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Still at 7/10... didn't get any new numbers in the last couple of days. Thanks for the lovely lessons!

Yeah for Terracotta, it puts me half-way there!

I am up to 3 by now =)
Great to read about all those things =)

None again today so stilll 4/10.

I'm up to 3/10 today. Thanks to Terra Cotta

Up to 5, also because of terra cotta

Today's picks are 1 and 12! It's funny that the random number generator spit out those two numbers as 1 was the least popular and 12 the most popular amongst you guys...

1. Badiane, aka DMC 829
Lovely word, isn't it? Badiane is a fruit that can be found both in Japan and in China. While the Japanese kind is poisonous and banned in Europe, the Chinese kind is used in all sorts of culinary delights such as Pastis, Sambuca, or 5-spice mix. It also has some medicinal properties (an infusion will help with bloating and gas), to the point that it is actually one of the ingredients in the flu vaccine manufactured under the name Tamiflu.
Have you guessed what badiane is?............. Star anise!

12. Cassis, aka DMC 550
Cassis is a lovely little fruit that makes amazing jelly, candy, or fruit tarts, and is famous worldwide as one of the two ingredients in the cocktail Kir (btw the proper way to make a kir is 1/4 crème de cassis and 3/4 Bourgogne Aligoté).
The first bottle of crème de cassis was produced in Dijon in 1841. Legend has it that sometime during the 1950s there was an overproduction of cassis in Burgundy and Chanoine Kir, who was then mayor of Dijon, had the idea of mixing it with some white wine to use the surplus. He became very infatuated with the result, and later on gave the authorization to Lejay-Lagoutte to use his name to market their crème de cassis.
I remember, as a child growing up in Dijon, my grandfather grew cassis in his garden and make his own crème, and he used to mix a few drops of it with some water so I could have ''pretend'' wine like the grown-ups
A little culinary trick for you: if you add a small glass of crème de cassis to your coq au vin during the last half hour of cooking, it will make your sauce more rounded and less acidic.
Bottoms up!

What interesting facts!
up to 6/10

I'm also enjoying the history lessons/info about DMC colors, THANK YOU, MaudL!

Cassis puts me up to 6/10...3 Fifths on a Wednesday?????

none today for me. Still at 7/10 Love the info.

Carole

With Cassis I'm up to 6/10

Missed a couple of days...sorry But the up side is I got to read loads of great info and I'm now halfway there, 5/10 !

MaudL wrote:Today's picks are 1 and 12! It's funny that the random number generator spit out those two numbers as 1 was the least popular and 12 the most popular amongst you guys...

Funny too that both of those picks were fruit related!

One more puts me up to 8/10.

All the fruits you've mentioned sound so interesting, but none are familiar. I'm sure it's because I'm in the US. One of my passions is making jams and jellies, which I sell online fairly successfully. I'm always looking to try new things... so I've added these to my list to try and find!

I'm at 6/10

Great about the Cassis which gave me another one so now half way there with 5/10.

Ketta wrote:One more puts me up to 8/10.

All the fruits you've mentioned sound so interesting, but none are familiar. I'm sure it's because I'm in the US. One of my passions is making jams and jellies, which I sell online fairly successfully. I'm always looking to try new things... so I've added these to my list to try and find!

Ketta you should try blackcurrant if you can't find cassis, it's pretty close...

We're getting close to the end.... today's numbers are 17 and 27!

17. Ocre Terre de Sienne, aka DMC 920
Sienna is a form of clay whose yellow-brown color comes from ferric oxides contained within. As a natural pigment, it was one of the first pigments to be used by humans, and is found in many cave paintings.
The name derives from the most notable Renaissance location for the clay, Siena in Italy, and is short for terra di Siena, "earth of Siena". The mines used to produce this sienna petered out in the 1940s. Much of today's sienna production is still carried out in the Italian islands of Sardinia and Sicily, while other major deposits are found in the Appalachian Mountains, where it often goes hand-in-hand with the region's iron deposits.

27. Sépia, aka DMC 779
Not a huge lot to say about this one, other than the pigment was originally derived from the ink sac of the common cuttlefish. What does amaze me is that somebody somewhere sometime actually thought of cutting open the fish, retrieving the ink sac, and figured out how to make color pigment out of it. The human mind is quite special, isn't it?
Anyhoo, sepia's most well-known use is to give a black-and-white photographic print a warmer tone and to enhance its archival qualities. However this treatment does not actually use any fishy parts, but chemicals which convert the metallic silver in the print to a sulfide compound, which is much more resistant to the effects of environmental polluants.
Sepia toning is done in 3 stages: first the print is soaked in a potassium ferricyanide bleach to re-convert the metallic silver to silver halide. The print is washed to remove excess potassium ferricyanide then immersed into a bath of toner, which converts the silver halides to silver sulfide.
Incomplete bleaching creates split-toning, a multi-toned image with sepia highlights and gray mid-tones and shadows.

I have both numbers. Lovely colors. 9/10. But Ketta had 8 yesterday so Good Luck Ketta. I will be away from the computer much of tomorrow so won't be able to check the numbers if it is still on. Good luck everyone!

Carole

7/10 for me today....I bet there are others much closer (Carole for one, GOOD LUCK )