Golden Spiced Bread is Sometimes Sexy

I have a friend who says being nauseated is a lot like being pregnant.  You either are or you are not.  There are no halvsies.  If you are feeling ill you will have very primeval thoughts about, say, a monkfish piccata dish you recently made. No one vomits with ambivalence and certainly not about a slippery to the touch fish that is described as having a “muddy brown color, mottled with lighter and darker brown speckles.”

I mention this because my intestines, while they technically work and thank god have not been operated on, are assholes. They have been since I was a teenager.  I am aware admitting this violates the one rule of food writing: you do not talk about innards.  The second rule of food writing: you do not talk about innards.

But this is not Bon Appétit.  So I will tell you that last Thursday night, after eating monkfish and drinking precisely one beer, I spent most of the early morning hours lying in a fetal position on my bathroom floor. Because my digestive tract is a delicate flower, or I likely had some form of food poisoning, or some combination thereof. 

Are you still with me?

The next day the only thing I could stomach—besides some lemon-lime Gatorade—was this cake. It is a very good recipe and I have made about five different versions of it, including one savory edition that included sun-dried tomatoes, which was a grave mistake.

Brett said that the dried nightshade rendition tasted like gingerbread that had taken a wrong turn.  Imagine it is Christmastime and you slice off a piece from a freshly baked loaf, intending to wash it down with some delicious eggnog, but instead of candied ginger or some brandy-soaked currants, you find embedded tomatoes.

It was not completely inedible, per se, but I would not recommend it. I also feel compelled to mention I come from a lineage where it is customary to save leftover tossed salad and eat the soggy vinegar-laden limp greens the next day. Suffice to say tomato gingerbread is not something I ever hope to taste again, and that is saying something.

The version presented today is much better.  It is a recipe I have been experimenting with for awhile, because I have a few gluten-free friends who deserve to eat quick breads like the rest of us.  It is also very low in fermentable carbohydrates called FODMAPs, which research indicates can worsen digestive woes, like the kind you might experience due to post-infectious irritable bowel syndrome. 

It also has a pleasing spongy texture and pretty burnt orange color thanks to the turmeric. Because it is not overly saccharine, you can eat it at any time of day, truly.  Plus it makes a fine first meal after a bout of food poisoning.

The original recipe calls it a “golden savory cake” which sounds very sexy, but is not entirely accurate unless you intend to make the bread for an enemy and add those sun-dried tomatoes. Otherwise, it still trends more sweet than savory, though not enough to label it as a cake and get away with it unscathed. Regardless, it is a very good blueprint.

I recently found it is further enhanced by adding a schmear of frosting, which negates some of my earlier assertions.  The frosting recipe I used comes from Kindred restaurant, where my good friend Justin is employed. Like most everything they seem to make, their cinnamon bun cream cheese frosting is the kind of thing the devil warns you about.

So there you have it.  Not the most seductive of food stories, but an honest one and a damn good recipe.  Plus something that anyone who has ever had food poisoning or a colicky colon can relate too, without ambivalence.

Golden Spiced Bread

Ingredients:

• ⅓ cup (55 grams) plus 1 tablespoon (10 grams) rice flour, divided
• 3 tablespoons (30 grams) potato starch
• 2 tablespoons (15 grams) tapioca flour
• ½ cup (60 grams) buckwheat flour
• ¾ teaspoon kosher salt
• 1 tablespoon (7 grams) ground turmeric
• ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon (or allspice)
• ½ teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon ground coriander
• ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper (or chili powder)
• 4 large eggs
• ¼ cup (55 grams) maple syrup
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• ½ teaspoon orange blossom water
• 2 tablespoons (20 grams) olive oil
• ¾ cup (170 grams) milk (see notes)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon (10 grams) apple cider vinegar
• 2 tablespoons (20 grams) lemon juice
• ⅓ cup (50 grams) pistachios, roughly chopped
• ⅓ cup (50 grams) assorted dried fruit, roughly chopped (see notes)

Instructions:

Set the oven to 350 degrees.

Grease a standard loaf pan (9 x 5-inch) with a neutral oil, like canola oil. Line with a strip of parchment paper over the width of the pan, so that the parchment will hang over the sides a few inches. Grease the parchment with oil.

In a large bowl, sift together ⅓ cup rice flour, potato starch, tapioca, buckwheat, salt, and spices; set aside.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs, maple syrup, vanilla, orange blossom water, and oil; set aside.

In a large measuring cup, add the milk, baking soda, vinegar, and lemon juice; whisk to combine. (It should froth.)

