This last summer I had a bit of a mania for looking for old-school cookbooks in secondhand shops. My rules were simple; I was not allowed to buy any books that: depend on name recognition to sell (i.e. no celebrity chefs or bloggers); were published to promote a product or…
I’ve been remiss at keeping track of the recipes I’ve been trying out over the last few months, and in my defence, well, this blog isn’t exactly widely read or generating income, so I’m sure all three readers will forgive me if this lies fallow for a bit. Also, I’ve…
This was an easy one to do. The birthday girl, who has problems with digesting wheat, specifically asked that I make the Hippie With a Minivan black bean cake for her, since the last time she had it some years ago it left quite an impression on her. There were…
I want to get better at making cakes, so I’ve volunteered to make them for any interested friends to get the practice in. Related, a recent visit to a secondhand bookstore led to my acquiring The Art of Fine Baking by Paula Peck (1961), which contains several classic Northern and…
I haven’t had a lot of time to experiment with hand pies, and to be honest, my desire to mess around with different kinds of recipes is not what it used to be. That’s why I count myself fortunate to have come across this recipe, because even though I thought…
It’s been a while since my last post, but I haven’t been idle; mead-making has been taking up most of my creative cycles. However, after hearing about the relative success of Operation Pantry Clearout, a friend recently unloaded the contents of her freezer on to me, which included a sizable…
I’m on a quest to use up pantry items and free up some space, while making tasty things while I’m at it. I have my eye on clearing out the space currently used by applesauce, because I honestly don’t use it that much on a day-to-day basis. Growing up, apples…
Invariably, after making an angel food cake, the pressing question becomes “what do I do with all of these yolks?” Usually the answer is some form of custard; for me, it’s David Lebovitz’s vanilla ice cream recipe. This time, I didn’t have the cream on hand to make ice cream,…
Forever ago, I found a chart that listed all of the readily available non-wheat flours and their properties, for the purpose of helping people bake gluten-free things more easily. I can’t find that chart, so I’m looking around for other options now, and here’s what I’ve found so far. Between…
For the past few weeks I’ve been thinking about Southern food. It started when I found a smoked pork hock at my nearby grocery store, which was unusual enough for them to carry that I took notice of it the next few times I was shopping and finally bought after…
