Tien’s blog

I was still really cranky and stressed out this morning, so after a few hours of me stomping around the house, Mike suggested that I find something fun to do, to relax. He also suggested that I investigatewhy I was being cranky, since this is radically out of character for me.  Exercise, stress, seasonal [...]

After a gruesomely frustrating day of trying to get a very complicated task done while being interrupted and/or ranted at by several people and at frequent intervals, I was staring morosely at the computer screen wanting to pull my hair out and scream at the world to go away.  Yeah, cranky.  Also trying to come [...]

I had a little chocolate-tasting party today - two friends brought over an assortment of Scotches to trial (10 Scotches including the ones I personally have) and I invited them to try the Armagnac, Cognac, port, etc. ganaches that I had put together yesterday.  So we got out bundles of plastic spoons (to go back [...]

Today I mixed up a 500g batch of plain dark chocolate ganache base and had a ball of a time mixing it up with various alcoholic brews:

Marie Dussau Hors d’Age Armagnac
Dartigalongue Hors d’Age Armagnac
Cles des Ducs VSOP Armagnac
Kelt VSOP Cognac
Grande Champagne Reserve Cognac
Bailey’s Irish Creme
Chambord
Graham’s “Six Grapes” Reserve Port
the same port, mixed with muscat grape [...]

I thought some of you might be interested in the process I am using for my chocolate taste-tests.  I am testing things in three phases:

Steep flavorants in boiling cream.
Taste.  If it tastes good and the flavor is discernible, continue.  Otherwise, stop.
Determine whether to try flavor with dark, white, or milk chocolate.
Reheat cream to boiling and [...]