the making of fudge

I have made just about All The Fudge In The World. I’ve added it up, and all told it’s going to be 75 pounds (there are a couple left to do this weekend). That’s a lot of fudge. A LOT of fudge. Here are the ingredients, from The Big Shopping Excursion: Prepping a 12 pound quadruple batch. This is NOT for the uninitiated: I came very close to screwing this up. Expert level fudge-maker only. This in no way conveys just how much fudge is on the platter. 12 pounds…

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“Let Them Eat Cake” Recipe Roundup

Okay. I had loads of questions about the “Let Them Eat Cake” recipes, especially the gluten free stuff, so I’m doing a round-up on them. Gluten free, vegan carrot cake recipe with ‘cream cheese’ frosting. Contains flax ‘eggs’, which I’d never previously encountered and am now quite enamoured with as a substitution. Also, even fresh, that frosting tastes *remarkably* like cream cheese frosting, and if you stick it in the fridge overnight and serve it cold (it’s soft enough to spread onto a cake even when cold) it tastes exactly…

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chocolate sauce

We were out of chocolate sauce and had vanilla ice cream, so I went in search of a quick and easy chocolate sauce recipe. Some ten or fifteen minutes later, Ted, who is pretty dubious of non-Hersheys chocolate sauces, said, “This is really pretty good!” off the sauce I’d made. “Thanks,” I said. “I found a recipe, but it called for water and I thought that wouldn’t be very good, so I substituted milk, and then I thought, y’know, this is going to need some more fat in it to…

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Catie’s Ham & Bean Soup

Start by roasting a big ham with a lot of fat on it. Ideally roast it in a cast iron pan, so you don’t have to pour the melted fat into another pan when you take it out of the oven, but whatever works for you. Make an egregious amount of ham gravy. Three cups or more. (You’ve never made gravy? It’s easy. Take a half cup of flour or so and put your sautee pan of ham fat on a decently high heat. Sprinkle in some of the flour.…

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Kitsnacks: French vanilla ice cream

French Vanilla Ice Cream 4 egg yolks 1/3 c sugar 1.5 c cream vanilla to taste pinch of salt Mix egg yolks and sugar at a high speed until they’ve thickened to a lovely light yellow and make ribbons when you draw the beaters out and across the surface of the mixture. Scald the cream. Remove from heat when a perfect scald is reached. Add salt and vanilla. (I judged the vanilla by the mixture’s smell, and would guess I used 2-3 tablespoons. But that’s a guess.) Drizzle the scalded…

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