A radically different story about the origin of pretzels credits American Indians, who as the story goes had an ingenious method for preventing animals from making off with surplus wheat. They’d store it in rings of unleavened dough that they baked on hot rocks, then strung over the branches of trees a dozen or more […]
READ ONMy own thought on the origin of pretzels, and it’s not original, is that they were invented in Central Europe, somewhere around the region of what is now known as Germany. That said, this is absolutely not how it happened. Frankfurt, located in the German State of Hesse, has been an important commercial hub for […]
READ ONSpeaking of good conversation, there’s a fun one going on right now over on Rose Levy Beranbaum’s site about what went on here in this space last week. Rose put up all the content and invited her readership to comment — and many of them did. Read it and/or get in on it with both […]
READ ONThe emails just keep right on coming in regard to my It’s a guy thing post the other day. So many in fact that I’m going to have to give up sending personal replies to all of them. So for all you gender warriors out there who still may be working on your outlines, let […]
READ ONIt’s awfully hard to date the pretzel. That’s because its main ingredients — flour, water, salt, yeast — are the basis for just about every bread product known to man. Its shape, on the other hand, is quite distinctive. Perhaps a little too much so. Why? Because in an effort to make themselves sound intelligent […]
READ ONOf all the baked goods I’ve written about, I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a food-historical conundrum quite like the pretzel. No other foodstuff I’ve encountered has had so many — and so many bogus — origin stories attached to it. Part of the reason is surely because it’s so old. The pretzel has been […]
READ ONWell I certainly stirred up the ol’ hornets’ nest yesterday, didn’t I? Turned out there was a whole world of hurt in that shoe sale joke. (For me). I guess that’ll learn me, at least until the next time. Given all the stress of a big interview and lots of comments, I can’t tell you […]
READ ONIf I have any regrets about last week’s interview with Rose Levy Beranbaum it’s that I didn’t engage her more on the subject of Continental pastry-making and the relationship of American baking to it. I wish I’d delved a little deeper, since she had some surprisingly strong feelings on the matter. One thing that’s stayed […]
READ ONAnd so Joe’s Week of Rose draws near an end. Some of you loved it, some of you hated it, all of you have much more important things going on in your lives. Yet there is a question that’s still hanging out there: Joe, where did you end up? Which is to say, for all […]
READ ONI tend not to make a lot of bundt-style cakes, but I might need to change my habits because this was excellent. It didn’t take long for the girls, the missus and I to polish it off. Little 2-year-old Joan, who likes cake but has never been passionate about it, loved it so much she […]
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