Pour the wet ingredients (both the egg and the milk mixture) into the dry ingredients and whisk just long enough until everything melds together and the liquid becomes the consistency of pancake batter.

Pour the batter into your prepared loaf pan and bake for 40 to 50 minutes or until golden brown.  The loaf is done when the top is firm and springs back when touched (because you are using gluten-free flour a toothpick is not a reliable indicator of doneness).

Makes one loaf (enough for about 6 thick slices)

Notes:

1. Any milk (almond, lactaid, whole cow’s milk) could be used here.
2. My favorite version so far has involved dried mixed berries (blueberries, strawberries, etc.) as the fruit of choice, but dried cranberries are also very nice.
3. The original recipe uses almond flour instead of buckwheat, but almonds are higher in the type of carbohydrate that can cause digestive issues.  This is also true of the pistachios, so swap them for walnuts or pecans if you have a sensitive digestive system.
4. I realize this is a long list of ingredients, but it ensures that you end up with a bread that no one can tell is gluten-free. (Feel free to leave off orange blossom water if you do not have it.)

Gluten Free Salvadorian Cheese Pound Cakes, When Things Go Missing

My parents used to host an annual holiday party. About fifteen minutes before showtime, a gang of flickering votives would appear in the downstairs windows. My siblings and I would be summoned for shoe patrol, which was met with groans, and meant our shoe piles in the laundry room were rounded up and tossed somewhere out of sight.

My mother would then take the miniature crustless cheesecakes she baked in holly leaf paper wrappers and arrange them on a silver tray.  Each one was jeweled with a single red canned cherry.  They were meant to last for only one bite and I could easily have consumed them all by myself, bite by bite, had it not have been for the other guests.

The dessert only made an appearance around Christmastime. Its presence indicated that everything was going to be okay, except maybe for the Keds cast into internment.

When I think about those cherry-topped cheesecakes I feel a little heartsick.  They remind me of a time when my family unit was intact, before my parents divorced and went on to become people whose pairing, in retrospect, did not make sense.

They remind me that my childhood home was sold, painted forest green, and now hosts a blowup Santa on the roof well into Valentine’s Day.  (I am sure my mother would have something to say about that state of the laundry room these days, as well.)

They remind me I can never return to that place.

A teeny dessert with a cherry on top will never taste like it did at eight years old.  Its existence indicated there were grownups that also valued tiny little cheesecakes, and these adults would be the kind to protect you, and nothing would ever change.

I suppose I could make them for myself these days, but doubt they would feel the same.

I was recently testing a recipe for a friend and it reminded me of those little cakes from childhood, adult-sized. You would never know it was gluten-free, and probably would not care after tasting it either, regardless of your stance on wheat. 

The gluten-free cakes are slightly savory, but because of this they are easily eaten for breakfast with coffee, as is said to happen in El Salvador where the recipe originates. You can leave off the lemon zest in a pinch, though its presence melds the sweet and salty aspects together seamlessly.  You cannot leave off the pecorino cheese, however odd its presence seems. It adds addictive umami. Cheesy pound cake is a pretty apt description.

They will not replace the departure of those cherry-topped cheesecakes, but that is not their role. They stand in their own right as a present-day source of comfort and of remembrance.  There is an article in The New Yorker from February 13th called “Losing Streak” that sums up this evolution perfectly.

“Disappearance reminds us to notice, transience to cherish, fragility to defend. Loss is a kind of external conscience, urging us to make better use of our finite days.”

These cakes represent this, in food form.  It was never really about the cheesecakes, after all.

Gluten Free Salvadorian Cheese Pound Cakes

Adapted from Food52

Ingredients:

• 1 cup rice flour (see notes)
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 pinch salt
• 1 cup butter, softened
• ⅔ cup sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 1 cup whole milk Greek yogurt
• ½ cup pecorino cheese
• zest of one lemon
• sesame seeds, to top

Instructions:

Set the oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 6-cup muffin tins with butter.

In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the butter and sugar on medium high until fluffy and white (about two minutes).  Scrape down the sides and then add the eggs in one at a time, with the mixer running on low.

Turn up the speed slightly and beat in the yogurt and cheese.  Take care, the mixture may splatter a bit.  At this point the batter will look slightly separated.

Remove the bowl from the stand and fold in the flour mixture and the lemon zest with a spatula, until just combined.

Fill the muffin tins mostly full, the batter will puff up slightly but will not significantly expand.  Sprinkle each with a pinch of sesame seeds.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until the edges are browned and the middles spring slightly back when touched. 

Place the tins on a wire baking rack. When the cakes are cool enough to touch, run a knife around the edges of the cups to loosen them.

