Those of you who attended my presentation at NYU Experimental Cuisine Collaborative may remember that I began with a discussion of science vs. alchemy and the following definitions:

1) an early, unscientific form of chemistry that sought to change base metals into gold and discover a life-prolonging elixir, a universal cure for disease, and a universal solvent alkahest

2) a power supposedly like alchemy, especially of enchantment or transformation (don’t you adore this definition!)

I also mentioned that ‘some people’ think that baking is alchemy. The ‘some people’ I had in mind included my husband Elliott. But I couldn’t say this because he was in the audience!

Afterwards I told him that I was referring to him and he said “yes—I knew that—but you always misunderstood. I didn’t mean it as a bad thing but as a good thing. I have little respect for scientific theories alone—it is the people who actually perform the experiments, i.e. the alchemists who understand…”

Thirty two years of marriage and it took this presentation to understand an important issue between the two of us. All these years I had been assuming that he was putting me down on some level and it was quite the contrary. I’m telling you, dear bloggers, communication is surely the source of most of the world’s problems. Anyway, let us all continue to be alchemists and “enchant and transform” our world.

From the kitchen of Rose on 02.24.08 at 11:01 AM in Special Stories
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I first met fellow author and baking sister Marcy Goldman in Montreal during the IACP (International Association of Culinary Professionals) annual conference. She had invited me out to her home for a visit along with two other bakers and it was an enchanting experience to be in her kitchen tasting the cakes she made for us as we all talked baking. She also presented me with a beautiful rolling pin of her design which I used yesterday to roll out the bubka from her new book A Passion for Baking. I am sitting here (having already eaten a piece for breakfast and I don’t usually eat breakfast, trying to fight off the impulse to defrost a slice I stashed in the freezer to make just such a temptation less convenient.

One of our fellow bloggers asked me what I thought of Marcy’s bubka compared to the babka I had described in a previous posting. So of course I had to find out first hand even though I knew it was going to be wonderful—all the more so!

First let me explain the name bubka. In both Polish and Yiddish, babka is a diminutive of baba or babcha, meaning old woman or grandmother. When I was growing up, my grandmother described an old woman as an “alta bubba.” No doubt Marcy’s ancestors come from the same location in Russia near the Polish border (Minsk) as bubka seems to come from bubba. Come to think of it, maybe it was a distant village as my grandmother used the word bubka to describe little hard things that are undesirable as in “it’s not worth bubkas”! But a bubka or babka by any other name will taste as sweet and this is a cake/bread that deserves all the attention and enthusiasm it gets.

According to the New York Times, my dear friend Arthur Schwartz, whose book Arthur Schwartz’s Jewish Home Cooking is due to be published in April, writes that: ''Babka, in its original form, was stout and round, just like grandmothers used to be before they went to aerobics classes and practiced yoga.''

Now to Marcy’s bubka itself. Compared to Anne Amernick’s (to which I referred in the prior posting) it is less cakey and more bready, i.e. less tender and more chewy which I personally find more satisfying. This texture is mostly because it employs a combination of bread flour and unbleached all-purpose (I used Harvest King flour which is about the same protein percentage). Marcy describes the recipe as “…it strikes the right notes of sweet and bready,” and for me this resulted in the perfect balance between bread and cake. The dough is so lively it virtually bursts from the pan on baking. In fact, I would use a larger bread pan than the 9 x 5 recommended to keep it from spreading sideways as much. (My 9 x 5 pan is 7 cups but my All Clad 10 x 5 is 8 cups and I think that would be just perfect.) For those of you who weigh, I used 412 grams/almost 15 ounces of flour for half the dough.

To continue with the comparison, Marcy’s bubka has less egg and butter but more water which makes it lighter and moister. In fact, it is quite similar to my kugelhopf but moister which I prefer! I also adore the brown sugar/almond paste in the filling. Some oozed out to form crunchy edges on the crust—confession—I who write in no uncertain terms to let the bread cool completely before cutting kept attacking this bubka to eat those crunchy edges until finally I could stand it no longer and cut a whole still hot slice and consumed it all!

