28 Apr 2011, Posted by admin in MEET, 0 Comments
It would be too easy to say that Maida Heatter epitomizes that “gets better with age” adage like a fine wine, and I have a feeling she has always been pretty fantastic to chat with, anyway. She’s not half bad with a brownie, either. If only we can all be so graceful — and hilarious — about our key lime pie presidential moments at a youthful 95. Turn the page for part two of my interview with Maida on LA Weekly.
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27 Apr 2011, Posted by admin in MEET, 0 Comments
There are those people whom you’ve never met, yet you feel that instant under-the-table connection. The sort of person, as I envisioned Kim Ricketts to be, whom you look forward to meeting on your next trip to Seattle. Not at one of her well-edited book events — that would be entirely too predictable — but maybe in line at a coffee bar. Probably because you asked the barista a question that had nothing to do with coffee, but about that little spice shop you happened upon on your last visit. The one buried on a side street near the waterfront… do you know of it?
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22 Apr 2011, Posted by admin in MEET, 0 Comments
Betty Fussell, a “half blind” (her hilarious words in this hunting story) 80-something culinary history maestro appeared on the television series Foodography last year to demo her popcorn and venison turkey stuffing recipe — the same year she received a lifetime achievement award from the Culinary Historians of New York (she received recognition from the James Beard Awards the previous year).
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15 Apr 2011, Posted by admin in MEET, 0 Comments
Should you be fortunate enough to reach your 65th grape harvest — as a grower, not simply an imbiber — you know when it’s time to put those Sangiovese and Pinot Grigio grapes to work. And when to step back and let them enjoy a few more weeks on the vine. We caught up with grape-grower and vintner Charlie Barra, the 84-year-old owner of Barra of Mendocino and Girasole Vineyards wines (also in Mendocino County), who has a few more weeks until harvest (“We’re a couple of weeks late this year, we had a lot of cool weather in May and June, so the grapes didn’t come along for a while, but they look good.”). Turn the page for the interview.
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Though some may call Maida Heatter “The Queen of Cake,” and her revamped Maida Heatter’s Cakes is certainly at the top of our weekend baking list, after flipping through her companion cookbook, Maida Heatter’s Cookies, we would argue that royal title is best bestowed on the octogenarian (or older, even her publisher isn’t certain of her age) for cookies.
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14 Apr 2011, Posted by admin in MEET, 0 Comments
A Saturday morning spent chatting with Maida Heatter makes all those doubts that quality journalism (or at least quality as defined in my rather skewed food history-friendly mind) can survive in this trendy blogger and food celebrity-driven world disappear in a brownie batter moment. Here is part one of my interview on LA Weekly: There is a beautiful irony in knowing that all those years Betty Crocker boxed cake mix devotees were strolling the grocery store aisles in a fruitless search of the perfect pre-mixed chocolate birthday centerpiece, home bakers like us had already baked our way through a half dozen seven layer chocolate tortes with Maida Heatter. As we worked up from basic lemon pound cakes to more complex Dobos Tortes architectural feats via her cookbooks (two have recently been re-released), we felt we really got to the true heart of the Queen of Cakes.
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As far as book release timings go, Seattle private chef Becky Selengut really got the raw end of the omakase deal when her new cookbook, Good Fish: Sustainable Seafood Recipes from the Pacific Coast, was released this month. Glance at that subtitle and how can you not think of the recent tragedies that fish swimming the Pacific’s waters are facing this very moment?
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What’s inside a cookbook counts, but we still judge a book by its cover. Which is why even those books that should be on everyone’s shelves, like Maida Heatter’s 1997 classic Cakes (itself a compilation of two 1980s titles by Heatter) really do take on a fresh feel with a design revamp, recipe tune-up, and reissue under the same title. Heatter has simultaneously released the matching — cover-wise, at least — book Cookies, a compilation of her best cookie recipes of the past quarter century (more on that later).
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In today’s LA Weekly, I revisit an earlier interview with Darren McGrady, former private chef for Princess Diana and a swell guy who donates 100% of the proceeds from his cookbook to charity. This week he shares his recipe for chocolate biscuit cake, a classic British concoction of crushed wafer cookies suspended in a chocolate-butter mousse, then chilled and covered with more chocolate [SCRATCH THAT, turns out his publisher has suddenly recalled the recipe, even from McGrady's own blog -- ah, another bloody $$-driven American company]. Turn the page for the original story.
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26 Mar 2011, Posted by admin in MEET, 0 Comments
This month’s artisan story in the LA Times Food section is all about jamming. It’s a back-to-her-childhood-roots sort of story with a modern edge, but that’s hardly half the story about the woman behind Laura Ann’s Jams, Laura Ann Masura, a former indie punk drummer turned sweetly scented jam maker.
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