Book Club Tuesday: Anna Olson’s Baking Wisdom

[B]aking isn’t just following instructions; it’s a journey and an exploration. (1)

It’s not very often that a home baker can pinpoint where tips come from because we take them in, make them our own, and move ahead. One tip that I learned from watching Anna Olson on her show was to add skim milk powder when making whipped cream to stabilize it. That piece of information has served me well (as well as all my friends and family who I passed it onto). Watching her often, I learned that much of her Continue reading “Book Club Tuesday: Anna Olson’s Baking Wisdom”

Book Club Tuesday: 100 Morning Treats

I keep thinking about why I’m so enamored with Sarah Kieffer’s books. Is it because I feel a culinary kinship with Kieffer? In her latest book, 100 Morning Treats, I feel like I can relate when she talks about how that early morning time in the kitchen is hers. In the introduction she talks about arriving at the little shop she worked at in Minneapolis at 5 o’clock to start her day, “With most of the city still asleep, those dark hours were mine, and I spent them in solitude, quietly whisking, mixing, and stirring.” (11)  For me, spending a peaceful, Continue reading “Book Club Tuesday: 100 Morning Treats”

Book Club Tuesday: Cake & Loaf Gatherings

You know what cookbook I didn’t know I needed in my life until now? A baking book that focuses on seasonal gatherings. Much is made of seasonal cooking and, it’s mostly to do with availability of ingredients (i.e., the fresh ones). But, as I baked from the newest cookbook from Nickey Miller and Josie Rudderham (co-owners of Cake & Loaf Bakery),  Cake & Loaf Gatherings, I’ve come to appreciate their approach to what seasonal baking Continue reading “Book Club Tuesday: Cake & Loaf Gatherings”

Book Club Tuesday: Good & Sweet

When a copy of Brian Levy’s Good & Sweet arrived in the mail, I felt leery about the subject matter. To be honest, I am tired of the narrative of sugar being unhealthy – has there ever been a time when someone ate sugar because it was healthy? I find that these narratives set up sugar as a false opposite – while refined sugar is “bad,” books go on to convince home cooks of the Continue reading “Book Club Tuesday: Good & Sweet”

Book Club Tuesday: Cake & Loaf

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“…when we sat down in that coffee shop and laid out our bakery dreams to each other, they were really about creating a space we wanted to go to every day. To build something that would address as many of the systemic issues we had seen in our own bakery jobs as possible. A place to foster creativity and feminist ideals. A business that would give more than it would take from the community and that centred sustainability in all its decisions. The results have not always been what we intended, and we are still learning how the systems in which we operate affect our biases and how we can continue to be better. It has been a financial challenge. Trying to operate in an effectively non-profit way in a capitalist system is fraught with compromises and disappointments. Luckily, we are resourceful folks and have had the honour of working with many amazing people over the years, so we feel like we have won the life lottery.” (4)

Over a decade ago, Nickey Miller and Josie Rudderham opened the brick-and-mortar version of Cake & Loaf in Hamilton, Ontario and now, they have a newly published cookbook (of the same name) to share with home bakers. I’m new to the Cake & Loaf world but as I read through the introduction, I learned that Continue reading “Book Club Tuesday: Cake & Loaf”

Book Club Tuesday: Fabulous Modern Cookies

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To us, cookies are the most approachable of all desserts. (9)

What Chris Taylor and Paul Arguin say in the introduction to their latest book, Fabulous Modern Cookies, is absolutely true! Of all the desserts, cookies are the most approachable. Thinking back to when I was little, one of the first things that I baked with my mom were cookies, and this is the case with my own daughter. It’s about having fun and enjoying the results. I remember that when Katie and I made animal crackers, hers weren’t that great looking, however, Continue reading “Book Club Tuesday: Fabulous Modern Cookies”

Book Club Tuesday: A Good Day to Bake

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When Benjamina Ebuehi spoke these simple words – “just for the fun of it”– during a recent online talk hosted by The Book Larder (watch here), she summed up the reason to bake from her books. To be grateful for and take joy from the act of baking and creating moments for yourself and for others. In her latest book, A Good Day to Bake, Ebuehi offers Continue reading “Book Club Tuesday: A Good Day to Bake”

Book Club Tuesday: Baking with Dorie

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This is my fourteenth cookbook, and it arrives exactly thirty years after my first. A lot has changed over those decades, but not the joy I get from baking. That’s constant and unfailing. If you’re a baker, you know exactly how I feel. If you’re not, the sweetest thing I can wish you is that you become one. Bake something and share it. It might change your life. It changed mine. (3)

People who adore Dorie Greenspan have a favourite Dorie book. I came to my favourite Dorie book when my (then) baby daughter was becoming acquainted with food. The mealtimes Katie enjoyed the most were the ones when I made pancakes or waffles. This is where Dorie comes in: Dorie’s fourth book, Waffles: From Morning to Night, is full of flavourful and beautiful waffle recipes Continue reading “Book Club Tuesday: Baking with Dorie”