to put in the filling, the top of the cake tore a patch off the sticky bottom surface. I decided to try a student recipe on how to beat the eggs and sugar. So I tried the second time, with a smaller recipe as follows. 2 eggs 50g caster sugar 50g self raising flour So this time, I felt like the mixture was good to go, before it turned into a huge blob and decided to stop my 550w stand mixer. I don't know if beating till 10 minutes would have ruined it... I didn't smell as much raw eggs as I previously did. However this time I baked it at 170C for 15 minutes ( they didn't state any temperature and timing was wrong and gathered info from commenters and my oven's manual ), however after removing the parchment paper off the flan dish this time, the bottom was STILL sticky but not as before. However, it still had a raw or fried eggy.

On the subject of modern plated desserts: I have noticed a recent trend that has caught my attention - the flexible/pliable ganache (sometimes called the flexicurd). Now, I have made a few recipes for these types of desserts, which have turned out well (Specifically the Alinea Cookbook chocolate pliable ganache). Another recipe can be seen here on page 68. (ingredients listed below) 375 g chocolate 1 sheet gelatin 50 g water 100 g sorbitol 3 g agar 50 g glucose 900 g heavy cream 2 g salt Now, my question is this: does anyone know of a good way to modify this recipe (or of any others) to accommodate other flavors? I have seen some very interesting pliable ganaches, such as yogurt, beet, grapefruit, coconut, etc. However, there doesn't seem an obvious way to modify these recipes. For a lot of dessert components this is as simple as changing a fruit puree to another flavored liquid. I am not so confident in this due to the fact that the recipes contain a lot of chocolate, which contributes significant textural properties. To further complicate this, I know some hydrocolloids are sensitive to pH (pectin) or ion concentrations (LA gellan, carrageenan). Anyone have experience with this?

I am hoping an experienced baker-gifter may have an answer for me. I would be very interested to know the shelf life of various cookies like shortbread/sable, chocolate chip, crinkle cookies, biscotti and the like. Friends and family have asked me to make these for teachers' and other gifts (for co-workers, the vet, etc). I know full well that some of the recipients won't eat them as soon as they get them, so I want to label them with small "enjoy by..." notes. I know amaretti cookies last for ages, and many other cookies seem to sit for months on grocery store shelves. The recipes I have are with butter, and regular household ingredients (so no invert sugar to prolong freshness, and no shortening to replace the butter etc). So what shelf life can I expect these cookies to have?

Hi everyone!!! Does anyone have a good neutral glaze recipe that doesn't use pectin but still uses some thermo reversible gels? Even recipes with gelatin leaves are already a big help! In my country is rather common to do mirror glaze (or sort of) using cornflour, but as you can imagine, it doesn't look or taste the same as the professional glazes do. Because it's only for a small amount of fruit tarts and pastries I would like to be able to do my own glaze instead of buying those 5kg buckets. Thanks guys!!!

Has anyone seen this book? I've sort of been eyeballing it the last few weeks, and just saw today that its apparently not on pre-order anymore, but available to ship from Amazon. Looks like a nice CIA text on dessert, heres the table of contents: Ch1 The Basic Elements 1 Ch2 Pre-Desserts 105 Ch3 Plated Desserts 163 Ch4 Dessert Buffets 261 Ch5 Passed-Around Desserts 331 Ch6 Cakes (Entremets) 381 Ch7 Petits Fours (Mignardises) 449 Anyone have thoughts on this one? I'm tempted, but dont really know much about it. LINK

Hi there. I was hoping someone could give me some ideas on desserts to make using dijon mustard. Nothing comes to mind, and there's not much I can find online either. Thanks in advance!!

