POWERAGE

                                                               I HAVE THE POWER!!!

 

 

Now He man isn't the only guy that can claim this. After an almost 6 month ordeal with the electric company, landlord, town of Ramsey and Vannatta electric we are powered up with 3 phase electric. Not only did this involve rewiring our store and the whole building  we had a new pole installed with transformer,

 dug a giant trench in the landlords front yard to bury pipes,

ran more wire than I have ever seen

and kept a team of highly professional electricians busy for weeks.

 

Now that we have the juice my boys from Allbake came back to fire up all the equipment. A few glitches but everything is fine. Our double rack oven kicks serious ass.

 

Still a lot to do

This and That

I would say that the kitchen is 90% done. All of the major equipment is in and for the most part installed. Plumbers and electrician's have been working like crazy. While all of this has been going on we have been sourcing out other equipment, working on a price comparison sheet for all of our vendors, helping out in the shop painting(with the help of my pregnant wife and beer) and organizing, running all over NJ & NY picking stuff up and a million other things.

I finally found the espresso machine of my dreams. It's just like the ones we saw in Italy. La Pavoni
I can't wait to fire this bad boy up with some fresh roasted custom blended coffee from Jersey shore coffee roasters.

 

Finally all of the legal issues with the former tenants of the café side have been resolved. We have signed the lease and our now remodeling.

 It is now time to put our stamp on the town. We have sourced the company for the sign and awning midatlantic sign . This is kind of a process when it comes to the town. You have to come up with a rendering and then put in an application to the design review board. They have their meetings once a month which you attend where they grill you on all kinds of stuff. If they approve you then file a permit which also has to get approved (by the same people who approved it in the first place). We are good to go and it should go up this week.

 

I picked up a great deal on a dough sheeter and saved a few grand thanks to my new found friend Ben at ALLBAKE.

Univex SFG500B
univexcorp.com





 

I had a custom logo put on the gelato case. It looks awesome!!

 nextdoorgraphics.com

 

 

The uniforms are in

                                                               A few smallwares

 

Kick ass bench scale!

doranscales.com

 

Something I didn't know about scales. When you purchase one for a retail operation the company receives it from the manufacturer. They then calibrate and test it and give you a certificate of calibration. Shortly before you open someone from the state will come and test it out. They then put a sticker on it. Note to self : when buying anything that is being weighed check for the state sticker

johnsonscale.net

Commercial Planetary Mixer, 20 qt. capacity, counter model

 

 

 

Now we keep pushing forward

 

 

 

 

Quest for the Best

 

best

/bɛst/ Show Spelled [best]  

adjective superl. of good with better as compar.

1.

of the highest quality, excellence, or standing: the best work; the best students.

2.

most advantageous, suitable, or desirable: the best way.

3.

largest; most: the best part of a day.

adverb superl. of well with better as compar.

4.

most excellently or suitably; with most advantage or success: an opera role that best suits her voice.

5.

in or to the highest degree; most fully (usually used in combination): best-suited; best-known; best-loved.

We have been trying to focus as much as possible on recipe testing. The rental kitchen is working out pretty good. If you are looking to start a small business with a little bit of money its good to go. This time we took on some cakes and tarts.

We have been trying to perfect a pate choux recipe ( I want them to look like FAUCHON pinterest.com). ( The below was a nice try but no cigar). I have been making pate a choux for years with the same recipe with decent results but was never 100% happy. There are recipes with whole eggs, 1/2 eggs 1/2 yolks, some with whole eggs and egg whites, some with bread flour, some with pastry flour, some with milk some with water, some with butter some with shortening. There are some with baking powder and some people steam them slightly before baking. What I want is a consistent smooth shape, not cracked and rough. I want the shell to actually taste so good that you would want to eat it without the filling and glaze and I want it to be nice and hollow to allow for the proper filling to pastry ratio. The "Quest" continues.

We did another tasting for my one partner and his wife. Things went pretty well again with a few comments. We presented the cannoli cream again which they seemed to like but (I think it still needs to be perfected). Vanilla birthday cake- great, mocha torte- great, lemon tart- great, Lady finger cake- great, coffee cake- not so great, tiramisu torte- needs work. It's really nice to have people to taste your food that actually have a palate for it. We get great feedback and it is really making us better.

