Nope. I can just see your neurons pointing fingers, your eyes sending signals to your brain, with a little interior voice saying, “Oh, yes, those are biscuits, just like my grandma used to make.” But don’t be mistaken when you look at that photo. Nope. Those are scones. Which I baked the other day from a … More Biscuits or Scones: British Origins of an American Favorite!
Because Russian Orthodox Easter falls on the same day this year (2010) as the Western Easter, it seems appropriate to include recipes for Russia’s most well-known Easter sweets: Kulich, a tall puffy “baba” or sweet-bread cousin to Italian Panettone (maybe with phallic overtones and fertility in mind?) and Paskha, a cheesecake-like dairy-rich concoction eaten with … More From Mother Russia with Love: Kulich and Paskha and Easter
To contemplate bread even more, please go my previous post, Panis Gravis, or, Bread, Endless Nurturer. I’ve baked bread for years and years. In fact, except for the odd hamburger bun, my family never eats “boughten bread,” as my mother-in-law called it. In a time when “carbohydrate” evokes images reminiscent of horror films, singing the … More Cheese + Flour + Yeast + Salt + Eggs = The Ancient Mystery of Bread
Begin with a washing of hands, cleansing and purifying, before approaching the stove, as to an altar. Pouring water into a pot, do you remember the source? Rain, clouds, rivers, streams, lakes, oceans … Transformation, from elements and compounds and chaotic matter to life. Essence. Alchemy. In your hands, a cook’s hands, water shape-shifts into … More Water, the Essence of All
Christmas cakes were baking, the famous pompou and fougasse, as they were called, dear to the hearts of the children of old Provence. ~~ Christmas in Legend and Story A Book for Boys and Girls I’ve always loved the “Jacob’s Ladder” look of fougasse. The lacy leaf-like lattice reminds me of the connection between bread and … More Panis focacius, la Gibacié, and la Pompe à l’huîle, Kin Under the Crust, One of the Thirteen
[A photograph, and nothing more, for silent contemplation.]