Hi guys! I got excited to post something as this is my first one. So, the top 3 desserts I like to eat when I was still in Philippines were Halu-halo (literally means mix-mix in english), brazo de mercedes and chocolate crinkles. 1. HALU-HALO is one of the popular food during summer. This is basically: shaved ice with evaporated milk, sugar, and the following: - nata de coco (coconut cream based on a google search, these are cube-like jellies), - sweetened red beans, - sweetened bananas, - cooked sago or tapioca, - ube or purple yam, - leche flan (this is also one of the best desserts to eat), - macapuno (made of coconut), - sweetend jackfruit, - sweetened kamote (this is similar to sweet potato but caramelized), - sweetened kaong (sugar palm fruit) - and topped with a scoop of ice cream. These fruits are usually bought in jars (found mostly in Asian grocery stores). You basically put the fruits at the bottom, add sugar (if you want because almost all the fruits are sweetened so it's already sweet), then you fill the cup/bowl with shaved ice and add milk. And most importantly, mix it well before you eat because you don't want to eat shaved ice with milk only and then eat the really sweet fruits last. 2. BRAZO DE MERCEDES Yah, I think the name is Spanish? I tried making this but I just failed. It's kinda hard to do and takes a lot of patience but it's really worth it. This is my favourite cake! In Philippines, most bakeries sell this but my favourite is from Goldiluck's which is located in shopping malls. Brazo de Mercedes recipe 3. CHOCOLATE CRINKLES These are my favourite chocolate cookies! I think this one isn't really from Philippines but they are really popular. I was kinda shocked when I came here in Canada, because they don't sell these cookies in the bakeries I've been to so I tried baking these on my own. Since my post is getting long, I'll put the recipe as a link at the bottom. http://sweb2.dmit.na...rinkles-recipe/ I hope you enjoyed my post! Happy eating and baking everyone!

Whilst on holiday in Skiathos this Summer we visited a pattiserrie in the town a couple of times to take away a box of his absolutely amazing cakes. They were'nt anything like the dense oily phyllo pastry type cakes we've seen and eaten before but wonderfully custardy confections with a very light almost 'brick' type pastry. Of course these could just have been the bakers own creations but I'd love to try replicating something similar. There seems to be a real scarcity of recipes for greek pastries though. Can anyone reccommend any books or websites that might get me started?

Just two days ago I received my order for Christophe Felder book ' patisserie'. I was so excited walking out from the post office only to come home to find out that it is written in French! So I went online and hunt around to see of this awesome book actually comes in English version, it does and it will be published on february next year! I pre ordered the English version, but right now I am just picture browsing on the French one. Tee hee I would highly recommend this book for dessert lovers because of its step by step photos and the amazing stuff and ideas in it. It's pink too!

Hi everyone, I'd like to make some eclairs to take to an event with lots of people bringing food - because there'll be a variety of (tasty) stuff I'd like to make my eclairs really small so they're not too filling and people can try them (also I think they'll look cute). Is there any reason I couldn't pipe out very skinny choux lines and hopefully end up with dainty little puffs? Ideally the final baked size would be about 8 - 10cm long and less than an inch wide... but i'm wondering if they may not expand properly or have a solid shell or something... anyone know? Cheers, Stuart

Is it possible? I've always done mine in small batches (meaning 14 or 28 at a time) in a regular oven; I am going to be getting requests for 150+ and I would really like to use the convection oven (low fan). I'll have time to try it out mid-Sept when things calm down, but thought I'd see if anyone is making it like that now; or has in the past and can either reassure me it's possible or save me from wasting the ingredients Basically, it's an egg foam (whole eggs beaten with sugar), with melted chocolate and butter that has a hot sugar syrup added to it, then that is added to the eggs and it's baked in a bain marie. I always get a crust on mine, it breaks up when the cake is compressed down after coming out of the oven (I always push down on the whole ones with the bottom of a tart pan, or for my individuals, a smaller round pan that fits inside the 3" round pan. This way, there is little chance the cake will be "sunken" on the sides - but if that were to happen, we'd just fill it out with some semi-firm ganache.

this is my recipe that i use for chocolate pudding--when made in very small batches, it always comes out nice and creamy and i can freeze it too! but when i try making it in larger numbers, obviously i need a larger pot and inevitably it ends up getting grainy the majority of the time and it always gets burnt bits in the bottom of the pot since theres so much surface area 1g milk 8# sugar 7c corn starch 52oz egg yolks 44c semisweet chocolate 12oz vanilla 24oz butter i know i've got the weights i use for corn starch and chocolate laying around in one of my notebooks, but thats the jist of it i dissolve the corn starch in some milk, heat up the milk, sugar, and egg yolks. once thats nice & hot, i add the corn starch slurry and bring that to a boil. normally in smaller quantities i would add the chocolate directly to this mixture to melt it, but in the larger quantities i'll melt the chocolate separately and once the corn starch mixture has come to a boil, i'll add the melted chocolate and bring it all together. finally once its cooled down a bit i'll add the butter to finish it. my question is, in order to keep this recipe, is there any...."shortcut" (and i say that in quotations because i don't mean shortcut for time, more like a tip that would help me cook such a large quantity with a greatly reduced chance to make it go grainy) i tried adding the pudding over the chocolate and let the residual heat melt it, but that just ended up leaving me huge chunks of chocolate---which i brought the cooked pudding back up on the heat and melted the chocolate pieces, and strangely enough, it came out creamy i just love how tricky it can be multiplying a small recipe x 100 haha well, any assistance with this topic i would really appreciate it thanks!

