A Tiger In The Kitchen

Poilane Miche: Tackling A Legend

As usual, I had bread on my mind the moment I returned to New York from my latest trip to Singapore.

After weeks away from my oven, I always touch down just itching to bake something. And this time, a quick check with my fellow Bread Baker's Apprentice challenge bakers revealed that they were mired in a difficult spot in the bread lineup.

"We are in Sourdough right now," said Daniel in Berlin (a.k.a. @MisterRios of the Ährelich Gesagt blog). "Everyone is tRYEing their best."

Ahh, bread humor. Gotta love it.

After the laughter subsided, however, I started to get worried. Sourdough in the hands of lesser bakers can be a massive pain in the tush. 

I should know.

Just last month, bolstered by a successful pane Siciliano and wondering what to do with a bowl of sourdough starter, I brazenly decided to take on a legend: Poilane miche -- the Holy Grail of breads.

Top 10: The Memorable Eats Of 2009

 

You know it's been a good year when you are able to say this: 2009 was when I began to eat for a living.

I'd always been a devotee of affairs of the stomach. I may have written about fashion and other lifestyle areas for a living but baking, braising, trying new recipes, eating out -- those were what consumed me when weekends rolled around. 

Luck has its ways of finding you, however. Now, on the precipice of 2010, I'm beginning to close out a lunar calendar year of cooking and eating with my family in Singapore as research for my book, "A Tiger In The Kitchen." 

My journey so far has taken me many places -- France, where I had the loveliest gingery champagne cocktail with friends old and dear; China, where my father and I went in search of my great-grandfather's footprints in the village of his birth. And, of course, Singapore, where my aunties and maternal grandmother have been plying me with meals, recipes and much, much love along the way.

With all that I've packed into 2009, it's hard to decide what the highlights have been. But, inspired by some stellar Top 10 gastronomic lists out there (definitely check out Sam Sifton's list of Top 11 dishes in New York in the New York Times), I decided to give it a go.

Here, in no particular order, are my 10 memorable eats of 2009. 

Enjoy, buon appetito and listen, let's do this again in 2010 ...

Panettone: The Seven-Day Bread

 

If you are among the people who believe that nothing says "The Holidays" like a festive loaf of panettone, let me just say this: You are mad.

This bread, it is evil.

It will drive you insane, make you tear your hair out. You may find yourself repeatedly staring intently at an unrising bowl of taupe glop, thinking, "Just, why, God, WHY?"

I mean this for the folks out there attempting to bake it, that is. (If you're the sort who buys panettone in a store then, sure, go for it. I'm sure that's pretty harmless.)

The problem I had here was holiday spirit.

Recently, I found myself so infused with the stuff that I decided to tackle panettone for the Bread Baker's Apprentice challenge. 

Pane Siciliano: One Sexy Bread

The same thing always happens when I've been on my weeks-long trips for book research in Singapore.

When I'm away, I find myself overcome with intense longing for something in my Brooklyn home. By the time I return, it's all I can do to keep myself from running toward it (cue slow-motion romantic comedy music here) and getting it all hot and, well, hot.

My family home in Singapore doesn't have an oven, you see -- so when I'm away from my trusty hunk of stainless steel, a major itch to bake starts taking over.

When I returned this time, I was determined to jump back into the Bread Baker's Apprentice challenge, where bakers around the world are making a bread each week from Peter Reinhart's "The Bread Baker's Apprentice."

On the docket that week was pane Siciliano, a beautiful, golden Italian bread formed in a voluptuous "S" shape.

It seemed like just the thing to scratch my itch.

Apple-Cornmeal Cake: A Reason To Celebrate

A dear friend recently asked me what my ideal birthday cake would be.

My immediate answer was a pure pipe dream (in the U.S. anyhow) -- a durian cream cake in which the sliver of cream wedged between two layers of pound cake is flecked with hefty chunks of creamy durian, a pungent, Southeast Asian fruit that's hard to find in New York.

Now, if I can't have durian cake, my second choice would be a vanilla cake coated with a creamy guava or passionfruit icing.

I know, I know.

I have been told I can be hard to please.

Having no durians, passionfruit or guava at hand, however, I set about making myself one of my absolute favorite fall cakes -- an apple-cornmeal upside down cake that is so simple and can be assembled so quickly that I've set it out for more Thanksgiving and autumn meals than I can count. 