In the process of making this bubka I have quite fallen in love with Marcy’s new book A Passion for Baking along with Marcy herself! That is because she provides a real and personal presence in this book. Starting with the cover which shows her hand (and what is more eloquent or definitive of a baker than her hand) drawing a heart in the flour on the counter, you see the love she has for her craft. Right beneath it are the words: “Bake to celebrate . Bake to nourish . Bake for fun.” Does this not say it all?! It reminded me of the visit to her home when she shared that before cleaning up her work counter she always drew a heart in the flour that remained on the surface. In fact, her son when he was only 12 took the photo that inspired this cover. It is the hand of a ballerina baker!

Marcy dedicates this book to her sons: “…I love you more than words can say and far more than infinite fields of golden wheat. You are the gold of my heart.” But anyone who opens this book will feel her love and generosity pouring out to all her fellow bakers as well, and in full measure.

Note: Marcy generously is offering this recipe below. Do check out her site: www.betterbaking.com

Baker's Bubka With Crumb Topping
Bubka is pure heaven to me - because it strikes the right note of sweet and bready. It is also relatively easy to make - not as complicated as true Danish with its rolled in blocks of butter but certainly richer and moister than a sweet dough. I often use a bread machine to make the dough - although I have to give the mixing a hand at first by using a rubber spatula, just to get the rich dough properly going.

Dough
1 1/2 cups warm water (100 to 110 F)
2 tablespoons rapid-rise yeast
3 large eggs
2 yolks
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon pure almond extract
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup milk powder
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
3 cups all-purpose flour
3 cups bread flour

Filling
1/4 cup unsalted butter
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup chopped almond paste
2 tablespoons corn syrup
2 teaspoons cinnamon
3/4 cup chopped almonds, optional

Egg Wash
1 egg, pinch sugar

Crumb Topping
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup scant confectioner’s sugar
1/2 cup all-purpose flour

Generously spray two 9 by 5 inch loaf pans with nonstick cooking spray. Line a double-up baking sheet with parchment paper. For an extra large bubka, use a 10-inch angel food cake pan, also sprayed with nonstick cooking spray. Place the pans on the baking sheet.
In a mixer bowl, hand whisk the water and yeast together and let stand 2-3 minutes to dissolve the yeast. Briskly whisk in the eggs, egg yolks, vanilla, almond extract, lemon juice, sugar, salt, milk powder and all-purpose flour. Then stir in the butter and most of the bread flour. Mix dough, then knead as it becomes a mass, with a dough hook or by hand for about eight to ten minutes, until smooth and elastic, adding in more bread flour as required.

Remove dough hook and cover entire mixer and bowl with a large, clear plastic bag. Allow to rise, about 45-90 minutes until puffy or almost doubled in size.
This is also an ideal dough to refrigerate overnight and resume next day, allowing dough to warm up a bit before proceeding.

Whisk an egg in a small bowl for the egg wash.

For the Filling, in a food processor, process the butter, sugar, almond paste, corn syrup, cinnamon, and almonds to make a soft paste or filling.

For the Crumb Topping, in a small bowl, cut the butter, confectioner’s sugar and flour together to make a crumbly topping.

Turn out onto a lightly floured work surface and gently deflate the dough. Divide dough in two portions. On a well-floured work surface, roll dough into a 16 inch square. Spread on the filling over dough surface. Roll up dough into a large jellyroll. Cut in half. Place both halves in prepared pan, beside each other - it doesn't matter if they are a little squished. Brush well egg wash and sprinkle with some sugar. Repeat with remaining dough and filling. Spray the tops of both loaves with nonstick cooking spray. Place the pans on the prepared baking sheet and cover with the large, clear plastic bag. Let rise until the bubka is flush or a touch over the sides of the pan, 45-75 minutes. Brush with egg wash. Sprinkle with Crumb Topping.

Preheat oven to 350 F. Bake 40-50 minutes (55-70 minutes for one large bubka) until bubka is medium brown. Cool in pan fifteen minutes before removing to a rack or serving plate.

Makes one large or two medium bubkas.

From the kitchen of Rose on 02.23.08 at 10:43 AM in Bread
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Hector made the loveliest cake, here's what he wrote..

