***Remember to enter the cookbook giveaway!*** UPDATE ON MARCH 11, 2009 – WE HAVE A WINNER!!! ikkinlala from Canada!****

This week, Tuesdays with Dorie host Bridget of The Way the Cookie Crumbles chose Lemon Cup Custard on page 387 of Baking: From My Home to Yours. Because I know Master Chow, my honorable husband, prefers to avoid dairy, I decided to cut this recipe in half.  Why?  Because if it was really good, I knew I’d eat all of it.  If it was bad . . . I knew I’d have to eat all of it!  So, how did it turn out?  All I have to say is . . .

BURP.  This was fantastic.  I made a vanilla version, so I halved all the ingredients in the recipe except for the vanilla bean.  I used an entire bean, then added about 1/2 tsp. of vanilla extract after the milk mixture had cooled.  I also threw in a small pinch of salt.  It took about an hour for this to bake to the right consistency, and it was smooth, silky, and a lot like flan.

Which just happens to be my favorite dessert in the whole world.  Sigh.  My mom’s version was out of this world.  Eggs, cream, milk . . . so rich she’d only make it around the holidays, and we would devour it.  Ah, to be young again, and oblivious to the scale and cholesterol levels!

This recipe is now among my top favorite Dorie recipes.  Be sure to check out the blogroll to see what other custard variations everyone came up with.

*** UPDATE ON MARCH 11, 2009 – WE HAVE A WINNER!!! ikkinlala from Canada!****

Finally, finally, I have my new range, with an oven that works.  A new microwave that cooks, not burns, and has a turntable that turns.  A smaller, sleeker refrigerator, that does not freeze my food.  Now, I’m going to share my “lessons learned” when it comes to appliances.

First, let me say that this week’s TWD pick by Whitney of What’s left on the table? – Caramel Crunch Bars, page 112-113 – is fabulous.  I’m toying with the idea of making them with dulce de leche in the future, in addition to the chocolate and toffee.  I did not use Heath bars; instead, I bought a big tin of English toffee at Trader Joe’s and cut the pieces up.  Considerably more bang for the buck than a bag of Heath bar pieces.  I baked them in a 9×9-inch pan based on the comments by other bakers, because I wanted a thicker cookie than people were getting in a 9×13-inch pan.  I’ll try to get a picture of them up later.  I’m playing catch-up this weekend with TWD (in case you didn’t know, I’ve been out of commission because my range went to that big bakery in the sky), and I’m going to be making the World Peace Cookies, so once I find my camera, I’m going to take a picture of the lot (if there are any cookies left, that is!).

Now, I won’t keep you in suspense any longer.  Here is the giveaway:  The wonderful new book, Baking for All Occasions, by Flo Braker.  The rules:  leave a comment on this post any time between now and midnight, March 10, 2009 EST.  The comment should include one or more of the following:  why you love or hate one of your major appliances, and/or what is your dream appliance and why.  I’ll ship only to the United States and Canada (sorry everybody else!).  Winner will be picked on March 11 using the Random Number Generator, so please be sure to enter your email address (it won’t be made public).

Now, let us turn to the four big Lessons in Appliance Shopping.

First, form follows function.  What that means is, even though you LOVE that 36 inch Viking range, if your kitchen will fit a 30-inch range and you are not going to be doing a major kitchen remodel, focus your research on what will fit. After your budget, that is the most important thing.  So, measure, measure, measure, then measure again.  Once you know what will fit, pick a fuel source (if you don’t have gas, why look at gas ranges?), and only after all that should you pick a finish (stainless, white, etc.).  If you want a dual-fuel range, be sure that your electrical outlet has enough juice (see below_.  Once you’ve hammered out all these details, then you can move on to the consumer research.

Second, do your research.  Read Consumer Reports and message boards on the internet.  Do not focus solely on the “official” reviews – I learned a lot by reading the consumer reviews at Consumer Reports (CR), many of which completely disagreed with CR’s rankings.  For example, I ended up getting the GE Cafe gas range you see pictured above.  It fit in my kitchen.  It was gas, and stainless.  I wanted the dual-fuel range, but since this line comes with a warming oven, I discovered that my electrical outlet did not have the juice to power it.  Of course, I discovered this only after the delivery guys were standing in my kitchen.  The store was very nice about exchanging it, I must say.  Changing the wiring would have involved at least a $500 electrician’s fee, and then I would have had to pay someone to dry-wall and patch the ceiling and bookcases that needed to be torn down to do the electrical work.  So, I went with gas.  Reviewers gave this range much better satisfaction ratings than they gave a comparable Viking, and it was more affordable.

The GE Cafe line came out about 4 years ago, and I discovered that two major consumer complaints were the cheap plastic knobs and overheating of the oven control touchpad when the oven was in use.  Because of this, I was able to ask the right questions.  I learned that GE upgraded the knobs, and fixed the overheating problem by adding more insulation.  I’ve tested out the oven, and this has proved to be true.  Bottom line:  do your research.  Appliances cost a lot of money, and you want to get the most for your dollar.

Third, carefully choose to whom you give your business.  If you are buying new appliances to upgrade the look of your kitchen in order to sell your house, that’s not going to matter.  Look for a great deal.  But, if you plan on staying in your home, you should look beyond that.  I bought my appliances from a small local company that has been in business for decades.  Their prices were competitive, but what made them stand out was that they have their own service department, and will service only the appliances that they sell.  Because I bought three appliances, they gave me a discount on their 5-year warranty package, which covers EVERYTHING, including power surges.  If I never use the warranty, at the end of five years, I have the choice of extending it or another year or applying it toward merchandise credit.  The icing on the cake is that if we move, the warranty is transferable to the new owners.

So, why should this matter?  Folks, one thing I learned is that cost does not always equal quality or satisfaction.  I was astonished at the number of complaints over Sub-Zero’s, Vikings, Thermador, etc., particularly with their customer service.  It’s one thing if you spend $900 on an appliance, it stops working, and then you get lousy service, but it’s an entirely different matter when you spend $4,000 on a refrigerator or $7,000 on a range, and you can’t get anyone out to your house for a month to fix it.

Finally, you may have to compromise. We ended up getting a Fisher and Paykel refrigerator to replace our Maytag.  If I could have, I probably would have gone with a Liebherr, which received great consumer (actual users, not the pundits) reviews, but that would have involved ripping out our maple cabinets, and that wasn’t going to happen.  Oh, and it was $4,000, and that REALLY wasn’t going to happen. We went with the F &P because : (1) it fit, (2) got decent reviews, (3) did NOT have an ice maker or a water dispenser, and (4) came with a 5 year warranty and good service/repair support.  The trade off?  Space.  When I emptied the old fridge, I filled 9 grocery bags to the brim.  This new refrigerator fits only 6.  It has changed my shopping patterns, but we now have more room in the kitchen, and my husband loves it because he can find everything without asking me to hlep him!

If you have any questions about this whole process, just ask me in the comments.  I’ll be sure to answer.

And be sure to check out the other TWD bakers this week!