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Hercule Poirot and Apricot Jam

Posted in other things with tags on April 18, 2011 by thebrokenganache

Last night I was watching Agatha Christie‘s Hercule Poirot’s: The Third Girl and about 20 minutes into it I thought wouldn’t it be nice to have some Earl Grey Tea with some biscuits and jam. Unfortunately when I went to get some the cupboards were bare! All I had was bag of dried apricots. So I put Hercule on pause to make some jam.  Normally making jam out of dried fruit its best to let the fruit soak for 24 hours in water so they get nice and plump, but I couldn’t wait that long, I had a movie to get back too. 3 hours later I was ready to resume the movie and enjoy my late night snack.

Tea and Homemade Apricot Jam

Homemade Apricot Jam

 This is how I made apricot jam:

  1. Chop up  8 oz bag dried apricots
  2. Pour boiling water over top of apricots so they are completely covered and let them soak for and 1 1/2hours
  3. Strain apricots and save the liquid
  4.  Pour the reserved liquid in a pot  add i cup organic cane sugar and juice and zest  of 1 lemon and  and bring to a boil  and  reduce to quarter of it’s volumePlace soaked apricots in a food processor and pulse a couple of times
  5. Add the apricots to the pot and simmer until it is nice and think about 15 minutes.

Since I like cold jam on biscuits I had to place the jam in an ice bath to cool it down quickly. You may ask was it worth putting the movie on pause just to make some jam – YES. That yummy sweet tart flavor on a buttered biscuit with a pot of tea watching a good film. nothing could be better.

That’s all for now.

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A Big Thanks To Everyone

Posted in other things on January 27, 2011 by thebrokenganache

First and foremost a big Thank you to everyone for all your kind words and emails. They meant a lot to me and I am grateful. After the holiday break-in I found myself sinking into a deep dark hole which I’m out out of now.
During that experience I was praying for something to help me out of that state of mind and for some reason I started reading a bunch of books by Deepak Chopra and meditation. Now I’m as far from a new age person as you could get but I decided to give it a try and for whatever reason it worked.
I can honestly say through meditation I’m the happiest that I have been in ages. Well thats’s it for now and thanks again for everyones support.Oh by the way tomorrow I will be making colored chocolate domes! I hope they come out. :)

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A miserable end to 2010

Posted in chocolates, other things on January 1, 2011 by thebrokenganache

It was such a nice holiday season before Thursday evening. For Christmas I received a wonderful gelato machine  from Andy. I was thrilled with all the different flavor combinations I had come up with and was looking forward to posting about a bunch of new treats for the New Year’s, like candy canes, spicy pumpkin seed brittle, macadamia coconut buttercrunch and a ton of yummy gelato’s I had made.  But that all changed 8:28pm on December 30th. We were having a lovely dinner with our friends Karen, Denise and Nancy when I got a phone call from the alarm company telling me that our alarm had gone off and our home may have been broken into.  Shocked and devastated by the news we rushed home only to be greeted by the police at our front door. Who I must say could not have been nicer and more helpful. When we opened the door (with the police in tow) the alarm was blaring the dog was going bizerk a small table and some art work had been turned over and was on the floor and then we noticed that both laptops where missing and then we saw all the damage to the windows in the back of the house and the small hole in the bedroom window with glass all over. All of which will have to be replaced. According to the officers the thieves where on the property for sometime since they had gone around the yard to turn off all of the landscape lighting then attempted to go from the french doors to every window in the back of our home trying to break in. Luckily we have impact glass which managed to slow them down quite a bit – but in the end they still got in. The officer thinks they gained entry close to the time we all pulled up to the house and it scarred them off thank goodness because it really could have been much worse. I must say I’m still on edge and I haven’t been able to sleep much since, i’m still a bit jumpy about very little sound I hear and i’m scared to leave the house for fear that something will happen. I feel so violated. Andy has been great through the whole thing and he has secured the house well (with what he called a multilayered security protocol that he won’t discuss!). All this does give me some peace of mind. I know it could have been worse and thank God we weren’t hurt.

The reason I am posting all this is that there will be a delay in chocolates and treat postings since it’s a bit hard for me to concentrate on them at the moment and I still haven’t quite wrapped my head around  everything yet. But given a little time for those mysterious security protocols to go into effect and I will be back with new treats and posts!

Stay well and healthy.

