[aaronatthedoublef]

Happy belated birthday!

[aaronatthedoublef]

Ahhh. I misunderstood. I looked up SFBI and found it in San Francisco. I was looking for classes by them in Chicago. I'll look for Chocolate. Thanks. I grew up in Chicago and much of my family is still there.

Frontera used to be great. But the last time I was there it was a little disappointing. But that was one lunch five or so years ago so it might have been a fluke.

My favorite barbeque is still there but it's down in Hyde Park so a bit out of your way. And Giordano's is still my favorite pizza but that may just be out of nostalgia.

I don't remember the name (I'll get it for you if you're interested) but there is a great bakery up in Evanston run by a member of a team that won the International Pastry Cup. And if you're up that way and are a John Hughes fan and have the time, Molly Ringwald's house from "16 Candles" was for sale so you could call a realtor and go on a showing.

[aaronatthedoublef]

I went to KAF twice in two weeks recently. Their Vermont shop is about 15 minutes from where my kids were going to summer camp.

Everyone was really nice but the baked goods were a little disappointing. Some of it may have been my choices - croissants that were made fresh in the morning may not last the whole day. But it is a nice place with a nice feel to it.

Walmart has a lot of different KAF products but no pastry flour. They do have Bob's Red Mill however and it's a bit less expensive I think - especially if you batch it up and have an order over $50.

I still like the recipe roundups I get from KAF so I'll stay on their email list.

I'll have to check out SFBI in Chicago. I'm always looking for an excuse to head back there and I even have a free room.

[aaronatthedoublef]

I was at Costco yesterday and, like Luvpyrpom found vanilla with vanilla, water, and alcohol. It was also $17 for a pint so I bought a bunch of bottles. I may try making my own but I believe it needs to steep for a while so this should tide me over until it's ready.

I also ran buy Target on the way home and they had McCormick. The ingredients were also simple - vanilla, water, and alcohol.

We keep our ginger in the freezer and then shave it off when we need it. Never tried the vodka trick. Wonder what it would do to the taste of vodka...

[aaronatthedoublef]

Oh, and for as for different vanillas I cannot tell the difference in baked goods. We have a Penzy's nearby and I can tell the difference between the Bourbon and the Mexican when I smell them in the store but not when I bake with them. I wonder if I could in something very mild like pastry cream?

[aaronatthedoublef]

The food renegade column is interesting. The bottle of McCormick does not have corn syrup or sugar, just vanilla and alcohol. He also says you need to use bourbon and most things I've read say to use a neutral spirit which is definitely not bourbon.

Now if you have corn allergies, do you also need to worry about the alcohol? Again, bourbon has a good amount of corn so something neutral like vodka might be better.

[aaronatthedoublef]

I made strawberry shortcake in jam jars. My biscuits came out nice and high with lots of layers. The one problem I ran into was in my second batch I chilled them a little too long and some did not all bake all the way through. I did not notice this until they'd sat for several hours and I was in too much of a hurry to try popping them back in the oven. But has anyone tried this? Is there a time limit if these sit out too long and they cannot go back in. I might have been able to fry them. Fortunately I had enough to work around the under-cooked ones.

My three year old asked me what I was making and I said "biscuits". She was very upset because, she insisted, biscuits are for DOGS not people! My wife assured her it was all okay and while she ate the strawberries and whipped cream she was a little suspicious of the biscuits.

[aaronatthedoublef]

Walmart.com has reasonable prices for McCormick and Nielsen and Massey. McCormick has no sugar in it if anyone is looking for that.

[aaronatthedoublef]

I think vanilla finally became fed up with saffron and decided to up its price!

[aaronatthedoublef]

Let's try this again... sorry I typed a long response a couple nights ago and then my browser timed out as it was posting and it was lost. So here we go.

First, thanks for your replies.

This is the third year I've done the class. Mike, it is a blast for me and the kids seem to like it as I've been asked back to do it again. The difference this year is they would like me to do this with the seventh and eighth grades. In the past I've made about 15 pounds of dough. This year's eighth grade is bigger than last plus the seventh and I figure I'll need around 30 pounds.

