Guff from the Corn Belt

I had a feeling I wouldn’t get off scott-free from last week’s post on ethanol, and sure enough when I went home to Chicago last week, I didn’t. Wondering exactly what business a baker has criticizing the ethanol lobby, select ag interests (i.e. family and friends) invited me to put a sock in it. Flour […]

READ ON

First it was dairy…

…and now, of course, it’s flour. No surprise there since farmers like all other business people are driven by profit. If corn is where the money is and they have the option to grow it, then they’ll grow it. That of course leaves less land on which to grow other things, like wheat, which means […]

READ ON

Dork, Interrupted…again

A series of minor calamities kept me from posting much today. I didn’t even get to bake off the cake layer that I was planning to glaze. It’s the way things go when you’re preparing for spring break, which for U of L begins tomorrow. The Pastry clan is/was supposed to be getting out of […]

READ ON

Yes MSG?

Interesting to see the New York Times attempting to quell a little food hysteria instead of their normal practice of fanning its flames. This article is a surprisingly balanced look at an additive that’s been causing fits of (media induced) apoplexy for 40 years.

READ ON

The Confectionary Phases of Sugar

Crack, speed ball…oh no wait, that’s what Amy Winehouse had for breakfast this morning. What I meant to say was thread, soft ball, firm ball, hard ball, soft crack, hard crack. These are the phases that a sugar syrup passes through as it “cooks”. The names are inspired by the form a drop of the […]

READ ON

What about the corn syrup?

Oh yes, I got so busy talking about sugar and crystals I almost forgot about the corn syrup portion of the recipe. Regular readers may remember several posts on corn syrup from last fall in which I drew an analogy between a bottle of Karo and a cement mixer filled mostly with ball bearings (free […]

READ ON

What’s going on with the oven?

Friend and regular reader Warren checked in a couple of days ago with this note: Hi Joe, I like the way you are formatting the site lately, the tips and hints etc side bar is really great, although I have got used to going back over the threads and getting lost in the esoterica scattered […]

READ ON

What’s the point of all this?

The point is that crystal sugar is grainy. You can’t make a smooth icing out of it. In order to create a smooth and glossy icing, you first have to melt those sugar crystals down and disperse their molecules in water. Which is to say, you have to make a syrup. And fondant syrups (as […]

READ ON