On Pleasureful Pastry

Tasting Restraint

On September 15, 2014

Inside artistry there is craftmanship, inside the end, a beginning.

I enjoy the kind of happy ending where occasional personal restraint pays off in some unexpected and beneficial way. In the extreme, I think restraint is called denial. I’m not a proponent of denial.

In fact, there are some categories of purchases that are exempt from restraint in my book. Shoes. I love a great pair of shoes. Like my courageous purchase of those little red patent Stuart Weitzman flats. Strangers (men, mostly) continue to compliment me on them. Make no mistake, these are not the Ruby Slippers, although in wearing them I know how [G]Linda, the Good Witch, must have felt in dreamily waving that magic wand. I call them my Ferrari’s. Capiche?

Restraint seemed prudent a year ago at a Retail Confectioners International (RCI) conference on what I would call a capital purchase for Essential Confection, my new confection business.

Nine hundred dollars is enough money to get my attention. A piece of equipment that would literally cut my caramel production time by fifty percent called my name. The roller-cutter. A pseudo-rolling pin with large wheels of customized size designed to cut pastry. Rollers… the highway to heaven.

Nine hundred dollars was a tough pill to swallow for a new business-hopeful and yet, I saw the payback in increased efficiency and standardization of product. I didn’t act. Restraint.

Fast forward to today. I have the great good fortune to have the input of the world’s top pastry chefs (largely through my willingness to purchase their books) and in perusing Thomas Keller’s Bouchon there was answered prayer. The bicycle.

A bicycle is this adolescent version of its $900 big sister. At one-tenth the price. Each of the five wheels can be adjusted to a cutting width of between a half-inch and five inches. Designed to cut pastry, I wrung my hands in the hope that it would be substantial enough to cut caramels, took a deep breath and immediately ordered one.

This is the happy ending part. Or, perhaps, I should call it a happy beginning because, yes, it’s officially a caramel cutter. A really well engineered piece of equipment. Gliding strokes resulting in gloriously plumb pieces, made no less handmade or succulent in their uniformity.

Beauty on the eye, delight on the tongue.

On Preference

By lindanaylor

On September 14, 2014

In Blogs

A weightless voice hung in the room, roundly sweet in its silence…

Perhaps a consequence of having an interest in all things and being master of few, I recognized some years ago that I prefer to support what people do well and can’t seem to make time to critique that which falls short.

In the culinary blogosphere, authors’ interests attract me in different ways. Here’s a smidge of my go-to reads:

Language and imagery flourish on Hortus Cuisine. The author’s focus is simple, regional eating, the ingredients of which arise from a small farm between the Marche and Emilia-Romagna regions of Italy. Luscious photography.
Princess Tofu imbibes a lightness of humor with a love of tea in San Francisco’s minimalistic Meccas. It’s easy to sip with her at Samovar while musing over the site’s poetic intros.
The Pastry Department takes a pen and ink approach to professional pastry, the author the pastry chef at Chicago’s Blackbird and Avec restaurants. Yarns of story-telling infused with courage that an aspiring pastry cook may lean on in the hope of a future’s promise.
Dessert First, a self-proclaimed San Francisco pastry girl, casted about with its Roasted Fig Gelato with Balsamic Caramel recipe and reeled me in. Casual reading, a visual pleasure and fully fueled pastry creativity.

This is my short list. I follow others for geographic or specific content reasons, or just for the sheer pleasure of reading the posts.

Noticing others’ design ethics and writing styles also helps me to refine my aesthetic voice.

The weightless voice that hangs in the room…

There is Definitely a Candy Goddess

By lindanaylor

On September 11, 2014

In Confection

I wish to taste the sweetness of life; I wish to have the sugar speak for me…

No historical recipe interests and challenges me more than Cream Candy.

In a previous post I alluded to its lure: provocative in texture with a fineness of interior. What went unsaid is the utter madness I feel in trying to perfect it… hell, in just trying to execute it… without failure.

Not every failed recipe attempt is my fault, though it feels like it’s my fault. The cream candy recipe I first came in contact with was completely non-standardized. Three ingredients cooked to some nameless temperature, the successful texture of which could only be vaguely described as a blob sinking or swimming in a cup of cold water with some sort of visual appropriateness. No blame on my shoulders here; old recipes had no standardization, and I knew that going in.

