I’m headed back to Indy Style tomorrow! It will be my third time on the show (I previously demonstrated my recipes for Cinnamon Roll French Toast and Slow Cooker Carnitas). This time, I’ll be talking about the many uses for biscuit dough and showing how easy it is to make at home. I hope my appearance will go smoothly but it’s live TV so anything can happen. Catch the show at 9:00 a.m. EDT on WISH-TV Channel 8 (CBS) in Indianapolis or stream it live online at www.indystyle.tv. Wish me luck!

It’s a dough baller! Click this link to see a manufacturer’s video of a similar machine at work.

We use this piece of equipment every morning in the MCL Restaurant & Bakery kitchens to make our signature Cloverleaf Rolls. The baker mixes and kneads the dough just like you would at home. Then he or she puts the dough on a special plate. It starts out as one large blob of dough and ends up as several golf ball sized pieces. This happens by putting the plate, which has special indentations, into the machine. The machine shakes and individual rounds form in the indentations on the plate.

The baker puts three balls together in each well of a muffin pan. As the dough rises, it clusters together to form the cloverleaf shape. I doubt you’ll want to purchase your own dough baller for home, but you can roll them by hand and use the same technique to create your own homemade cloverleaf rolls.

It’s time for another installment of “What Does That Do?” You know how to play—guess what this piece of MCL Restaurant & Bakery equipment is used for in the comment section below, then check back tomorrow for the answer.

I’ve been asked to judge a new contest sponsored by Reliable Water. It’s called the Hottest Kitchen Entrepreneur Challenge and the winner gets $2,500 in seed money. To enter, you just have to submit a cool idea for a food business concept. You can submit an application online at hotwater247.net through May 15.

I’m looking forward to seeing what neat innovations people come up with. As judge, I’ll review all the applications and determine my favorites. Then my fellow judges and I will meet with the finalists face to face. A finalists’ showcase will be held on June 20 in the Bankers Life Fieldhouse which is open to anyone who attends the Chamber’s annual party, Schmooza Palooza. Come check out the winner and be sure to stop and say hello.

There’s a lot of talk these days about whole grains. They’re filling and heart and waist friendly—but only sometimes tasty. That’s one of the challenges I’ve been attempting to overcome as I work on a new recipe for multi grain bread. What do you think readers, would you choose multi grain if it were one of the bread options at MCL Restaurant & Bakery?

My job is usually pretty neat (what with all the taste testing and setting things on fire). But there are some weeks when it gets even more fun because I get to venture outside of the kitchen and meet really cool and deserving people. That’s what happened to me this week (and I’m not just talking about Bumblebee).

As part of MCL’s sponsorship of the I Love to Read Challenge, I attended the winners’ ceremony which was held at the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis. If you haven’t heard of the I Love to Read Challenge you should click here to learn more. It’s a really great program which encourages kids to exceed their reading goals.

There wasn’t much time for me to explore the world’s largest children’s museum, but I took a moment to snap these shots. I am definitely bringing my daughter back here soon.

I’m testing a new Catfish sandwich at MCL Castleton today until 3:00 p.m. It consists of two pieces of Southern Fried Catfish on a freshly baked Kaiser roll. Then it’s topped with your choice of my new homemade Creole mayonnaise or lemon garlic mayonnaise and finished with lettuce, tomato and onion.

Send your opinion of this new item to testkitchen@mclhomemade.com so we know if it should become a regular part of the MCL Restaurant & Bakery menu at all stores.

Looking for an easy, yet scrumptious holiday breakfast? Here are two recipes which will leave you full and with plenty of time to open presents. Both recipes can be made the day before and reheated in the oven the next morning or assembled on Christmas Eve and baked Christmas Day.

The Loaded Hash Brown Casserole will stick to your ribs and satisfy even the hungriest of sleep deprived parents. While my recipe for Apple Walnut Coffee Cake will fill the whole house with the smell of warm cinnamon. Which makes having your kids to wake you at 5 a.m. almost worth it.

Recipe for Apple Walnut Coffee Cake

Recipe for Loaded Hash Brown Casserole

I’m willing to try any dessert you can set on fire.  Figgy pudding (or plum pudding as it’s also known) delivers on this front making it one of the more exciting holiday treats, but the flavor may or may not be your cup of tea. Figgy pudding is a traditional English Christmas dessert. It resembles a fruit cake minus the maraschino cherries and is loaded with booze. The name is a huge misnomer because it doesn’t have to contain figs (just dried fruit) and it’s not a pudding as Americans know it. Instead, what sets it apart from other cakes is the cooking process. Figgy pudding is steamed in the oven through the use of a water bath. Another reason figgy pudding stands out from other desserts is its cameo in the classic carol “We Wish You a Merry Christmas.”

Looking for a memorable way to present it?  Douse it with brandy and set it ablaze (carefully, of course). It will wow your guests and be an unforgettable end to any meal. If you want to try some but don’t have the two hours needed to cook this cake you can purchase it at World Market ($4.99-$14.99). I found it to be rather tasty. It’s like fruit cake–without the cake part getting in the way. But be forewarned, if you don’t like marmalade or raisins you won’t like this cake. If you do enjoy those things, then you’re going to love it.

I previously posted about a BBQ Chicken recipe I was working on for MCL Restaurant & Bakery. But one of my biggest projects of 2011 was a Chicken Pot Pie. Now that it has become a regular menu item I thought I’d give you a sneak peek at what goes on in the test kitchen and explain the effort it takes to launch a new menu item.

Most new items go through a lengthy process which includes recipe development, product testing, recipe tweaking, more testing, and companywide rollout. In all, it can take up to a year to create a new menu item (which is what happened with the pot pie). However there are exceptions. Alterations to current recipes or new recipes that are similar to existing menu items may be fast tracked depending on customer feedback during testing and how much employee training is needed to make the new product. New recipes that prove more difficult to prepare or recipes that have a unique flavor profile usually take longer as we work to iron out all the details. A new item isn’t ready for launch until it can be replicated consistently and has a taste that appeals to customers.

The ideas for new menu items come from many places. Sometimes I get an urge to make a particular dish or I see a food trend and want to put my own spin on it, other times I try to perfect an existing recipe or find a more efficient way to make it. Necessity, the mother of invention, also plays a role. If an ingredient is no longer available or if the quality of an ingredient decreases, I’ll work with a recipe to develop another way to make it.

Once I have an idea, I’ll play around with the proportions, the ingredients and the cooking methods until I get the flavor just the way I want it. Then I share the new item with the MCL executives. If they think it has potential, a small amount will be made and sold at one store. Customers are asked for their feedback and we review this information to make any necessary changes. It can take several months until we feel we have enough positive responses to move to the second phase of testing.

At this point, I’ll type up the recipe and teach a select number of stores how to make the item. Not only are we looking for customer opinions, but we’re also checking to see if the new item is consistent from store to store. We don’t make our food at a central location and reheat it in each store, so it’s imperative that each restaurant be able to prepare, cook and serve the new item the same as the others. This phase of testing is a great time to identify issues with production. For the pot pies, customer feedback was good but the time it took to make each one was very high. I had to work with the bakers to streamline the process and make it more efficient. Only after all the problems have been resolved can the new item be rolled out to the entire company.