It All Started With Polyester

The inspiration for the Pop Tart wasn’t a recipe, it was a packaging material. A product called BoPET (Biaxially-oriented polyethylene terephthalate) otherwise known as Mylar. It’s a stretched polyester film that we mostly take for granted now, but in the 1950’s was considered a miracle product. Then, consumer goods makers had precious few choices when it came to containers or wrappers to put their…well… “stuff” in. You had cans, you had boxes, drums, cartons and crates, but that was pretty much it. And all of them had their limitations when it came to durability or resistance to environmental conditions like heat, cold and moisture. And if you wanted consumers to be able to actually see your product in the package, forget it (unless you could stuff whatever it was into a glass bottle).

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Baking with Bourbon

Back about the time of the bourbon festival, reader Julie asked for a few bourbon-infused baking ideas. This morning reader Linda kindly forwarded this link full of boozy recipes. If there are any keys to successful baking with bourbon, I’d say they are: a.) employ it only in very sweet preparations, since bourbon is a comparatively sweet liquor; b.) combine it with similar vanilla and especially caramel flavors like brown sugar and molasses, and; c.) unless you want a strong alcohol flavor, employ it only in situations where the alcohol can easily cook out: sauces or things made in shallow pans (thin pies, bars or cookies). Remember, however, that even a sauce that’s thoroughly boiled won’t rid itself of every vestige of alcohol. So if you don’t want any in your dessert, use a different flavoring. Thanks Linda!

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Yolks Hard & Soft

Reader Daniel asks:

I was wondering if you might have an insight into a question I have been trying to answer for quite some time. In some traditional cake recipes from central Europe (usually cakes that involve ground nuts as well, like a Linzer), the dough calls for the addition of hard-boild egg yolks, passed through a sieve. I always wondered what this is supposed to do to the consistency of the cake vs. using raw yolk, and what may have prompted the bakers to use yolks in such an unusual way. Do you happen to know anything about that?

Great question, Daniel! The answer is that hard boiled egg yolks are a tenderizer. Consider that for the most part wheat flour is the “bulk” — the building material — of a cake. There’s just one complicating factor: it contains gluten. That gluten is important to some degree. The network of intertwined molecules helps trap the gas and steam that allows the cake to rise.

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Are you a recipe creator?

Months later, I’m still buzzing a bit from our family trip to North Carolina and the Asheville area. So when an Asheville culinary institution, The Tupelo Honey Cafe, asked me to help them promote their recipe contest, I couldn’t say no. This year they’re accepting entries in the categories of sides, desserts and leftovers (love that). If you have an inspiration, send it on in. You could win a cookbook or a $200 gift certificate.

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Chocolates, Suspensions, Emulsions, etc.

Reader Angela writes with this fascinating question:

I have a question that’s bothered me for years, and it occurred to me recently that you might be able to answer it. I know that when you’re melting chocolate, it’s important not to let any water get into the chocolate or it seizes and gets all grainy. However, why doesn’t chocolate get grainy when you melt it with butter or whisk cream into it? At first I thought it must have something to do with the fat and water being emulsified in the cream/butter, but when you melt butter you break the emulsification so it can’t be that. Any ideas?

Oh I always have ideas, Angela. Whether they’re at all based in reality is another matter. Just ask Mrs. Pastry. But you’re very right that the act of melting butter breaks that particular emulsion, however in the process of whisking it together with chocolate, new emulsions and/or suspensions are created. But let’s back up for a moment.

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“Pop Tarts” (Square Turnovers) Recipe

Since it was Hedy Goldsmith’s Baking Out Loud that inspired me to try this project — and risk trademark infringement — I’ll use her crust recipe. It’s a bit leaner than my standard pie crust, which means it’ll hold up better. Plus it has a bit more sugar and salt, which will be more evocative of the real deal. You’ll want:

15 ounces (3 cups) all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons (scant one ounce) sugar
2 teaspoons kosher salt
8 ounces (2 sticks) cold butter, cubed and very cold
6 tablespoons ice water
1 1/2 teaspoons white vinegar
egg wash
jam of your choice
turbinado sugar

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Next Up: Pop Tarts

I wasn’t kidding in the last line of the post down below. This week I’m making hand-held pies, known commercially in the U.S. as Pop-Tarts. Really, Pop-Tarts are nothing more than square turnovers: filled pieces of pie dough that make a handy, mess-free single serving snack. Amazing what something as seemingly minor as a shape […]

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Jiro & Joe

Quite a bit of interesting chatter around here on the subject of Madeleines over the weekend, some in the comment fields, some via email, all on the subject of what makes a “true” Madeleine. There can be no definitive answer to that of course, since the perfect Madeleine is in the eye (more precisely, the mouth) of the beholder. For every person out there who claims to have made a textbook Madeleine there’s someone else who thinks it’s dirt. Most of these people live in France, of course. Not only are Madeleines taken much more seriously there, there are bakers who have spent a good chunk of their lives working to perfect them.

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Making Madeleines

The European pastry style must be rubbing off on me, because I’m becoming a sucker for ultra-simple treats like Madeleines. Crunchy and caramelly on the outside, soft and creamy on the inside and sweet, rich and lemony all over, these are the sorts of things I’m finding increasingly addicting as I evolve as a baker.

That said, I confess that making archetypal goodies like Madeleines always makes me nervous. They’re like chocolate cup cookies: a universal favorite, yet something everyone likes in just their own way. Which means making them here on the blog is something of a risky venture. For every person who likes their Madeleines the way I make them, there’ll be someone else who’ll consider them an affront to all that’s good and holy. But what are you gonna do. Let’s hit it!

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