In fact, it's what first came to mind when my Let's Lunch group, a bunch of intrepid cooks around the world who have a standing monthly lunch date, decided to do a fall dessert for November.

Light Wheat Bread: Simple Does It

The last time I baked a bread, what emerged from the oven was a loaf of casatiello, a gorgeous hunk of Italian bread studded with salami and oozing with hot cheese.

So you might understand why I wasn't exactly looking forward to this week's Bread Baker's Apprentice challenge loaf: Light wheat bread.

After the sexy Italian, wheat bread seemed like the yawner of a boy next door.

(You know -- the ugly one.)

But after having spent several weeks in Singapore without an oven at my disposal, I was itching to bake something. Anything.

And, as it turned out, this plain boy next door actually had his surprises.

Lime-Coconut Cake: Conjuring Summer

Yes, I realize with great sadness that summer is no longer with us.

But having grown up in Singapore, where it's generally about 90 degrees all year round, I've always chosen to regard this little "four seasons" concept as more of a state of mind.

And my state of mind all year round tends to veer toward clear blue skies, suncreen and sand-between-my-toes kind of weather.

Which is how I found myself thinking about tropical lime-coconut cake all morning.

And, just when I thought I was being silly and a little too wistful about bygone pie-filled, scorching-hot days these sage words popped up courtesy of Gwen, a chef who blogs at Pen & Fork: "Ignore the calendar. Proceed full speed ahead with 'put the lime in the coconut' cake and eat it all up."

Sound words indeed.

Casatiello: A Marvel of Meat & Melted Cheese

In my family's Singapore kitchen this week, my mother carefully brought out a prized discovery from her fridge, nudging me to try it.

Inside the box was a lovingly swaddled loaf of bread, filled with slivers of ham and dappled with bits of melted and crusty cheese. A friend had given it to her and my mother had decided it was the best bread she'd ever tasted.

"Hey, I think I recently made something like this," I said. 

"You DID?" came her incredulous response. 

Her disbelief was completely understandable -- I rarely set foot in the kitchen as a child. And when I finally did start cooking in my 20s, I was initially more known for inedible cheesecakes than Julia Child creations.

As for baking bread, it's something that seemed so difficult that I never considered trying it until I joined the Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge in May. But baking a bread every week along with more than 200 bakers around the world has been a surprisingly empowering and therapeutic thing.

In a piece that I wrote for the Washington Post Food section about the proliferation of online cooking and baking groups, Jeff of Culinary Disasters talks about learning to be patient from baking bread for the challenge. Wendy of Pink Stripes says she's become such a brave cook that she's applied that confidence outside of the kitchen, too. (Wendy, who had always wanted to learn to scuba dive, took the plunge in December.)

As for me, I've learned gobs -- about time management, the need for enough sleep, the importance of simply trying. Above all, through the exhilarating successes and occasional clouds of smoke, I've grown increasingly sure of one thing: If you set your mind to doing something -- even if it seems impossible -- you're going to be able to do it. (And, if you're lucky like I've been, you'll have the fist-bumps of fellow bakers, pushing you along the way.)

And that's intoxicating knowledge to have.

So, yes, Mum, I really did make casatiello, an Italian bread filled with cured meat and melted cheese that tastes just divine. And it was actually pretty simple ...

Focaccia: Where There's Smoke ...

This is a story that has a happy ending.

(See above.)

What happened before that ending, however, was not quite so happy.

There was the steady stream of smoke spewing from the oven; there was the coughing. And then there was the glowering from Mike (who was doing the coughing). 

But there was a lesson learned while making focaccia for the Bread Baker's Apprentice challenge this week:

Don't be so greedy -- use less olive oil.

Nutella-Ginger Cookies Only A Mother Could Love

I have been yearning for butter ever since I saw Julie & Julia a few days ago.

From the first moment that I saw Meryl Streep as Julia Child drop a slab of butter onto a pan, my deep, deep hunger began.

It's made me request extra pats of garlic butter to perch atop my steak in a French bistro and slather it so generously on bread that you could have omitted the bread and, honestly, I would not have noticed.

But, as Julia supposedly said, "With enough butter, anything is good."

And it was this very spirit that led me to finally get off my tush and make the Nutella dessert that I had pledged to do when I signed up for The Nutella Challenge. (It's a little exercise created by Paula at Bell'Alimento in which dozens of amateur bakers have agreed to come up with a dessert starring Nutella.)