Category: Pastry

Pinterest fans may have noticed that I’ve recently struck out in a new direction there. I’ve started a few boards, one of which contains gear I like and/or that people have given me to evaluate (so far no high-performance automobiles, but I’m trying to stay optimistic). One of the few pins that’s up there now is a set of plastic (really melamine) bowls that the good folks at Trudeau sent over a few months ago. It’s inspired a few questions, like: what’s wrong with crockery or stainless steel?

Deb over at Smitten Kitchen was making knishes this week, and said some vey nice things indeed about yours truly! Thanks Deb, those knishes look fantastic. I’ll be trying some of those improvisations — probably this weekend!

Reader Stuart writes to say that whoopee pie baker Beryl met and exceeded her $8,500 fundraising goal and was able to buy her used oven. Many thanks to all the generous souls who donated. Ya done good, JP readers!

I’m off to Florida for five days for a little seafood and relaxation. It’ll be the first time the girls have been on a plane or seen the ocean. Little 5-year-old Joan is excited to go, but says she’s worried about being “tasted” by a shark. We’ll see if I can get her in the […]

A few readers have registered complaints about my tender muffin rhetoric. They claim that if muffins are tender they’re indistinguishable from cupcakes. That of course begs the question: what’s the difference between a muffin and a cupcake? Though you might not think it, muffins and cupcakes are quite different under the hood.

That’s probably the biggest question most people have about muffins: should I be going for the cone on the top or not? Experts disagree on the subject but my firm feeling on the cone is that it’s a no-no. But why?

Cone-shaped muffin tops are like domes on cake layers: they’re a sign that the batter has been over-mixed, and a sure-fire sign that you’re in for a chewy, gummy muffin eating experience.

Really, nobody has seen a muffin man — a real one — since well before World War II. Once, and we’re going back some 150 years now to Victorian England, so-called “muffin men” were common in British cities. They sold a sort of dense wheat cake that went by the name of a “tea muffin.” Those cakes were a far cry from what we in America now know as “English muffins”, and today they are entirely extinct as a food.

The hatted, bell-ringing merchants that once roamed the streets of London with flannel-draped baskets of hot muffins now only exist in children’s rhymes. As early as 1899 traditional tea muffins were on their way out in Britain and the mantle of muffin cookery was being passed to the States. Or so said Victorian-era cookbook writer Theodore Francis Garrett: