Archives:
- Fleur du Mal Cherry-Chocolate Cake
I was going to name this cake after Becky Sharp, the social-climbing heroine of Vanity Fair. It’s Betty Crocker Devil’s Food made good with stiff-peaked egg whites and a slug of kirsch in the batter. Pillows of chantilly-lightened cherry curd, a necklace of sugar pearls and a tiara of red cherries complete the upgrade.
If the […]
- Green Tea Rice Krispie Treats
There is a Chinese snack I grew up eating called sachima. It’s similar to a Rice Krispie treat, but lacks the bracing sweetness of melted marshmallows; it gets its sugar from much mellower rock candy, which has toasty notes of burnt caramel. The doughy bits are larger and airier than Rice Krispie grains, and sesame […]
- Cauliflower And Bresaola “Carpaccio” With Parsley Oil
I’m sure I am opening myself up to many additional pieces of hatemail and accusations of “zenophobia” [sic], but I’m laying bare last weekend’s Iowa City food diaries anyway, with the ground-breaking observation that Midwesterners eat not-so-great food, and too much of it. (To be fair, I started eating trash on the morning of my […]
- Southern Crack, or Country Clafoutis
For me, the American South has always been the very height of exoticism. Europe? Old hat. Growing up in Hong Kong, I was the weird teenager who went to Tower Records only to buy copies of the Oxford American. I became obsessed with Carson McCullers, and started writing a short story set in Pine Bluff, […]
