Hold The Fungus

After a few minor setbacks, my cookie embed wedding favor project is now complete. This great project shows how to make high quality wedding favors at a bargain price. Aside from being rather unique, they taste great and are easily customized to match wedding colors or skin tones.

The heart of this project are the cookie embed molds - one of the most popular chocolate mold types in recent years. These are designed to encapsulate an Oreo® cookie in chocolate.  Since the bride and groom are on separate mold sheets, the favor is easily changed for  alternate lifestyles as well.

Add in a bit of simple mold painting and a clear acetate box and you have a professional quality favor that is easy to make at home.

As usual the illustrated step by step project instructions are available free. See Cookie Embed Wedding Favors or visit my chocolate project / instruction index for a huge selection of other free projects and basic chocolate making instructions.

Popularity: 30% [?]

Congratulations to Rock for winning Hell’s Kitchen.  His performance was nearly flawless, and the men actually managed to put aside their differences and work as a team.

Bonnie’s performance left a lot to be desired and her leadership in regards to preparation was sorely lacking. She was also saddled with a team that has more often than not worked poorly together, but she chose them. 

Running out of food for her signature dish seemed really stupid on such an important night - especially since it appeared she spent valuable prep time laying on the sofa. But that may just be how things were filmed / edited and doesn’t necessarily reflect the reality.

All in all, I feel the right person won - but I sure would have liked to see the final be between Rock and Jen.

Popularity: 26% [?]

Last night Top Chef said goodbye to Sara N.  A pleasant young woman who apparently can cook, but has pretty much flown below the radar throughout this series with no controversy, no wins, and no major losses. That may have been her biggest error. This is after all a tv show and somehow I suspect that they are judged as much for creating drama as they are for cooking skills - at least to some extent.

It appeared in last night’s judging that the choice was between Sara and Howie. Sara was there because of  slow service and hamburgers that were poorly seasoned and dry. A crime of the highest magnitude since hamburgers are about as basic as it gets and the first thing many Americans learn to cook.

Howie on the other hand, was up to his usual beligerent standards. He seems to have chosen the “it’s a competition so I will shaft you if possible” route that has worked so poorly in Top Chef previously. He knew the burgers needed to come out faster, yet kept quiet - essentially putting his entire team on the chopping block.  As usual, this strategy came very close to backfiring on him as it put him in the bottom two. I thought for sure that Howie was leaving after hearing the judges tell him his attitude has sabotaged his teams, but apparently the drama he creates saved him this time. 

Overall this has been a tough season to choose a favorite, but in the end I expect it to come down to Dale or Tre. From what I can see, Tre has the most wins but I suspect that Dale has more talent than we have seen to date. It would not suprise me to see them as the final two.

Popularity: 29% [?]

I don’t think I have ever changed favorites more during a series than I have during the current Hell’s Kitchen series. It seemed like nearly every week folks would exhibit some really unappealing traits which would have me rethink my favorite.

Initially, I found Melissa the frontrunner for my favoritism, as she was from my home town and seemed very good in the kitchen. Eddie seemed pretty likable too, but I had the feeling it would come down to Melissa and Rock at the end.

As the series progressed the ladies team degenerated into a continual cat fight, and Melissa had a melt down. I found myself rooting for Rock and Julia. Rock because he was the only guy with his act together and Julia because she was such a likable person.

Unfortunately Rock began to exhibit some really unattractive qualities - like acting childish whenever tasked with doing something many of us do every day - like sorting recyclables.  Personally I don’t care what your background is - if you consider yourself above doing what most folks do on a daily basis, you need some serious attitude adjustment.

So at this point I was cheering for Julia, until her untimely ejection from the show. I found my loyalties switching to Jen who was fairly likable and skilled in the kitchen.  Her getting kicked out on the basis of booby trapped food seems rather unfair as she went first, and that alerted the other two to watch the food like hawks.

So that leaves the final two. Not too a difficult choice as Bonnie seems to be a spoiled young lady who apparently has reached 26 years old without ever needing to clean up after herself.  Considering how much yelling and ridicule she was subjected to during the series, I am actually stumped as to how she made it to the final two. Rock however comes from a humble background and  I can relate to him although his temper tantrums can be annoying. His overall performance has been head and shoulders above Bonnies, and his skill in the kitchen is undeniable.

The final episode should be quite interesting as several former competitors have been brought back for it. This should make for an interesting show as I am sure they have brought back a fair amount of animosity with them. Overall the ladies team seems to have more skills as a whole, but have a tendency to not work well together. The mens team on the other hand are a bit better at working together so this may offset the skills.

So let’s see you win Rock.

Popularity: 27% [?]

Although the main point of this blog is cooking for picky eaters, I do occasionally find time to do some baking.  Recent Food Network shows like Ace of Cakes and Cake Challenges have enticed me to learn more about cake decorating and I will be writing some about my experiences as I learn.

This stylized flag cake involved a lot of piping with several  tubes so was good practice as I am none too skilled with a decorating bag.  For those just learning to pipe designs in icing I offer one main piece of advice - practice extensively on waxed paper before commiting yourself on a cake. The icing may then be scraped off the waxed paper and put back in the bag for continued practice.

Another learning experience here was to cover my unwaxed cake board.  Within an hour of finishing this cake the grease had soaked into the board making an unsightly design around the cake. Although I could have camoflaged this by icing the board, that is time consuming and my kids were hovering around ready to devour it so I let them eat the evidence.

