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mochateri's Profile

Website:

Location: Belize

About:

Favorite foods: i love pastas, my favorite food in the world, period. Second to pasta is sushi and mushrooms; any and all kinds of mushrooms, yum.

Last bite on earth: i can't decide!

The Ten Most Recent Posts By mochateri

From Talk

fresh cocoa beans

i just bought some fresh cocoa beans in the market, but i don't know what to do with them!
i researched on how to make chocolate bars from fresh cocoa beans, but the process is really confusing and i don't have a lot of the equipment needed.
so what else can i do with fresh cocoa beans?

The Ten Most Recent Comments By mochateri

From Talk

fresh cocoa beans

@Boscompb: how do i "press" it?

@phaelon56: thanx a lot for that cocoa nib in chocolate idea!

From Talk

fresh cocoa beans

@phaelon56 :after i roast them, can i just crush them and use it as cocoa powder?

From Talk

fresh cocoa beans

it's raw whole cocoa beans - straight from the pod.

From Talk

SE users: please introduce yourselves.

hey, i'm teri, i think i might be the youngest person on this thread here
i'm 17, and i currently live in Belize, but i am originally from Taiwan, so i grew up eating traditional chinese food.
i am graduating from highschool this summer, and i'm going to study restaurant management.
i love all kinds of food and i want to learn how to make them, so i found this site, which i love, because there's new updates everyday to keep me entertained.

From Talk

The one thing I want to learn is (?)

i would love to learn food photography,
i always tried to take pictures of the food i make, but the pictures alway weren't as good as the food

From Talk

Chinese Dumpling and Soup Technique

yeah that is how we normally cook dumpling
i just didn't know there was a reason behind it
but in my family, we don't drink the "soup" of the dumpling
we normally make a different and more flavorful soup to go with it

From Talk

Love to eat, hate to chop

i hate chopping garlic too. it's just sticky...
but i love chopping celery, esp when i slice the ribs into strips,
it's so fun

From Talk

Waffles vs. Pancakes

waffles, no doubt
with strawberries and whipped cream
or with syrup is good

From Talk

Posting abbreviations

oh and:
OMG= oh my god
NVM= never mind

From Talk

Posting abbreviations

being a teenage girl, i feel obligated to reply to this

most common ones (to me) are:
LMAO= laughing my ass off
ROFL= rolling on the floor laughing
@= at, or used when talking directly to certain someone
BRB=be right back
TTYL=talk to you later
J/K or JK= just kidding
WTF= what the f***
WTH=what the heck/hell
THX= thanks

that's all i can think of right now
hope it helps

Responses to Comments by mochateri

From Talk

SE users: please introduce yourselves.

I'm Rosezilla (named for my three year old daughter and the giant lizard thing that stomped Tokyo...it's what I call her when she's being...how you say...willful). My real handle is Mandy. I live in Santa Barbara County again after growing up here, but lived for 11 years in western Sonoma County...home of fabulous food and wines. It spoiled me rotten, to become an adult surrounded by all of that luscious produce and foodie opportunity. I managed a microbrewery's kitchen for 6 years, and have SERIOUS opinions about ales, should anyone care for them. Now I'm a home cook primarily, although I do a little catering here and there. My daughter's favorite foods are salmon and broccoli, so I feel as though I've triumphed a bit over the three-year-old beige-food diet. We do, however, eat at McDonald's every Friday after school...it's our little Happy Meal indulgence...and those tiny cheeseburgers are SOOO good. I live with and cook for my mother, as well. I am dating a high school band director, who has actually LOST weight being with me, as he's eating more asparagus and less fast food. I think that size 14 should be the new size 6. I am curvy, healthy, happy and active...and think that excellent foods should be part of everyone's diet. I am active in the "S'Cool Food" movement here, which tries to bring local and sustainable healthy food into school cafeterias. And I love, love, love this website.

From Talk

fresh cocoa beans

@Boscompb: how do i "press" it?

@phaelon56: thanx a lot for that cocoa nib in chocolate idea!

From Talk

fresh cocoa beans

You can certainly haver some fun with them. If you have access to an old hot air popcorn popper such as the original West Bend Poppery and you can do it outside or near a window it's easy to roast the beans. Folks who roast green coffee beans at home this way go both by bean color and by the sound of cracking during a certain transformation process so they know when to stop the roast (called "first crack" and "second crack" stages).

I'm not sure what the target temps or metrics are for knowing when cocoa beans are roasted to the right level. If you don't have a hot air popper you can instead rely on conductive heat (rather than convective) and roast them on a cookie sheet in the oven with frequent agitation or even in a cast iron skillet on stove top. And some folks swear by "dog bowl heat gun" roasting (done outdoors using a large stainless steel pet food bowl, a pair of gloves and a heat gun).

You could then crunch the roasted beans with a mortar and pestle to get cocoa nibs of a sort. I went to the chocolate show in NYC late last year and some vendors had incorporated cocoa nibs into various chocolate confections - gave them a nice crunch and flavor burst.


From Talk

fresh cocoa beans

No. In order to use it as cocoa powder, it has to be "pressed" to form a cocoa cake. The pressing removes cocoa butter and leaves the cake with varying percentages of cocoa butter as well as the "cocoa cake" which then has to be ground into powder form. Just crushing the cocoa bean, or nibs, will result in making a chocolate liquor paste which requires further processing in order to become cocoa, cocoa butter, chocolate liquor, etc.

From Talk

fresh cocoa beans

@phaelon56 :after i roast them, can i just crush them and use it as cocoa powder?

From Talk

SE users: please introduce yourselves.

@alacto-- I grew up in Williamsburg! If you're still there, I'm quite jealous of your accessibility to Aroma's. I was a slave at the Cheese Shop for a few years, and while I can't stand the house dressing any more, oh the cheese and wine selection....mmmmm

From Talk

SE users: please introduce yourselves.

Bro recently made these avocado eggrolls for a party. They are wonderful. We didn't use a sauce - no one noticed :D.

Whip 'em up and bring 'em down to the party!!

From Talk

SE users: please introduce yourselves.

@kfarrel3: Hope you're enjoying Florence! I miss Antico Noe sandwiches so much :(

From Talk

SE users: please introduce yourselves.

Mrs. L, a, ahem, 40 something (at least for two more weeks) who is just learning to cook and dealing with the fact that I own over 500 cookbooks (over 400 that have never been cooked from!). I live in San Jose CA and I see dead people for a living (no really, I manage a cremation business). I love serious eats to help me find out what's going on in the food world and to make me feel even more behind cuz I cook recipes I see here rather than open up one of my many cookbooks!

From Talk

SE users: please introduce yourselves.

@NC Terry - I looooooooooove Zingerman's! Love love love! You have the best job.