BOOKSHELF « A Woman Sconed

Cookie of the Month: Looking to THE cookie

By rahoward, on November 7th, 2020

I first learned of black and white cookies the way many Americans who don’t live in New York (where the cookie is well-known), learned about the black and white cookie — from a “Seinfeld” episode. Jerry Seinfeld, waiting with his friend Elaine on her quest for a chocolate babka at a bakery, gets . . . → Read More: Cookie of the Month: Looking to THE cookie

Scone of the Month: Befriending figs and pistachios

By rahoward, on October 4th, 2020

Amid the dominating voices (and recipes) screaming “PUMPKIN SPICE!” and “APPLES!” this fall are the softer whispers of two other seasonal flavors: figs and pistachios. I’m seeing a lot of fresh fig recipes as figs come into their full ripening, and pistachios, too, are an early fall crop. The two are found all . . . → Read More: Scone of the Month: Befriending figs and pistachios

Easing into a peach pie

By rahoward, on September 29th, 2020

One of the many things I miss about my mom is her knack for picking good recipes. She didn’t enter into this lightly. Not one to squander either her Ingredients or her time, she would consider new recipe possibilities at length and intently and would usually back a winner.

Sometimes, surprisingly, her intended . . . → Read More: Easing into a peach pie

Produce-ing out of the box

By rahoward, on September 13th, 2020

Even reclusive people — homebound due to a pandemic — can go stir-crazy.

I’ll admit, as a recluse, I was likely not as opposed (though still as discombobulated, mentally) by the imposed exile to which we had surrendered in March. I’m fortunate I can work from home (and am rarely bored here), and . . . → Read More: Produce-ing out of the box

Scone of the Month: Sweetening with fresh corn

By rahoward, on August 22nd, 2020

Come August, I almost always get a bout of “cornostalgia.” Never heard of it? I hadn’t either, since I just came up with the term that has me dreaming of rusty tassels, rustling long green leaves, shimmering gleams of blonde cornsilk covering kernels in shades of cream to gold.

I wanna make things . . . → Read More: Scone of the Month: Sweetening with fresh corn

Cookie of the Month: Marveling at madeleines

By rahoward, on August 21st, 2020

My first bite of madeleine, a yummy little shell-shaped pound cake/cookie, did not release a flood of remembrances, as it did Marcel Proust in his writing about the bakery treat in “In Search of Lost Time” (1913):

“…my mother, seeing that I was cold, offered me some tea, a thing I did not . . . → Read More: Cookie of the Month: Marveling at madeleines

Going ‘green’ with an invisible ingredient

By rahoward, on August 18th, 2020

I’d read the recipes, been intrigued by the videos and even heard out the positive proclamations by a co-worker, but there was still no real way I could be sure that any avocado, of any kind, could be turned into chocolate pudding.

A chocolate-y paste maybe, but certainly nothing to match the chocolate . . . → Read More: Going ‘green’ with an invisible ingredient

Waiting out a summer pudding

By rahoward, on August 8th, 2020

Summer pudding has long been on my “to-make” list. A well-known dessert among the British, I don’t know that too many are aware of it here, although it has been featured on cooking shows and in magazines. I’ve seen just enough about this simple, but unique dessert that I knew I wanted to . . . → Read More: Waiting out a summer pudding

Cookie of the Month: Shooting for the stars

By rahoward, on July 1st, 2020

The Fourth of July has always had even my reclusive nature upended, getting into the spirit of potlucks and family or community gatherings. For the last several years, I’ve trotted out some dessert recipes with Independence Day flair and ventured out of my house for a neighborhood potluck, resplendently held in the beautiful . . . → Read More: Cookie of the Month: Shooting for the stars

Scone of the Month: Topping blueberries with streusel

By rahoward, on June 28th, 2020

Give me coffeecake — or anything streusel — if I’m given a choice of cakes. Granted, I don’t usually make coffeecake as my birthday cake (it’s not “festive” enough), but if there was only one cake I could have, that would be it.

Buttery vanilla cake, laced with layers of cinnamon-y filling . . . → Read More: Scone of the Month: Topping blueberries with streusel

“People ask me: "Why do you write about food, and eating, and drinking? Why don't you write about the struggle for power and security, and about love, the way the others do?" . . . The easiest answer is to say that, like most other humans, I am hungry.”
--M.F.K. Fisher

"It was in a yellow limestone church in Stockdale, Kansas, a crossroads town, that I sat dreaming during summer Sunday sermons, not of heaven or hell, but of the good dinner to come."
--Clementine Paddleford