[Mike Nolan]

I've been buying Fleischmann's IDY yeast in 2 pound lots (2 one-pound packages) at Sams, but they've switched to another brand, which I may try once I run out. I've still got a pound of Fleischmann's yeast unopened, I don't use it as fast these days with just two of us.

I think Costco has Red Star IDY.

[Mike Nolan]

Spot wheat prices are at multi-year highs, and durum wheat prices have more than doubled on the world market.

High demand and shortages due to weather-related crop issues are to blame. I'm sure higher transportation costs are factored in as well.

Next year could be worse, fertilizer prices have in some cases tripled and farmers are having to decide what to grow and how much they can afford to plant and treat.

I don't think the fall (December) wheat storage reports are out yet, those generally come out in January, but that'll be interesting to watch.

[Mike Nolan]

I did make bagels today, but they didn't rise as much as normal, I might have dumped the yeast on top of the salt. They did float after a few seconds in the boiling water and they're a little smaller than normal, but I think they'll still be OK for supper, maybe a little denser than usual.

[Mike Nolan]

Shipping is what's really killing me on mail orders for flour, and that's somewhat ironic because a lot of the flours I use are probably grown and milled in the great plains, then shipped to Texas or Ohio or further away, then shipped back to me.

[Mike Nolan]

Last night's onion soup was a bit strange, the onions never got soft, even though I cooked them in the oven for nearly 6 hours and boiled them in the stock for another two hours after dinner. It was edible, just a bit crunchy.

Tonight we had artichokes and bagels from Panera. I would have made bagels but we didn't come up with what she wanted for supper until nearly 5PM. Maybe I'll make some tomorrow.

[Mike Nolan]

I made chocolate cake-in-the-pan (or crazy cake, if you prefer) for my wife's birthday today.

[Mike Nolan]

Jarlsberg is usually classified as a Swiss-like cheese, but true Jarlsberg come from Norway, although there are licensed cheesemakers for it in Ireland and in Ohio.

[Mike Nolan]

My plan for today is to make French onion soup, starting by caramelizing about 10 pounds of onions in the oven.

[Mike Nolan]

My understanding (confirmed by Google) is that raw milk cheeses must be aged at least 60 days to be sold in the USA. The local cheesemaker at the farmer's market makes a couple of raw goats milk cheeses, she's won a number of awards for her cheeses.

That which we call Swiss cheese is usually mass produced and bland. But it's not just because it is made from pasteurized milk.

I keep a little pre-sliced Swiss (usually Sargento) on hand for sandwiches, but I never cook with it.

For cooking purposes I buy 5 pound bags of whole milk mozzarella at Sams (about the only place I can find mozzarella that isn't part-skim), and I buy Havarti in 2 pound blocks (pre-sliced) at Costco.

Sams for years had an excellent 4 cheese blend, a mixture of shredded parmesan, romano, asiago and provolone, but they've stopped carrying it. Instead they have a shaved cheese blend (parmesan and asiago, as I recall) that was a major disappointment. I went out and bought some tubs of shredded asiago and romano and use that with some Kraft parmesan (which I'll probably replace with another brand once it is gone.) Not as good, but tolerable.

[Mike Nolan]

I'm an active poster on the BBGA forum, and I've learned a lot there. Many of the people there are professionals in all the best senses of the word. I consider myself a persistent amateur or in BBGA terminology a 'serious home baker'.

I am kind of curious as to how my name came up, though.

I'm glad you found a place to develop your skills in a working environment.

There are a number of bakeries in Lincoln but I'm the only BBGA member here, there are only 4 in all of Nebraska. A lot of BBGA programming has historically been aimed at people on the east or west coast and occasionally in Chicago (like WheatStalk), that may be a factor in their low membership here.

[Mike Nolan]

I think I got that package at Aldi's, which I don't hit very often, maybe every month or two.

[Mike Nolan]

Dinner tonight was sort of a surprise. I was planning to make macaroni and cheese with frozen chopped broccoli, but the package I bought was spinach and I didn't notice that until after my wife tasted it.

I think I intended to get chopped broccoli but picked up the wrong package in the store. Either that or this was an extended senior moment. :sigh:

I think it still tastes pretty good, my wife says was OK but she didn't finish her bowl. But at least she's got sweet potato pie.

[Mike Nolan]

I am baking a sweet potato pie this morning. No real change from the last few, except that I made the filling last night, refrigerated it overnight, and used a stick blender on it this morning to smooth out lumps.

I think I may have over-baked it a bit, it cracked all the way around about a third of the way from the rim, but this filling is pretty stiff (I'm using heavy cream in it) and I may need to tinker with the baking time/temp.

I'm sure it'll still taste great, though.

[Mike Nolan]

I picked some more lettuce so we're having salads with tuna fish. I'm also baking some sweet potatoes, some of which are for my wife to eat for lunches and some for another sweet potato pie.

[Mike Nolan]

I'm more of a chocolate chip cookie person, not very Christmasy, though lately I've made chocolate pecan meringue cookies the most, mostly because we've been making things that use egg yolks and I have left over egg whites to use up. My wife likes making her chocolate 'mushroom' cookies, the recipe is posted here. Neither of us do much cookie decoration. I'm not very artistic and she's got an inherited tremor that makes it difficult to do piping or precise decoration work.

[Author]

Posts