Hi everyone! I was wondering if someone can give me a good white chocolate brownie recipe, I've been changing a few brownie recipes and everything messes up when I change dark chocolate for white chocolate. Butter seems to split and consistency gets totally wrong. I'm just looking for a fudgy and dense white chocolate cake that resembles a brownie. Thanks in advance! Lia

A slightly less heart-stopping version of a classic. Ingredients - Dough 4 C unbleached all-purpose flour 1 C quinua flour * 1 C panela / piloncillo / demerrera / the darkest brown sugar you can find 2 C tepid water 1/2 oz active dry yeast 8 TBSP light extra-virgin olive oil, plus a bit more (see instructions) Ingredients - Filling 1 block (about 6 oz) bittersweet chocolate, grated 6-8 TBSP panela / piloncillos / demerrera etc. 3 TBSP ground cinnamon 1 TBSP ground ishpingo (optional - it's not available outside of Ecuador) A handful of golden raisins (optional, but I really like them) 1/2 C finely-chopped walnuts (optional) Ingredients - Caramel (optional, but very tasty) 1/4 C panela / piloncillo / demerrera etc. 1/2 C light corn syrup 1 TBSP butter, melted Hardware Mixing bowls Measuring cups 10" round, deep pans (or deep-dish pie plates) Measuring tape Sharp knife Method 1. Sift the flours together. 2. In your choice of cup or bowl, mix the water and the sugar together, then add the yeast. Allow to bloom 10-15 minutes (or until you've got a good froth going) 3. Stir the yeast up, then add it to the flour along with the olive oil. Knead until slightly elastic and resilient. This is a fairly slack dough with a texture similar to brioche, and because of the sugar it will never get to the point where it's not slightly sticky. 4. Lightly grease your bowl with a bit more evoo, and slip the dough into it. Set it in a warmish, non-drafty place to rise until slightly more than doubled in bulk. 5. Punch down and divide into two balls (use your scale to make sure they're even. When I do this, they're about 1 lb 8 oz each.) 6. Roll one ball into a rectangle roughly 14" by however long, and about 1/8" thick. 7. Brush the surface of the dough with a bit of evoo, then sprinkle about half of the filling on and spread it around until it's fairly evenly distributed. Sprinkle on the raisins and nuts if you're using them. Leave a margin of about 1/4" at the edges of the dough. 8. Starting on the shorter end of the rectangle, roll up the dough. 9. In a bowl, mix together the ingredients for the caramel. 10. Grease the pans well. Then divide the caramel between the two, spreading it so that it covers the bottom of the pans. 10a. If you're like me, now place 7 walnut halves upside down into the caramel - one in the center, and six around it. This is an optional step, but I'm really fond of pralinized walnuts on top of my buns. 11. Measure the roll, and divide it into 7 sections. Place each section in the pan - one in the center, and six around it. Press them down slightly so that they're touching. 12. Cover the pans and set them aside to proof for about 20-25 minutes, or until poofy. 13. Heat your oven to 350 F / 180 C 14. Bake 30 minutes (this is for my altitude - yours may take longer if you're closer to sea level) or until the tops of the buns are lightly golden. 15. Unmold almost immediately onto your choice of a wire rack or a foam cake base (I use cake bases) - this prevents the caramel from sticking to your pan. * Quinua flour can be hard to source outside of South America. Good substitutes include Amaranth, Millet, and Spelt.

I want to make mascarpone sorbet or sherbet (a la Thomas Keller and others) but cannot find mascarpone. Is there a reasonable substitute for this application? I've seen several variations, all including cream cheese, heavy cream and either sour cream, butter or creme fraiche. Pretty sure these would be acceptable in a savory dish but I'm not sure about a frozen dessert. Your experience is appreciated.