It gets so much worse. When I then have the courage to pour the nameless, formless, colorless mass out onto a marble slab or a frozen sheet pan (did I mention without touching or stirring), I stare at it in guarded horror as if it might either take wing or eat a hole through the table. That’s because I know what’s next.

The candy-in-waiting must be pulled and pulled until one moment before my arms fall off. Preferably in cold weather. With zero humidity in the atmosphere. In Portland. There is definitely a Candy Goddess, and she’s laughing her ass off.

At this stage, one of two things happens. Either the pulled candy mixture seizes without the slightest warning which is my most common outcome, or it doesn’t which means I still have at least one more chance to ruin it. In the confectioner’s playbook, I’m supposed to pull it into strings of similar circumference, then cut it into bite-sized pieces to “cream” overnight. Only once have I gotten that far. It was the time I had first degree burns on my fingertips from picking the hot mixture up too soon, so I was salving my fingers as I congratulated myself.

If the end product weren’t so damned good, so exceptional, so unlike anything else in the marketplace, I’d have long ago dropped it like a prom dress.

Anyway, simplicity does not equal success. Effort does not equal success. I’ve also noticed that whining and swearing have not yet equaled success.

So, this is a great little recipe to chronicle. I can promise you (and myself) a roller coaster ride, but I’m determined to be crowned Cream Candy Lady. I guess aloe vera can be considered a business expense.

I wish to have the sugar speak for me…

Confection Contemplation

By lindanaylor

On September 10, 2014

In Confection Contemplation

Mt Hood on the horizon wasn’t enough. I demanded the moon be its companion of scale…

In creating the voice for this new blog, I first needed to convince myself the effort was necessary. Creating the voice? Blogging is conversation, yes? How else would one be conversant if not with her own voice?

Ah, but what about tone, delivery, personality and humor? And how does each of these qualities impact the conversation with one’s chosen audience?

I truly don’t want to over-think this and, in fact I’m not certain I want to think about it at all. But there is a driver here. An important opportunity at the beginning of a project to create it in as much detail as I wish.

What else would I wish for? Poetry. As either a complement or a contrast to the content of the post . Or perhaps with no relevance to the post whatsoever. Weaving a line of story-telling into the growth of a professional skill set. After all, it’s not an academic blog. More creative form. More ease in the writing.

Well, now that was worthwhile, wasn’t it?

Confectionery Balance Brought Forward

By lindanaylor

On September 3, 2014

In Confection Commentary

Knowing my interest in quality confectionery of the past, a friend kindly let me page through two cookbooks from the early 20th century belonging to her grandmother.

Excusing the kid in the candy store metaphor, I found three recipes I can’t wait to work with.

Quality pics that truly represent these confections are rare. Nonetheless, here’s a visual in narrative:

Cream Candy. Also, a family recipe of mine. The surprising juxtaposition of a cooked and pulled sugar-and-cream confection that melts in your mouth in a way no other candy does. Exacting to make. Provocative in texture; with a fineness of interior. Vanilla. Maple. Peppermint. Nothing like it in the marketplace.
Coconut Squares, Balls. The rich, chewy substance of coconut is refined with glucose and butter. Dipped in bittersweet chocolate. Delectable. The star of a dessert tray.
Opera Creams. A Cincinnati influence is at work here. History says Cincinnati Opera patrons were treated to opera creams before performances. The velvety texture of soft vanilla cream is offset with dark chocolate of very high contrast and quality. It has no equal.

Each is more than worth the time, effort and patience required to refine and perfect. Experimentation in itself is pleasureful… shepherding ingredients into that which they can become.

Opera Creams

(reprinted as written from Lee’s Priceless Recipes, 1895)

Two pounds white sugar, 3/4 pint cow’s cream, boil to a soft ball; set off; add 2 ounces glucose; set on. Stir easy until it commences to boil, then pour out; let get 3/4 cold and stir it until it turns into a cream; then work into it 2 tablespoons vanilla; line a pan with waxed paper, flatten the batch in it, and mark it in squares. Set aside 2 hours to harden.