Revenge is Sweet
If the Japanese can send us Beard Papa and the Koreans PinkBerry, it’s only fair that we send something back, doncha think?
READ ONAuthor: joepastry
Making Ze Choux
Did I remember to say it’s pronounced like “shoe”? No matter. Making choux is a simple process, mostly just stirring. The traditional method is to simply use a wooden spoon, though a lot of people use food processors nowadays. Me, I can’t tell much of a difference between the methods, so I figure, why dirty […]
READ ONScrape-O-Matic
Also in the New York Times food section today an item about a beater (a.k.a. “paddle”) attachment that does your bowl scraping for you: the BeaterBlade. This new piece of gadgetry from New Metro Design is evidently meant to compete with the SideSwipe Spatula Mixer Blade that came out earlier this year. Both promise to […]
READ ONFall of a Southern Icon
It seems the initial fears over the purchase of the White Lily flour company by the J.M. Smucker company were justified. By the end of the month the historic White Lily Mill in Knoxville, Tennessee will shut its doors for good. It seems insane that in a day where the food world is on fire […]
READ ONPardon me, your Holiness.
In yesterday’s laundry list of things made with pâte à choux I neglected to include pâte à choux beignets, which are essentially deep fried spoonfuls of choux paste. Dropped into hot oil or fat, they blow up into incredibly light, practically transparent, puffs which are then sprinkled with powdered sugar and eaten. These delicate little […]
READ ONWhat is Pâte à Choux?
People call it choux for short. The word literally means cabbage in French, and if you’re wondering how a pastry dough (batter, really) made of eggs, butter and flour ever got that name, reflect for a moment on the knobbly top of a cream puff and you’ll get it. Choux dough (batter, really) is, along […]
READ ONWhat is an Éclair?
The word éclair means literally “lightning” in French. How and why this particular word came to denote an elongated single-serving pastry filled with custard nobody knows — and I mean nobody. Browsing through the typical food history reference, you get the impression they’re all eager for you to just move on to the next entry. […]
READ ONA little of the old switcheroo
Since my “How-To” menu over on the right seemed a little rambling and incoherent, I decided to organize it into sub-categories like “Bread”, “Pastry”, “Components” and such. Now instead of looking confusing it simply looks pathetic (with about five entries under each heading). Just means I’ve got a lot more blogging to do, eh? This […]
READ ONBrick oven sea legs
How’s that for a mixed image? But it’s true, I really think I’m getting the hang of this brick oven now, so much so that I’m confident enough to put up a post, How to Fire a Brick Oven over on the menu on the right. It’s rewritten/expanded version of one of the posts I […]
READ ONGotta Love that Osage Orange
Did a test burn with some of this bright yellow osage orange (hedge apple) wood on Wednesday. The results were spectacular. Granted it took a good deal longer than I’d hoped (7 hours from start to finish…it’s very dense stuff) but you can’t argue with the numbers: 900-degree oven walls and floor and a 1000+ […]
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