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MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL

Posted in other things on December 23, 2010 by thebrokenganache

I just want to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year. And say THANK YOU to all the taste testers and to everyone for taking the time out of their busy schedules to read and post comments on the blog, they have been so much appreciated. :)

See you in the New Year and may all your hopes and dreams come true in the coming year.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

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Bad scary movies and cookbooks

Posted in other things on December 18, 2010 by thebrokenganache

I’m a bit of a klutz at times if you haven’t figured that out from previous posts.  I should know better than to read and walk down stairs at the same time, but of course I don’t. I was totally engrossed reading a review of a new spa opening in my area and paying no attention to where I was walking, then all of a sudden I went tumbling down a fight of stairs at work and twisted my ankle. As I got up I thought well that wasn’t too bad, I mean it did hurt a bit but at least nothing was broken. So I continued with my day and attended our annual Christmas luncheon which I must say was really nice this year. But when I got home and took off my shoes my ankle was swollen to the size of a small orange. So it wouldn’t have been the best idea to go in the kitchen and start on my candy canes. Which I was bummed out about since my editor Mark gave me a wonderful Christmas gift, a pair of really cool insulated gloves which was so sweet and very much needed so I wouldn’t burn my hands pulling sugar. Normally I don’t open gifts until Christmas, because I love the way the tree looks with piles of gifts under it but he said I should open it right away since  I could use it that evening. I guess he read my previous post. The candy canes will have to wait for another day.

On another note the bake sale at worked raised $1,000 dollars for the Children’s Fund which is amazing considering everything was sold for only a $1.00. Next year I think they should raise their prices a bit since it’s for such a good cause and could make at least twice as much.

Today will be spent with an elevated leg hoping the swelling goes down more, watching  bad scary movies on the Sci Fi channel and looking at the stack of new  cookbooks that I got from the book sale at work where everything was going for a couple of dollars each.

That’s it for now

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A chocolate Painting

Posted in chocolates, other things with tags , on November 17, 2010 by thebrokenganache

I came across this wonderful blog today called Eye Candy run by fellow  blogger Jojo Krang from Switzerland. There is a wonder demo of painting with chocolate and coloring chocolate naturally. I can’t wait to try these techniques out when I get back. Check it out here.

Image comes from the blog Eye Candy run by Jojo Krang

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A Great Peanut Brittle recipe from Jan

Posted in candy, confections, other things with tags on November 8, 2010 by thebrokenganache

My friend Jan Norris who is a food writer and runs the blog Jan Norris:Food and Florida posted a wonderful Peanut Brittle recipe for the holidays.  So for everyone who wants  to make some great brittle. Check it out!

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Marsha’s cheesecakes

Posted in other things on October 11, 2010 by thebrokenganache

Today to my surprise and delight when I got into work there were four lovely cheesecakes waiting for me to bring home for us to try from our dear friend Elyse’s mother Marsha.

They were the most fabulous petite cakes just perfect for sharing with someone special! The foursome consisted of a plain cheesecake, chocolate chip , cherry and blueberry. They were all amazing with the perfect balance of flavors and textures. My favorite was the plain cheesecake and Andy loved the cherry cheesecake.

Marsha, if your reading this you need to  start marketing and sell them since they are so wonderful and I know they would be a huge hit. Thank you so much for sharing these with us. Now – its time to get busy with your new cheesecake business!

That’s it for now!

 

Marsha's amazing cheesecakes

 

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The little kitchen that could

Posted in candy, chocolates, confections, other things with tags , on October 6, 2010 by thebrokenganache

First I want to give a big thanks to all my friends and co-workers for taking the time to taste and comment on all the chocolates, confections, and baked goods – I know its been a hardship :) and I really appreciate all the feedback I have gotten. I also want to thank Geni from blog sweetandcrumby.com. It’s been a few years since I have spent anytime baking, actually not since my school days at Johnson & Wales, well reading her blog inspired me to start again, and I am so glad I did – thanks Geni!

So much has happened in the last 96 hours, I have had several people and companies that are asking for samples of some of the chocolates and confections I have made for my blog.  So tonight and tomorrow I am prepping for a whirlwind tour de force on Friday as I drive around town delivering samples….  Could this be the start of something new?  Who knows.. Oh the timer just went off …

That’s all for now.

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Tea Time

Posted in other things with tags on October 4, 2010 by thebrokenganache

When I got home tonight I had an overwhelming urge for tea and scones. So I whipped up a batch of scones from a cream scone recipe I found on the joyofbaking.com. I added zest from 1 lemon and a handful of dried cranberries. I wish they had a little more height but they did come out quite tasty. The  perfect after work treat; Devonshire cream, Apricot jam, fresh baked scones and a cup of Earl Grey tea. The only thing missing was a new episode of Hercule Poirot.

As soon as a bunch of new supplies come in I will be back to chocolates!

Thats it for now

Lemon and cranberry scones

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