Pennies from Heaven

The answers to my day-today problems don’t typically fall right out of the sky, but this weekend they did. I’ve been fretting about brick oven fuel supplies for a while now, since I’ve been lazy about acquiring a load of green (i.e. “fresh”) wood to start curing for next year’s baking. My problems were solved […]

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Making Fig Jam

Didn’t expect this, did you? Well I happened to receive a quantity of figs yesterday. They were very small and ripe, so action was called for. Fig jam is incredibly easy to make since you don’t have to worry about gelling like you do with most fruit jams. Figs are plenty thick and sugary in their natural state. The only issue you have with figs is — depending on how large they are — softening their thick skins. These were small and ripe so they didn’t need much softening. I had just 1 1/2 pounds.

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Rumford Low-Sodium Baking Powder

I recently received a press release about this new product from Rumford (really Clabber Girl, which now owns the Rumford brand). I was interested by it since I get regular requests for low-sodium recipes, and the good folks at Clabber Girl were happy to send along a sample for me to try. Though I have yet to test it comprehensively, I did use it for biscuits (American biscuits) last night. Biscuits are an excellent proving ground in our household because I make them once a week on average. Mrs. Pastry and the girls pick out deviations from the norm with spectrographic sensitivity.

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The Majority Minority

The immigrant groups that have historically gotten the most attention in Chicago are the Italians and the Irish. Italians because of Al Capone, and the Irish because, well, they’re everywhere there. This is not to take anything away from Chicago-Irish notables like Mrs. O’Leary (whose cow supposedly started the Chicago fire) and bartender Mickey Finn, who was so notorious for drugging and robbing his customers that he became the basis for the idiom “slip a Mickey.”

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Reflections on Affluence

Lovers of Continental breads and pastries constantly wonder why there are so many more bakeries in France than in the United States. The simplest answer is that the French outsource more of their baking than we do. Historically we Americans have done most of our baking ourselves. The more you bake at home, the less you need bakeries. That’s the general rule.

Yet the old Central European neighborhoods to the West of Chicago didn’t abide by that rule. The Polish and Czech kids I knew in high school came from the some of the baking-est families I ever saw. Their grandmas made cookies, pies and buns by the dozens during the week…yet they and their parents still went shopping at the Cermak Road bakeries on Saturday mornings.

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Kolaczki Recipe

Wait, you spelled the word differently in this post. Yes, that’s right. It’s the Polish spelling (or so I understand) because this is the Polish version. Or at least it’s the Chicago Polish version. Or one of them at any rate. Polish kolaczki are envelope-like cookies, made with a cream cheese short crust and jam. To make them you’ll need:

4 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
6 ounces (1 1/2 sticks) butter, room temperature
7.5 ounces (1 1/2 cups) all-purpose flour
pinch salt
about twelve total ounces of filling(s) of your choice
powdered sugar for dusting

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Next Up: Kolache

Here’s another project I’ve been fearing, but can hold out no longer. My twin sister called me up this morning to ask when I’m finally going to bite the bullet and make some good ol’ Chicago kolache. If you don’t know what kolache are, you may recognize them from some of their other spellings: kolaczki, kolacky, kolá?e or kolace. Still nothing? Then you don’t live among many Central Europeans (i.e. Poles, Czechs and Slovaks).

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