Dear Rose, the cake survived the 5 hour plane and the 5 hour car rides . . .

I hope the bloggers ask all kinds of questions, as this cake went thru a lot, including a near disaster of trying to cut the cake while still cold!

From the kitchen of Rose on 02.20.08 at 5:43 PM
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For Matthew and anyone else who has tried or will try the Seville orange curd I posted a few weeks back: blood orange zest makes a beautiful addition. I was just at Whole Foods in SoHo, looking to see if they had the Seville oranges. They didn't but to my surprise they had another batch of blood oranges. Tip: choose the ones that have purplish peel rather than orange as that is a sure indication of the color of the fruit within. If the oranges are mostly orange in color the interior will be mostly orange with maybe a few tinges of red.
Blood orange zest disappointingly loses its color on heating and becomes just orange but when subjected to minimal heat from the orange curd poured over it, it keeps its vibrant hue. Of course the orange inside is great to eat and blood oranges are exceptionally easy to peel. But don't wait too many days to do so as the inner peel hardens after the outside is zested.

From the kitchen of Rose on 02.20.08 at 11:25 AM in Announcements
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I'm posting this recipe at the request of one of the members of this blog.

Sprouting wheat berries is easy and fun but does take several days of pre-thought. It is a fantastic "science" project for kids as they get to see one of the most simple and basic forms of life that sustains our life--the grain of wheat and how water wakes it up out of dormancy (sleep) to sprout into the potential of a stalk of wheat or as in this case a loaf of bread with delightful crunch. Maybe we should rename it Sleeping Beauty Bread!

The sprouted wheat berries that rise to the top of the dough become very hard during baking so try to avoid having to many on the surface.

From the kitchen of Rose on 02.16.08 at 12:09 PM in Bread
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After the presentation demo in January we invited Woody to come with us to Hope for the weekend. We spent the whole weekend cooking and baking. I made him roast duck (he only had it once before in his life), wild Concord grape pie with grapes stored in the freezer since Summer of 1994 (you do the math!) that tasted as fresh as the day they were picked by me, blueberry pancakes with Seville orange curd, and beer bread for his ham sandwich to take on the plane.

I’ve decided that the time has come to label the sugar and salt antique glass canisters which are so close to identical that I ended up putting sugar in the bread instead of salt. I knew for sure I had put in what I thought to be salt but was puzzled why it rose faster than usual and also had a flat taste. It took several days for it to come to me—it was sugar not salt! This was not a total disaster as the ham was salty and it also led me to reinvestigate the recipe that is in The Bread Bible. It is for a free-form loaf made in the food processor. I thought it would make a great sandwich bread baked in a loaf pan but needed to have a softer crust so I added oil and also my beloved stiff starter for extra moistness and flavor.

This is my personal contribution to the “no knead bread” category. It is both faster and easier to handle and has more depth of flavor from the beer and the starter. If you prefer the same technique can be used replacing the beer with water. I’m not a beer drinker but I enjoy the slight bitterness of the stout. Elliott does not.

It is a fabulous bread with ham, cheddar cheese, and even orange marmalade which I made last week. Call it fighting bitter with bitter!

Note: the little white specks on the crust are due to the overnight shaped rise.

From the kitchen of Rose on 02.09.08 at 11:30 AM in Bread
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I’m not sure if I’ll ever make onion soup again, at least not as long as I live a 5 minute walk from Blue Ribbon Bakery and they still make their glorious version.

For starters, chef and baker Sefton Stallard makes some of the best bread I’ve ever tasted and believe me I’ve tasted many a bread around the world! When creating the kitchen for Blue Ribbon Bakery he excavated an ancient wood fired brick oven in the cellar and called in an expert from Europe to restore it to working order.

Seton studied in Paris at the Cordon Bleu and apprenticed in Paris and in Switzerland for several years. He created this onion soup based on his taste memory and, I suspect, improved on it as it’s better than any I tasted even in France.

When cold weather sets in there is little more pleasing than this hot soup filled with caramelized onion and topped with a slice of bread soft and comforting with the juices of the stock, also serving to float an ample island of stretchy/stringy strands of melted gruyère with crunchy golden bits adhering to the edges of the bowl. It satisfies every possible longing--at least while eating it.

