What are you cooking today?

[achookwoman]

Judy , you are a good teacher.  Lucky kid and what a good job she did.
I put water in the bottom for all my bread.  Probably just assumed that people would do it .  Better fix the recipe. 
Next Thursday i am teaching some local ladies to make bread.  We will make No Fuss something and Hot X Buns.  Blast,  no TMX.. I will put a thermometer in the oven just to test it.

[Cornish Cream]

Next Thursday i am teaching some local ladies to make bread.  We will make No Fuss something and Hot X Buns.  Blast,  no TMX..

Just think of all those calories you will be burning off without the TM Chookie

[judydawn]

Have a great class Chookie.  Sorry I wouldn't come to a non-TMX bread making class - got it too easy these days 

[Halex]

Thans chookie will do.

JD what beautiful presentation

H

[Tasty]

It looks pretty JD and I think it's fantastic that you encourage younger children to participate in the kitchen

[CarolineW]

They are so eager to learn and her Grandma said I should pick her up from school every day and bring her home with me
She was a great taste tester, also ate a hot cross bun, drank a smoothie I made with watermelon, banana & spinach in it.  DH said she could do his job of official taste tester  That's the sort of child I like having around, one who will try anything. It was a pleasure to teach her something, she picked it up so quickly and did a super job (as you can see) just by watching me do one on another plate.  I sent her home with a little bag of coulis and told her to freeze it and just snap little pieces off to thaw when she wanted to do some more decorating.

She and you did a great job Judy!  There's a 'child' in the UK who would love to know how to decorate like that 😄. Any tips?  I'm hopeless at presentation and would really like to learn.

[judydawn]

It's incredibly easy once you know how Caroline.  Just spoon some cream onto a plate, this batch of thickened cream was thicker than normal and runny cream works too.  Using the end of a spoon, dip it into your coulis and drop little bits onto the cream where you want a heart to appear.  It will form a dot. Take a skewer and in one motion without lifting it, run it through from the top to the bottom, making sure you go through the middle of the coulis drop.  Voila, a heart.  Have a practise with some runny jam and you will see how easy it is to dress up a dessert plate. Try different sized drops to see what size you prefer - you probably need the drop to be 4-5mm minimum but it depends on how big your serving plate is.
With Valentine's Day coming up, you could surprise your DH - even if you just gave him a plate of cream with one big heart in the middle LOL.

[goldfish]

JD - you're magical - just caught up with the photo of the young 10 y.o's plate . . she'll carry the memories of you and the time you spent with her for a very long time . .and I daresay she'll be sharing it all with her own grandchildren one day . . . 

[JulieO]

Not really cooking, but the TM was used  

While reading the cinnamon scroll recipe in For Food's Sake last night (at about midnight), I noted about the drying off of a vanilla bean in the oven so it can be milled to powder with the cinnamon stick etc for the filling. Instead I had a thought to put a few in the dehydrator and leave on low overnight so I went and did that.  Got back into bed and started googling drying vanilla beans.  First one i came across said not to dry in a dehydrator or they will be left flavourless,  .  It was recommended to just leave them out on the bench for a few hours and they should then be dry enough,   so I quickly stopped the machine and put the tray on a rack (for air circulation underneath) and left it on the bench overnight.
 
This morning when I walked into the kitchen I could smell the vanilla and they were dry enough to snap into pieces,     so I made the filling with one of them, (worked perfectly) and the rest i broke into pieces and milled for 1 min, scraped down, and did further minute as they were still a little gritty.  I now have lovely vanilla powder which will be kept in the fridge to use as needed.  

According to what I read, it's quite expensive to buy in powder form and it can be used in place of vanilla extract/paste, but only a little bit because of its concentrated form.  Will have to read up a bit more on it I think.

Also, I found this for anyone whose beans are looking a little dry and you want them back to being nice and plump. I got the link off the chow forum where many people had used the method and were very pleased with it.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOtz9gDcj2o

[courton]

JD, that is truly impressive. Wow!

[Halex]

Well I blame Tenina & Alyce, meant to be at the gym, but home cooking. See how east it s to skip out, must be more disciplined.......

I am also loving the fact I am on my own in the kitchen, no kids here atm.

Have made nigellas bananna choc chip muffins, have brownies hanas best ever brownies in the oven & just about to open Alyce & Teninas books tonsee what else I can do.

Cant make meals as i will get freezer build up!LOL

H

[fundj&e]

i made some donna hay gluten free choc chip cookies

[CreamPuff63]

what did they taste like uni?

JO I will be very interested in how the vanilla powder goes. I have been looking at my vanilla paste and thinking how expensive it is when I have so many vanilla beans lying idle in the pantry. (don't worry, I have some vanilla essence doing its thing in the linen cupboard) Just recently I was toying with the idea of seeing if there was a vanilla paste recipe somewhere on the web.

[fundj&e]

Very nice CP, i make them for my DIL will ask her what she thought of them

[JulieO]

JO I will be very interested in how the vanilla powder goes. I have been looking at my vanilla paste and thinking how expensive it is when I have so many vanilla beans lying idle in the pantry. (don't worry, I have some vanilla essence doing its thing in the linen cupboard) Just recently I was toying with the idea of seeing if there was a vanilla paste recipe somewhere on the web.

Yes I have the vanilla pods in vodka too, been brewing for just over 3 years.  In the past I have been decanting some into a small bottle to use and then I add more vodka to the big bottle, but it must be getting to it's end by now, so will just use up what's in the big bottle and then decide whether to start again.  

Will be interesting to see how the powder works out, it's supposed to be nice added to just ground coffee beans for a hint of vanilla in your coffee.

The sitting the pod in the rum and squeezing out makes it look very much like the paste, just need some rum.  

This is how the powder turned out.