For those who would like to see the step by step process used to make this, see: U.S. Flag Cake Project

Popularity: 32% [?]

Since one of the goals of this blog is to help others learn something about cooking I would like to discuss marinating.

Marinating is usually done with meats, but is sometimes used with vegetables. Marinating meats will help make them more tender and impart some flavor. It does require some planning, but the results are worth the effort.

Timing
The actual time in the marinade is not overly critical in most cases, and the following is a rough guide:

• Beef, Pork, Lamb - overnight
• Chicken  - 3 hours
• Seafood - 30 minutes

Preparation
If you are using a cooked marinade, allow it to cool to room temperature before using. Adding a hot marinade will actuallly start the cooking process. I prefer to marinade with enough to completely cover the meat, but just enough to coat the meat works as well. Halfway through the marination period flip the meats to ensure full coverage. Always cover and refrigerate during the marination process to prevent dangerous bacterial growth.

Finishing
Remove the marination from the refrigerator and allow to warm to room temperature before cooking. Cooking cold meat tend to make it tougher.

Popularity: 26% [?]

I have just completed a new project for the web site which shows how to make flavored chocolate coffee stirrers.  The article aslo includes packaging suggestions.

The popularity of these has parralleled the increasing demand for flavored coffees over recent years.  Most folks making these have relied on dipping plastic spoons into flavored chocolate or molded them with mixed results. With this new  system, they are easily molded into beautiful shapes and custom fit gift boxes are available.

See: Mocha Spoon Project

Popularity: 27% [?]

It was with mixed feelings that I watched Joey get eliminated on  Top Chef last night. His hometown is two towns away (about 5 miles) and he now lives in my hometown - NYC. Like most folks, I try to root for the home team when possible.  He even comes across as a fairly likable guy for the most part. Apparently he was an audience favorite as well based on all the comments about his elimination on Bravotv.com

On the other hand I was not totally impressed by his performance on the show. His food and cooking knowledge is substantially more than I ever aspire to, but he seemed to lack poise in the kitchen - at least on camera.  The cameras seemed to portray him as a sort of bungling guy that just gets by, but who knows how real that is. As we all know they are editing out a lot of stuff and  in reality only showing what they want us to see. Based on his recent employment, I have to assume he is much more competent than they have portrayed him to be.

On an unrelated note, what’s with Bravo’s web site? I understand wanting to come across as avant garde , I just don’t understand how that translates into cluttered and confusing.  The Top Chef home page has 19 video links (more than the video category page), blog links with a very distracting rollover, and a host of other clutter. Some links try to open a new window for no apparent good reason, and worst of all is some of the video clips load a commercial which crashed my browser when I tried to close it. I like your show, but don’t expect me to spend much time at your web site.

Popularity: 27% [?]

Being a meat lover, I tend to barbecue a lot. I love a good barbecue sauce, but find that many commercially available sauces leave me with a chemical taste so I generally make my own.

This is one of my Favorites and it can be made in either a slightly sweet version or a spicier version.

Ingredients Slightly Sweet Version:

• 2 cups Water
• 1 cup Ketchup
• 1/2 cup Cider Vinegar (I normally use cider, but white or red vinegar work as well)
• 1/4 cup Worcestershire Sauce
• 2 Tablespoons Onion Powder
• 1/2 cup Brown Sugar
• 1 teaspoon Salt
• 1 teaspoon Celery Seed (optional)
• Dash of Black Pepper

Optional - For a version with a bit more kick add:

• 1 teaspoon Cayenne powder
• 1 teaspoon Black Pepper
• 1 Teaspoon Paprika

These quantities may be adjusted to suit your taste. Cayenne may be substituted for some red hot sauce and is the main source of kick.

Preparation
Combine all ingredients in a saucepan. Cover and bring to a boil. Stir well, then uncover the pan and reduce the heat to a simmer. Simmer uncovered stirring occasionally until it reduces into a thickened sauce.

For those who are learning to cook:

Simmering is like boiling but over low heat so just a few bubbles are coming up.

Reducing is cooking a liquid to evaporate some of the water. This thickens it and is used to make many sauces and glazes. Reducing must be done uncovered (or partically covered) to allow the water vapor to escape.

Popularity: 28% [?]

I saw Curtis on Take Home Chef make an interesting sounding steak marinated in red wine and crushed Juniper berries which sounded quite interesting.  Cooking with wine sounded pretty good so I decided to give it a try even though I am not a wine drinker.

I had to hit three markets before I found Juniper berries (in the spice section) and I stopped at the liquor store for a bottle of cheap wine on my way home (in New York you can only purchase wine in liquor stores). Experienced cooks reading this are probably laughing by now, but I didn’t know any better at the time.

So I smashed some Juniper berries with a pot, poured some wine into a bowl with the berries, and poured it to cover some nicely marbled steaks to marinate. The balance was used to make a sauce by reducing in a heated pan. After covering and refrigerating for about 20 hours I slapped those steaks on the grill and proceeded to cook the most vile tasting steak I have ever tried to eat.

I learned a valuable lesson - don’t cook with wine that you would not want to drink! Cooking will actually concentrate the flavor of the wine. That’s a good thing if using a good tasting wine, but if using a bad tasting wine it concentrates the bad flavor.

Popularity: 25% [?]