Another lovely memory I cherish of perfect French onion soup was in Tasmania when I attended a culinary symposium. The night before the conference the local culinarians prepared a welcome event and instead of serving fancy complex dishes they made a huge cauldron of this soup. It was the perfect solution for feeding a hungry crowd of food professionals and no one could have been happier. It also served to honor the Escoffier mantra: “Faites simple”! My translation: Make it simple but make it right.

The main secret to great French onion soup is caramelizing the onions to a deep and flavorful brown in an ample amount of butter. A good quality stock adds to it’s depth of flavor, good bread as well, and of course the gruyère should be the best you can find. (I get cave aged French gruyère from Murray’s cheese.)

Slowly sautéed onions produce the best flavor and Sefton’s methods of caramelizing the onions takes 4 to 5 hours of frequent stirring (of course he's doing a large quantity) which is fine if you’re a chef and doing other things in the kitchen or have a kitchen slave. If not, I’m including a great shortcut that food writer Lora Brody came up with using a crock pot so that no tending of the onions is necessary and they come out perfectly caramelized as well.

Caramelized Onions

6 to 8 Spanish onions (about 2 1/2 pounds) 3 to 4 inches in diameter, stem and root ends removed, peeled and left whole
4 ounces butter (1 stick)
a 10-ounce can unsalted chicken or vegetable broth

In a slow cooker (crock pot), set on low, place onions, butter, and broth. Cook until the onions are deep golden brown and very soft—12 to 14 hours.

Drain and reserve the broth for the soup. Wrap the onions in plastic wrap and store in a freezer weight zip-seal bag for up to 2 weeks refrigerated, up to a year frozen.

Caramelized Onion Soup (before I met Sefton)

for one
1/2 cup caramelized onion, sliced
1/2 cup cooking liquid
1/2 cup broth
salt and pepper
2-3 slices toasted baguette
sliced and grated gruyère (1/8” thick slice + 1/4 cup grated)

In a small saucepan, combine the onions, cooking liquid and broth and bring to a boil. Salt and pepper to taste.

Ladle into an onion soup bowl. Top with toasted baguette. Sprinkle with the cheese and broil until bubbling and golden.

Sefton’s French Onion Soup for a Crowd

6 medium Spanish onions, sliced
8 oz. butter
1 oz. ladle flour (that would be about 2 tablespoons)
2 teaspoons salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper, preferably white, finely ground
2 cups dry white wine or vermouth
12 cups chicken stock (unsalted)
toasted bread
sliced gruyère—about 4 slices for each bowl

Caramelize the onions in butter, on low heat, stirring often for 1 hour or until deeply browned. Add the flour, stir well, and then add the white wine. Reduce it on low heat for about 10 minutes. Add the stock and simmer partially covered for about 1 to 1 1/2 hours. Add the salt & pepper and adjust according to taste.

Ladle into bowls, top with toasted bread slices, then with the cheese, and place in a preheated 400F oven for 8 minutes. For a crunchy top place under the broiler for a few seconds—just until some of the cheese turns golden brown.

From the kitchen of Rose on 02.03.08 at 1:15 PM in Savory Cooking
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I just received my sample of the final "Scrape-A-Bowl and I need to go on record immediately to state that I did not approve this final product though a quote from me is on the box which says "This new beater is a work of art."

The concept is a good one but in my testing of a prior model before the final I found that the pressure of the blades against the inside of the bowl locked the bowl in place making it necessary to dislodge it with a rubber coated hammer. Also the jiggling of the head of the mixer caused the pin holding it in place to work its way out and the heavy head of the mixer fell onto my marble counter top which would have cracked it had I not caught it just in time.

I see that the new model is slightly shorter which may have solved this problem but until I try it again I can't swear to it!

Also as of yet I haven't seen approval from any of the major manufacturers using this attachment for their machines. I have heard that there is concern as to whether the friction against the bowl will gradually wear the motor.

The concept is excellent but I reserve judgement until I have the chance to test it further.

From the kitchen of Rose on 02.02.08 at 12:34 PM in Announcements
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