For those of you who can’t bear to pry yourselves away from your terminals lest you miss the debut of another scintillating Joe Pastry post, I’m now on Twitter — which means you can carry me around in your purse or pocket and never have to suffer Joe Pastry separation anxiety. Truth be told I’m […]
READ ONSo, the baguette. Just a skinny stick of bread, right? Just more of the same stuff that comes in a loaf, only rolled out into a long skinny shape. What’s the big deal? In fact once upon a time it was a very big deal, primarily because the baguette was the edible outcome of series […]
READ ONAfter the beret, the tight black turtleneck and the skinny mustache, is there anything more stereotypically French than the baguette? I think not, which is a bit, oh, how do you say in your country…ironic. For the baguette is not French. Or to put it more precisely, the baguette was not invented by the French. […]
READ ONThis is my first official bread request, and it’s a doozy. It’s not that baguettes are difficult to make, but that there’s a certain Zen to them. Good baguettes are less a destination than a journey. They only have four ingredients — and in France can have nothing more by penalty of law — so […]
READ ONReader Kate writes in with this about sifting: I had an interesting experience with sifting the other day. I was trying out this “organic, whole grain pastry flour” for kicks, and while sifting, was surprised to find a weevil pop up from the sieve! Having been raised on all-purpose bleached flour, it was a shock. […]
READ ONAoife (pronounced EE-fah, I believe) writes in from the Emerald Isle with this about hot cross buns: Been a reader for a while now and loved your debunking of the hot cross bun myths. As to the latest recipe you posted, I’m not sure I’ve ever had a hot cross bun where the cross was […]
READ ONMexico Bob chimes in with this highly dubious assertion: By now I thought everybody knew that hot cross buns originated in Mexico where they are called “pan de muertos”. Except that “bread of the dead” is a Day of the Dead thing, is it not? And aren’t those shapes on the top supposed to be […]
READ ONPagans and pagan symbolism are just the thin end of the wedge when it comes to hot cross bun buffoonery. There are all kinds of other made-up stories that have found currency over the years. Let’s see…there’s the one about the medieval monks who put crosses on their bread to ward off evil spirits. There’s […]
READ ONI had network problems all day today, and only just now got them sorted out. It’s been many hours of switching things on and off, and listening to muzak with a cordless phone pressed to my ear. Tomorrow, I trust, will be a better day.
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