Makes 12 individual cakes

Notes:

1. I like them cooled to room temperature, but enjoy them even more after being chilled overnight in the fridge.  They take on the properties of cheesecake better in this form. They can be frozen, as well.
2. The recipe makes no distinction between brown or white rice flour.  I used brown and will again (there was no notable density from the extra fiber).
3. Hard cheeses like cojita or parmesan can also be used, but pecorino is what I keep around.

Gluten Free Peanut Butter Cookies, An Unconventional Valentine

There is a negative thirty-six degree wind chill in Boston today. It is Valentine’s Day.  In hopes of a nice meal, Brett and I have sacrificed three chickens for the preparation of a ramen broth from the sadistic souls at Momofuku.

In a peculiar development that speaks to the mental illness of my family, my brother—who lives in Virginia where it is a balmy fourteen degrees—is making the very same ramen.  Consequently, there was no discussion of our respective soup plans, nor was there collusion to use broth to fight the cold four hundred miles apart. 

We are simply cut from the same cloth of people who will spend, at minimum, ten ungodly hours hacking chickens and reducing steeped kombu.  Our lineage has the patience for such a task and the stupidity not to know better.

Momofuku ramen is a bitch, in the words of my brother. (Happy Valentine’s Day!)

Luckily, the people we attract—the depraved souls—find this activity somewhere along the spectrum of romance and gratuitous torment.

I do not have this recipe for you today.  You will never get the hours calculating the weight of deboned animal carcasses and rendered bacon fat back. One can only hope, for the good of humanity, there are but few humans capable of such idiocy outside the confines of a professional kitchen.

I do, however, have a very good cookie recipe for you, sane person.  One that should surprise and delight without bone cracking or blood or cursing, if done properly.

It uses only five ingredients and shamelessly declines flour, making the cookies needlessly—but deliciously—hip.  That they are gluten-free is not the point.  The point is that they are quite good and easy and suitable for your friends with celiac disease. 

The concept is fairly simple.  Take peanut butter (a winning beginning) and add brown sugar and eggs and three hundred and fifty degrees.  I thought about making them again and adding in cayenne and scraped vanilla bean seeds.  But I did not have the energy today.  You can imagine what babysitting a painfully slow simmering pot of chicken parts and pulverized mushrooms does to a person.

In essence, this recipe is about as far away as one can get from Momofuku ramen.  None of the ingredients require research, nor do you have to involve a calculator at any point in the process. (Odds are you probably have the necessary items in your pantry right now.)

There are, however, a few unifying factors worth mentioning.  Both recipes have New York origins—hailing from very popular city spaces—and are very good.

They are also both capable of heating up the joint.  Which is really the whole point on a day like today. 

Sea Salted Peanut Butter Cookies

Adapted from Smitten Kitchen and Ovenly: Sweet and Salty Recipes from New York’s Most Creative Bakery

Ingredients:

• 1¾ cups (335 grams) packed light brown sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1¾ cups (450 grams or one 16-ounce jar) of smooth peanut butter (see note)
• Sea salt, for garnish

Instructions:

In a medium bowl, whisk together the light brown sugar and eggs until smooth.  Whisk in the vanilla extract and the peanut butter until everything becomes fully combined and turns lighter in color.  It will not be as thick as regular cookie dough.

Chill the dough in the freezer for about 30 minutes. This will help the dough set and scoop well. 
Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

When ready, take out the cookie dough.  If the edges of the dough look like they have frozen a bit, stir the dough again briefly.  Scoop out about 2 heaping tablespoons of dough per cookie, setting the mounds a couple inches apart.  (Having a scooper is helpful.)  You should be able to fit about 10 to 12 cookies per sheet. Sprinkle each mound lightly with sea salt.

Place one sheet of cookies in the freezer for 15 minutes.  This is the first one you will bake.  Place the other sheet of cookies in the fridge.  Set the oven to 350 degrees.

After 15 minutes, place the freezer sheet into the oven and place the fridge sheet into the freezer.  Keeping the cookies very cold will help them keep their shape better.

Bake the cookies for 15 to 20 minutes, or until they turn golden at the edges.  The middles will still be slightly soft.  Let the cookies set for a minute or two on the hot sheet and then transfer to a wire rack to cool.  Repeat with remaining cookies. 

Let cool completely before eating.  This will help the cookies properly set so that their edges are crisp and their centers are chewy.

Makes about 20 cookies

Notes:

1. I only tried this with regular (not natural) peanut butter. Processed peanut butter is alleged to yield a better shape.
2. The longer you keep the scooped cookies chilled the longer their cooking time will be, so be flexible with their time in the oven, if necessary.