 I am also on a quest to create the best coffee cake ( presenting a  few day old one was not a good idea). Talking to everyone in north Jersey they all say that B&W bakery in Hackensack has the best yelp.com  . I disagree, the crumb was to thick, not enough cake and I could feel the shortening coat the roof of my mouth. For those of you who are not familiar with coffee (crumb) cake there are two types yeast raised and cream cake style. To me yeast raised coffee cake is not a cake but a Danish. When I think of coffee cake I think back to being a kid and walking to 7-11( to buy my mom cigarettes and using the leftover change, they were .75 a pack) and buying drakes or Entenmanns. The cake is soft but slightly dense and buttery and the crumb is thick but not to thick, crunchy on the top and soft toward the cake part and doesn't all fall off when you bite it. So far I have made about 6 or 7 different kinds and am still working on it. It WILL be the best, look out B&W.

 

 

                                        Can't wait to get into my kitchen and bake for real.
.

Stainless

WOW! what a crazy week. Most of the major equipment got delivered and totally transformed the space. Now the reality has set in that this thing is moving forward and we may actually get open by June ( come on Rockland electric!)

The ovens are so big that they would not fit through the door. We removed the window and built a ramp so the truck could back right  up into the store.

Then at zero dark thirty the troops from all bake technologies arrive to delivery the massive pieces.

 

 I have to give it up these guys were awesome and I highly recommend this company.

 

Now with the big items in other stuff starts to arrive pastry display cases, candy stove, range, gelato machine and my shiny new precision mixer

 

 

Now with all the stuff in the building it looks like a completely different room.

 

 

Ansam Kitchen and Ventilation are next on the list to install the hood system. These guys are awesome as well but are all business. They had the whole thing delivered and installed with a quickness and they had the cheapest price I could find.

 

 

 

 

I'm ready to start baking!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Vendors

Now with construction well under way I need to start lining up my vendors. Up to this point we have been purchasing everything at restaurant depot. This place is crazy they have everything from marscapone cheese to walk in refrigerators and at great prices. I will probably get a good amount of things here.

 

 

From being in the business for a few years I still have some connections with pastry specialty vendors.

 I plan to use parisgourmet, they sell MEC111 gelato flavorings, trablait coffee extract, cocoa noel chocolate and a few other items I like

. I will also purchase some stuff from qzina which sells basically the same stuff as paris gourmet but their prices are pretty reasonable. They sell chocoa , cocoa barry, valhrona and callebaut chocolate, I will probably get cocoa powder, pate glace, glucose, transfer sheets and a bunch of other things from them.

 I think a big part of our operation will be the gelato. I bought a case that can hold 6, 5 liter pans and we also plan to do gelato pops.

I will get most of these supplies from .pregel america. I like this company and have used them a lot in the past. I even took a class at their training center in North Carolina. They have free shipping to NJ.

For uniforms we decided on happy chef their selection isn't the greatest but they are very reasonably priced and local in Butler NJ (and the High Point Brewing companyramstein beer is next door) Chefworks has a bigger selection but are way more expensive.

To clean the uniforms, side towels ( don't bring them home and put them in the laundry basket in the bedroom your wife will get quite pissed)  and other items we are going with yankee linen . Even if you don't use their uniforms and you buy your own they will come clean them.

For paper goods I am going to try Imperial Bag & Paper . I have never used them before. I requested a price list and the guy his taking his sweet ass time getting back to me. We shall see. I can get most of the stuff at restaurant depot anyway.

For other bakery items like frozen eggs, sweetex, almond flour etc.. I am trying a local distribution companyA. oliveri and sons . As I tend to be anti corporation (sysco, US foods) I'll give them a shot. Hey one small business should help another ( my one good deed for the day)

I think that's about it. I ordered some stuff online
http://coffeesleevemojo.com/
http://www.uprinting.com/
http://www.printmyribbon.com/

 

 

 

All Aboard!!!

Full steam ahead!!!
A few short hours ago I was sitting on my ass bitching about how nothing is getting done and BADA BAM! A shit storm of activity starts going on at the shop ( thanks to my partners lighting a fire under the contractors ass, sparked by one of my pain in the ass emails :)

Sal and I went over this morning to the sound of power tools, contractor trucks lined up outside, saw dust flying, electricians wiring stuff and guys in the basement messing with the gas line. I was so pumped up I almost started break dancing ( not really well maybe just a little)

 

Then I'm thinking to myself HOLY SHIT! I have a million and one things to do. My partners would like an opening in mid May and it's now almost mid April. Set the cruiser to light speed chewie here I go.