Making the world a little sweeter one pastry tip at at time.
With the discontinuing of the 402 pastry tip from Bakery Crafts and Parrish’s Magic Line (who I both purchased them from wholesale in the past), I’ve been inundated with questions on where to find this tip, or how to replace this tip, or if there …
If you’re making a little spiked ice cream to cool you down, these rules for making your icy treat will come in handy. The Real Rules of Making Boozy Ice Cream via Serious Eats, by Max Falkowitz, is a pretty good primer on using beer, …
Pastillage is a very hard sugar dough used for decorations and show piece work. It can be molded, rolled out, and pressed into forms. It dries very hard and can be sanded if needed to smooth out any rough spots. While just about all recipes …
Here are basic differences between desserts related to the pie. For more information, read all about The Pie Family and All the Cousins. Pie – Dessert with a filling that has a single or double crust. Deep Dish Pie – pie baked in a deep …
What is 10x (or 6x for that matter)? It is a particular grind for powdered sugar, which typically is mixed with an anti-caking agent, such as a starch. Powdered sugar is also called confectioner’s sugar or icing sugar, and is used for quick mixing buttercream …
Chinois A chinois (fine mesh strainer) is an incredibly used and taken for granted piece of pastry equipment. It removes all the spice and herb flavorings from infused simple syrups and makes slightly curdled crème anglaise perfect again. A quick look at them and one used in …
A baker’s blade is described on PastrySampler.com. There are pictures of what they look like, as well as a video courtesy King Arthur Flour on how they are used to slash unproofed bread.
Metric Conversions From centimeters to liters, here are basic equations to help you convert to Metric: Centimeter: Inch to centimeter in x 2.5 to get approx. equiv. cm Gram: Ounce to gram oz. x 28.35 to get approx. gm Kilogram: Pound to kilogram lb. x …
Biscuits have three general terms in the bakeshop: Cut out or dropped quick breads, baked light or soft with a golden brown crust, generally leavened with baking baking powder, baking soda, sometimes a little yeast, or just by the introduction of air such as beaten …
With all the talk of the Hostess company in bankruptcy, I wanted to know what the term ‘stalking horse’ meant to the financial markets as in recent news from Food Business News, a stalking horse bidder was named for the Hostess company. The plain definition …
Xanthan gum is used as a binding agent in doughs and acts as a stablizer, and is perfect for creating gluten-free flours. On Pastry Sampler, I’ve shared a couple of different recipes to try for gluten-free flour mixes a basic recipe based on rice flour …
I do lots of reading for all my pastry writing and I recently found a little gem, Foods and Food Adulterants on Baking Powders, from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It goes into detail on the “investigation into the character and composition of baking powders.” …
Yes, there is more than one way to mix a cake, and depending on the recipe and the resulting cake, it could be firm and dense, light and airy, or coarse and crumbly. Choosing the right recipe will enable you to choose the right cake for …
I get this question a lot, so I figured it would fit with the June theme for this blog – What is a dariole mold? A dariole mold is a small, round mold, and can be found by different retailers by the name of ‘aspic mold’ or ‘baba mold’. These …
Ice cream. Sweet, cold, and delicious. And not a modern invention, even though the use of an ice cream maker and freezer make the job of making it and storage of the treat easy. I wrote about the differences between Italian, French, Philadelphia, and New York style …
I’m a big fan of Indian food. I love the spicy sauces and rich vegetarian entrees. And having ordering from the dessert menu of many different Indian restaurants, I’m not sure which I enjoy more – eating them or seeing the paper-thin sheets of silver decorate them. …