I love this incredibly moist pistachio cake made with a few ingredients—just pistachios, eggs, and sugar, plus some almond extract and a pinch of salt. Dorie Greenspan has a Simple Almond Cake in her cookbook, Baking Chez Moi, that my aunt has been making for years, and every time I eat it with her, I say I am going to re-create it with pistachios. I am so glad I finally did, because it’s even better than I imagined! I made my own pistachio flour by toasting the raw nuts and throwing them into a food processor. Surprisingly, almond extract really brings out the flavor of the pistachios here.
Serves 3 or 4
My mother, Larisa, was born in Odessa, Ukraine, and has made borsch all her life. ’This is the hot winter version: vegetarian and super-quick to prepare but also hearty and filling, with a lovely sweet-sour flavor and gorgeous red beet color. It’s served garnished with fresh herbs and a dollop of sour cream.
Cake
This recipe is a summer favorite from Chef Chris Wiliams of Lucille’s Houston. Chris marinates a whole side of fish, (on the half shell means skin-on, scales-on) for 10 minutes and then quickly grills it skin-side down. His marinade is where the magic comes in. It’s elemental with freshly-squeezed lemon juice, thyme, garlic and the earthiness of smoked paprika. He serves it with coconut rice and a slightly wilted collard green salad. It’s summer eating at its best.
This recipe is inspired by fond memories of shrimp toast, a treat from childhood lunches at my uncle’s Sydney restaurant, Lee’s Fortuna Court. This beloved Cantonese snack features small triangles of bread, which are smeared with a paste made from minced shrimp, then dipped in sesame seeds and deep-fried. This mushroom version satiates my hunger, thanks to the rich, bold mushroom pâté, which I use as the paste for the bread. This “fried bread” is pure comfort food. If you’re short on time, use store-bought mushroom pâté.
When Major Jackson was fresh out of college, he found a Cajun restaurant in Philadelphia that had the best Chicken Big Mamou he’d ever had. When the restaurant closed he tried to recreate the recipe but it never came out quite right. That is, not until one of our producers did some digging and found the original recipe for him.
Some of my most memorable recipe breakthroughs are a result of error, mistakes, and happenstance. I try to reframe even the most upsetting accidents as a potential victory or chance for growth: Does it help me examine a recipe or dish from another angle? Is there something I can learn from my failure? Can I repurpose my mistake in some way? The answer is yes!
In the process of revising my favorite biscotti recipe, I accidentally doubled the amount of butter and sugar. Butter isn’t even a traditional ingredient in biscotti, so what happens when you add twice as much? In the oven, the log spreads like inching lava, finally settling into a flat, bronzed disc. Once the disk is cooled, sliced into thin spears, and baked again, the result is a super-crisp cookie, studded with toasted fennel seeds, dark chocolate, and whole hazelnuts.
A small tumbler of vin santo or espresso for dunking would be a heavenly accompaniment. Cheers to happy accidents and faux biscotti.
Pan de elote is one of the very few things my mom would bake for us every summer when sweet white corn was in season. The best way I can describe this is as a fusion between a pound cake and corn bread. It’s sweet, dense, and creamy, and perfect on its own or with a dab of butter or with a drizzle of honey.
Hot puddings are a great thing to make and eat in the cold weather, there is something so comforting and warming about them. Whether you enjoy this with cold ice cream, add more depth with some double cream, or just enjoy it on its own, this chocolate pudding has a lovely puddle of sauce at the bottom. The addition of cinnamon and cardamom would make anyone go for seconds.