It’s the first week of January and my cupboard is full of the detritus of holiday baking. Miscellaneous bags of dried fruit vie for space with walnuts and pecans. Spice mixes prepared for mincemeat and plum pudding need to be used up as they will not last until next December. In my fridge I have buttermilk and cream crammed in next to an absurd number of eggs. What to do with this mess? I opt for scones. Scones are the British cousin to a biscuit. Unlike muffins or quick bread, they have a gravitas to them. Slightly dense and crumbly, they suit the cold, dark days of January. The ...
Baking
BRING ON THE HOLIDAYS! CRANBERRY CHOCOLATE TART
I'm taking a break but I couldn't leave you without a fabulous dessert for the Holidays. I posted this blog last year and will be making it again this year. Tart from cranberries, rich with chocolate and lovely to look at, it's a sure winner! It’s November 29th, the Sunday after Thanksgiving. My tree is up and decorated. The outdoor lights are on. My house smells like cinnamon and pine. For the first time in my life I bought my Christmas tree before Thanksgiving and decorated it on Thanksgiving Day. I went for a walk this evening. The glow of lights on many of the houses and ...
FRENCH 84’s: ALMOND, STRAWBERRY AND TOFFEE COOKIES
Inspired by a walk through the markets of Paris in the Spring of 1984, these thin cookies snap when bitten revealing an interior filled with the flavors of almond, strawberry and toffee. Thanksgiving 2021 was very special at my house. All three of my daughters were present, each with a lovely baby boy born this year. And as if that weren’t special enough, we were also joined by my middle daughter’s British in-laws who were seeing them for the first time since 2019. Gratitude was definitely on the table! It was such a treat to be able to feed all of them and host them at my ...
PRALINE PUMKPIN PIE
Every Thanksgiving I find myself faced with people who actively want a pumpkin pie. And every Thanksgiving I search for a way to make it better because I’m not a big fan of pumpkin pie. Last year I experimented with a homemade squash puree. It was good but not, to my mind, memorable. This year I decided to use some of the skills I learned in my Master Class with Christina Tosi; specifically, how to test a number of options and flavors without having to make four or five different pies. I combed through cookbooks and magazine for suggestion then refined the ideas into ...
WHY YOU ARE GOING TO MAKE A FRUITCAKE THIS YEAR
I hear you. Fruitcake is awful. It's a hard rock of weirdly colored candied fruits which doesn't taste much like fruit. In addition, most commercial fruitcakes are sickeningly sweet. No one wants to make that! But what if it wasn't? What if fruitcake was a joyous celebration of dried fruits: pineapple, golden raisins, cranberries, along with pecans, candied ginger and delicate candied peel? What if the cake was moistened with apple brandy, heady with the taste of fall? Would you make it then? Gather your fruits and nuts in a bowl and toss them together. If you like a bit more ...
CANDIED CITRUS PEEL (MIXED PEEL) AND THE SLOW FOOD MOVEMENT
A while back I was approached by a casting agent for a new cooking contest featuring home cooks with “a unique prospective and good short cuts”. I declined. Not that it wouldn’t have been fun, but I am not a good fit for that. More than anything else I believe that if you are going to the bother of cooking at home then you should use the best ingredients and give your efforts and the food the time it needs to be the best it can be. Also because rushing causes things like this: The Slow Food Movement was founded in 1986 to promote locally sourced, home cooked meals. According the ...
SO WHAT IS A JAPANESE STYLE STRAWBERRY CAKE?
A delicate sponge cake containing a layer of fresh strawberries and a gelatin stabilized whipped cream icing, made in the Japanese style. What is a Japanese Cake and how is it different from any other cake? If you have traveled to Asia and spent any time at all walking through markets and towns, chances are you have passed a bakery. The shelves hold beautiful confections, shiny with fruits glazes, filled with fruit flavored custards and mousse. They look familiar but somehow not. And that’s what they are. They are an Asian fusion of European style cakes using fruits and ...
PUMPKIN BISCOTTI WITH GINGER AND CRANBERRY
And all the lives we ever lived and all the lives to be are full of trees and changing leaves. –Virginia Woolf Autumn is a time of reflection. As the light softens and changes; as the mornings darken and the evening comes earlier; as rain drops drearily, dragging reluctant leaves from their hold on branches, my coffee break demands a little more. It asks for biscotti. Crisp on the outside, soft on the inside, flavored with warm spices, candied ginger, cranberries and fragrant pumpkin, my biscotti reminds me of the past and future combined in each season. Spring, summer, fall and winter, ...
BRING ON AUTUMN! APPLE AND PUMPKIN SPICE BREAD
It’s October. Are we doing Halloween this year? I certainly hope so or, judging by the amount the grocery stores are selling, all of us are going to be munching on candy well into the New Year. And I am looking forward to seeing what ingenious costumes my neighbors come up with after a year’s break! October is time for apples, pumpkin, warm spices, and afternoon snacks. I took a trip over to my local Trader Joe’s to see what they were offering up this Fall. I came back with a fun assortment. One item in particular was begging for a recipe—Maple Butter! So I created this Apple ...
FAIRY CAKES FOR MAISIE
Fairy Cakes are a British treat. Small cakes made of Victorian Sponge and topped with a simple icing and a candy or two, they are easy to make and hard to resist! I spent four days last week babysitting my three-year-old granddaughter and 6-month-old grandson. My sister asked me how it went, and this is what I said: Babysitting was very similar to having children. Good days and bad days, boredom and anxiety, fun and laughter, hugs and kisses and tremendous love. Not to mention those lovely moments sitting in a dark room holding a baby and watching him fall asleep. And of course, ...
