Certain recipes or baking concepts often keep floating my way. I believe this is due to algorithms, or what have you, where whatever bent you are on via the Internet boomerangs all manner on the subject back to you. I also still believe in synchronicity, search engines be damned, and […]
Occasionally, I stumble across a recipe that reminds me of the versatility and homey comfort of muffins. I don’t make them a lot, and I should, particularly when I find an easy, flavorful version like the Lemony Yogurt Muffins from “Baking with Dorie: Sweet, Salty & Simple,” (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; […]
Sometimes I am a rebel. When the rally cry is pumpkin spice, I start to think about sweet potatoes. Or should I call them garnet yams, which is what the red-skinned, orange-fleshed creatures most of us call sweet potatoes really are (the jewel sweet potato is another version of the […]
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 […]
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] […]
Shortbread is pretty much my favorite cookie. Just a few ingredients (usually a basic blend of butter, sugar flour and salt), it’s easy to make and despite its simplicity, rewards with rich flavor and isn’t too terribly sweet. It’s virtually fail-proof, too. I’d say over-baking is the biggest risk to […]
I wrote recently of an inspiring book documenting a year in an Irish garden. Between it, the current stay-at-home orders and my own spring fever, I’ve been spending more time out back, with my trees and plants, in a bleary-eyed, sun-induced kind of green-fogged nature dream. In my meditative times […]
Fruit desserts are among my favorite, partly because of their wholesome coziness, as well as some of their colorful names. You have fools, grunts, slumps and crisps, and even more specifically with apples, you get dumplings, brown “betties†and pandowdies. I have yet to make all of these whimsically named […]
Certain ingredients create certain sensations, like those whose tastes create the illusion of cool, despite not actually being a lower temperature. Powdered (confectioner’s) sugar is one…a fine dusting of this soft sweetness automatically tempers any sort of sweet — even one as strongly warm-flavored as coffee or chocolate or cinnamon […]
When considering the rightness of the Universe, one can look no further than the timing of the lemon. The depth of winter — this year,= dark, cold and freezing from coast to coast — is the height of lemon season. Bright citrus of all kinds, lead by the lovely lemon, […]