The last two years I made four batches in my 5qt KA on Saturday afternoon and let it rise overnight in my refrigerator. Then Sunday morning I moved it to temple and cut it into 15x1 pound rounds. I then cut up each pound into three balls, wrapped them, and put them back in the refrigerator.

Then the kids came in and we shaped loaves of challah. Some made simple, three stand braids and others were more ambitious. A girl last year made three of the best looking loaves of challah I've ever seen including a three strand, braided round.

We set the challah aside to rise and then I showed them how to make the dough to the point where I put it in the refrigerator for the first rise. I've used my recipe in my mixer. This year I want to show them a no-knead recipe so they know a $250 stand mixer is not a requirement to make bread. And I know I could make my loaf and knead it by hand but I am too lazy. I did it for my son's bar mitzvah when I needed a loaf bigger than I could make in my mixer but I don't want to do that again. 🙂

As to making the dough, the eighth grade teacher has offered to meet me at temple with her mixer and help me pre-make the dough. Also, I have a second, 4qt mixer that I could bring so we could make three batches at a time. We might even be able to open it up to students and parents who are interested.

Or, I could ask a chef friend if I can steal some time in one of his restaurants and make the dough in one batch in his big Hobart.

The other thing is what we do with the challah. Two years ago we did this in the fall and gave them to congregants who could not come to temple during the high holidays. Each student delivered a loaf to someone so that was very personal.

Last year they sold the loaves to the temple for a buck a piece and gave the money to the local food bank. If they sell them this year they need to raise the price. Supermarket challah sells for about $2 a pound and this is way better bread (even if some of the them are a little funny looking). It's a fundraiser so people should be a little generous. And we use pretty good ingredients.

I wanted to start planning now because we're doing this in February and time has a way of creeping up on me and I don't want to wait until the last minute.

Thanks

[aaronatthedoublef]

Thanks Mike. Appreciate it. Gives me a good place to start. And some places to stay away from!

[aaronatthedoublef]

From Woodie Allen's movie "Sleeper" way back in 1973...

Dr. Melik: This morning for breakfast he requested something called "wheat germ, organic honey and tiger's milk."

Dr. Aragon: [chuckling] Oh, yes. Those are the charmed substances that some years ago were thought to contain life-preserving properties.

Dr. Melik: You mean there was no deep fat? No steak or cream pies or... hot fudge?

Dr. Aragon: Those were thought to be unhealthy... precisely the opposite of what we now know to be true.

Dr. Melik: Incredible.

[aaronatthedoublef]

You are correct. The powder does lack the tang. I think that is what my family does not like (I do but I have been out-voted). They do like my sour cream coffeecake however so maybe there is hope.

Thanks

[aaronatthedoublef]

How strong is the buttermilk flavor here? I use powdered buttermilk all the time. I've tried substituting the real, liquid stuff in waffles and scones a couple times and my family did not like it.

I may try the boiled flour icing recipe. Looks interesting.

Thanks

[aaronatthedoublef]

I had a white, plastic lidded waffle maker for years. The place I bought it, Lechmere, went bust long ago. Now I have a metal lidded one that is about 10 years old and slowly dying...

For some reason I had different recipes for waffle and pancake batter for years. I now use the same for both which seems to amaze my family. Last weekend I made plain pancakes and waffles AND blueberry pancakes and waffles (my youngest has decided she does not like blueberries).

I have not tried the muffin trick yet but it makes sense. Everyone is putting everything in a muffin tin these days. The hot new thing in NYC is mufagles - a bagel baked in a muffin tin. I've also seen people breathless at "duffins" or doughnuts in muffin tins even though KAF did that years ago and bakeries here in Hartfordland (which usually lags the rest of the world) was selling those as dirt bombs for years before I moved here.

BTW, another new thing is bagel holes. Has anyone here cut bagels? I've always made ropes and then joined the ends together in circles.

BEW

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