whine & dine

Did you know that biscotti aren’t all tooth-breaking, desiccated pseudo-edible bricks? ‘Cos I didn’t. Or, well, I did in theory, only I’d never really had a good one. But after having a chat with one of my instagram crushes, @caffeine_and_carbs (I mean seriously: she’s a coffee-lover, bread-baker, lifts like a freaking boss, and has guns to die for), a couple of weeks ago about some new flavours she was thinking about (DEM NUTTER BUTTER BISCOTTI THO), my interest was piqued. Unfortunately, she operates out of Cleveland, OH, so the chances of me getting to try her creations in the near future are pretty dang low. Which could mean only one thing: time for me to try and make them on my own. Keep reading →

After the last month or two of stops and starts, it seems like summer is finally upon us in all its full and blazing (and intermittently armageddon-y) glory. And I don’t know how many of you are lucky enough to have air-conditioned kitchens, but my kitchen has this horrendous habit of amplifying the weather outside; in the winter, it’s a veritable ice box and I’m usually found shuffling around in house slippers and a giant hoodie at the crack of dawn when I’ve got to feed my starters, but in the summer I keep getting panic attacks that I’ve left the stove or the oven on without realising it because DAMN SON IT BE HOT IN HURRRR. Keep reading →

Yeah okay okay I know I’m obsessed and this is boring and you lot didn’t sign up for a sourdough bread blog and I’M SORRY I WASN’T INTENDING TO but but but Easter is just around the corner and apparently I have posted a HCB recipe before but I don’t even recognise myself because what the hell man VOLUMETRIC MEASUREMENTS? I have half a mind to go back and delete the offensive post. But it’s alright, sometimes we need a start point to give us a frame of reference for how far we’ve come. Keep reading →

I have this weird habit. Okay, I have many, but there’s this one food/recipe related one in particular. Far more often than I’d like to admit, I get inexplicably obsessed with some random dish that I’ve never eaten or made before. It generally arises from something as inconsequential as a passing reference in a book or TV show, but “inconsequential” is not how I’d describe the subsequent number of hours devoted to googling recipes, historical significance, traditional vs modernist versions, and the like. Which wouldn’t be a bad thing if all that research actually resulted in me making the damn thing. Instead, what tends to happen is I’ll end up so confused by all the different regional variations, vast differences in recipe ratios (or lack of proper measurements), and, paralysed by the fact that I’ve never even eaten it before and therefore have no idea what it’s meant to actually look or taste or feel like, throw my hands up in despair and abandon the project. Because: where do I begin? How will I troubleshoot if something goes wrong? Will I even know if something goes wrong? Keep reading →

You guys. I had these grand plans to finally tackle making tang yuan for Yuan Xiao Jie this Chinese New Year. Today is the Spring Lantern Festival, which marks the 15th and final day of the Lunar New Year celebrations, and is often associated with paper lanterns, solving riddles, and glutinous rice dumplings. L loves the black sesame dumplings, and I’ve never actually tried my hand at making them before, plus with some of the other recipes that I tried out over the holiday weekend, I had more than enough ingredients to give it a shot. Only we’ve both been instructed to avoid glutinous rice flour (since it allegedly exacerbates inflammation of injured joints?) so…it was back to the drawing board. But I think I’ve managed to come up with a somewhat seasonally appropriate recipe all the same. ;) Keep reading →