From Scratch

By suburban standards, Manhattan supermarkets are tiny so I always assumed if they sold something, larger stores everywhere did. Not so. Even though many recipes call for it, crème fraîche is not a staple in every dairy aisle is America, as I learned when I moved to New England. Of five markets I use, only […]

I’ve been writing a couple pieces about supermarkets and the tricks of the their trade, which I’ve written about often over the years. But this is different, a concept Jacques Pépin calls cuisine d’oppportunité. He employs it and so do I, enjoying significant savings and little waste.
Only two things are required: the willingness to try something new with […]

I wish I could say the glass inside my oven door is always spotless, that I clean up splatters on the scorchingly-hot window immediately so nothing ever becomes baked on, but I can’t. Nor can I say my kitchen is chemical-free.
Nothing short of running the self-cleaning cycle — an energy hog and an option I didn’t […]

As Los Angeles Chef Suzanne Tracht says, Passover is all about the matzoh balls. They’re easy to make — and I will sidestep the “sinkers or floaters” debate — and she shows us how in this short video from Epicurious.
What startled me here was her mention of matzoh ball mix to make them, when starting […]

Did you know teal is the hot color for Easter eggs this year? The 125-year-old PAAS company, whose name (which comes from the Pennsylvania Dutch word for ‘passen’, or Easter) is synonymous with egg decorating kits, says teal has replaced purple as the most popular color. The company also says Americans who decorate eggs will fancy up an […]

When I wrote about pasta portions and the American penchant for huge portions, I mentioned a man I met in Italy who took all Americans to task — actually, he called us barbarians — for oversaucing our pasta. He was right, we do.
Who better to explain the proper way than Mario Batali, in a video […]

If cake batters and cookie doughs could talk they might say, “I’m not bad. I’m just mixed that way.”
The purpose of creaming is to create air bubbles…
Creaming is a basic, essential technique that countless people get wrong. Many cakes and cookies, especially cutout cookies, begin with this step. It’s no time for shortcuts or impatience. […]

All-purpose flour, quick-mixing flour, cornstarch. All can be used to thicken gravy and for most of my life I assumed they were interchangable and simply a matter of preference. As it turns out, your choice of thickening agent depends on when you add it to the gravy and whether it will be reheated.
…your choice of […]

The most difficult aspect of making a woven lattice crust is resisting the urge to tell everyone how easy it is. When you get compliments — and you will, of the ooh and ahh variety — simply smile and say thank you. There must be people who perceive this as difficult or there wouldn’t be directions […]

I still remember reading something in an old cookbook when I got serious about pie crusts. It advised people making pie crust by hand to work quickly. Good advice, since overworking the dough’s not wise. Then I was startled by the explanation that if you’re nervous and your palms are warm, the dough will get too […]

The word “classic” certainly applies here.  Crisco was introduced in 1911 and millions of us grew up on this crust — also a classic pate brisee — and now that Crisco’s been reformulated (see Pie Crust, Crisco & Trans Fat), I’ve rediscovered it. Conventional wisdom among my mom and her friends was that nothing made a […]

One day out of the blue, I began having trouble with pie crusts, even when made in the processor, despite having made them without problems for years. All of a sudden they were dry, hard to roll and were neither flaky nor tender. It was so frustrating. I wasn’t doing anything differently. Then it dawned […]

Oftentimes pie crust recipes will give directions for a food processor but the stand mixer is forgotten. I’ll admit it’s not my first thought when I need to make a crust, but stand mixers do a fine job and some prefer it for crust making; it is easy to overwork the dough in a processor […]

Whenever I’ve made challah or other braided loaves of bread, I haven’t posted a recipe because I find it very difficult to describe the simple technique of proper braiding. It’s not like braiding hair. And it’s nearly impossible for me to describe how to use the thumbs in shaping dough professionally.
Technology to the rescue. This video lesson, […]

With local apples ripening and our pie-intensive holidays approaching, it seems like a good time to devote five days of posts to making pies, with an emphasis on crusts. Starting October 8 I’ll be providing tips, tricks and recipes I hope will help you to become a better pie maker or to make your first […]