January 15, 1919. A bulging, overheated storage tank burst, spewing a towering wave of fast-flowing molasses into Boston’s busiest commercial district, killing 21, injuring 150, and wreaking tsunami-style devastation. The incongruity of “molasses” and “disaster” tends to rob the legendary Great Molasses Flood of its gravitas. Better viewed as a horrific industrial accident, it offers up five lessons worth mulling over on its 96th anniversary. 1. Heed warning signs. The massive tank, which held more than 2 million gallons, leaked so badly that neighborhood kids used to scoop up the puddles with pails. The owner, U.S. Industrial Alcohol (USIA) Company, chose camouflage as a solution when it repainted the gray tank to match the…
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Jimmy Bruic’s Banana Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies
I wish to publicly thank Ellis Island for my Irish surname. Having walked the breathtaking landscape of my faux homeland, I will increasingly claim this island as my own. Actually, my kids are a quarter Irish, thanks to my husband’s great-grandparents who came from the Dingle Peninsula. So according to a Scientific American article (I’m not making this up), “Scientists Discover Children’s Cells Living in Mothers’ Brains,” I may be part Irish after all! And why shouldn’t I claim Irish food as my heritage? Smoked salmon, for which my brain has a unique receptor, appears in convenience stores, for goodness sake. I breakfasted on sweet, freshly smoked kippers, a royal relative of the canned…
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Nocciola (Hazelnut) Biscotti Dipped in Chocolate
Even more than “cashew,” which sounds like a sneeze, “filbert” is the stupidest nut name ever. Fortunately, the NAAFRCP (National Association for the Advancement of Foods Resembling Chick Peas) promoted the more melodious “hazelnut.” Proving that everything sounds better in Italian, “nocciola” rightly implies dark depths of flavor. The hazelnut grows abundantly in the Piedmont Region, and became a cocoa substitute as Italy rebuilt after World War II. This explains why nocciola gelato has the smooth richness of chocolate, and why Nutella tastes like chocolate spread with some hazelnuts, when it’s really the other way around. This recipephany produces a classic, crunchy biscotti with a toastier, more mouthwatering flavor than the almond variety. Because…
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Jan Hagel Cookies, a Dutch Treat
No relation to Chuck, the Jan Hagel is as fun to make as it is to say (Yahn HAHgle). This traditional Dutch Christmas cookie is a crispy melt-in-your-mouth delight with cinnamon and toasted almonds. Curiously, this cookie makes me think of my college orientation week. A day in Harvard Square was on the schedule, including an exciting “Dutch Treat” lunch. Imagine my surprise when we ended up at the Wursthaus, a legendary spot with fabulous schnitzel, but no Gouda or Edam. I suppose I might have figured it out if it had said we’d “go Dutch,” but I was a teenager who didn’t get out much. Two years later, I had my first Jan…
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Fig Brooklines, Cookie Clusters, and the Possibility of Dark Batter
Newtonian Physics I steer away from the cookie aisle, since I prefer to bake, and who knows what’s in those processed things? Yet one packaged cookie always draws me in: the Fig Newton. Crunchy little seeds in moist jam, the tender crumb that doesn’t crumble—all stacked neatly in a sleeve that suggests how many you could (but shouldn’t) eat in one sitting. What’s more, they could have been called Fig Brooklines. The Kennedy Biscuit Works of Cambridge (a founding bakery of Nabisco) introduced them in 1892 using a new funnel-within-a-funnel technology that formed a continuous tube of dough filled with fig jam. Since the bakery named their products after nearby towns, they called this…
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Gary’s Date and Oatmeal Bars
Date and Oatmeal Bars may be the first recipe I ever got from Gary Isaacson, who passed away two years ago next week. A born chef, he was fluent in all cuisines. Yeast loved him as much as everyone else did, and he put the “art” in artisan breads. I hope to post more of his recipephanies, and I invite his friends and family to send me their favorites along with any Gary stories that go along with them. ♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦ I was in the slow checkout line at Publix a few years back when the woman ahead of me put three boxes of Betty Crocker’s date bar mix onto the stopped conveyor belt. Like…
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Kathleen’s Tiny Tarts: short and sweet
Tiny Tarts. I admit I love the nutty name as much as the nutty flavor. You’d think “pecan” would be the operative word, but no, the diminutive size gets top billing. This recipephany goes back to our first visit to the postcard-perfect Canadian seaside resort of St. Andrews in the ‘70s. We stayed at our friend Julie’s family home, a charming Cape Cod cottage that served as a dining hall for officers stationed at a nearby fort during the War of 1812. Julie’s mother Kathleen was a superb, versatile baker, ahead of her time with high loaves of molasses oatmeal and other whole grain breads. When she treated us to these delicate Tiny Tarts…
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Peanut butter beats the breakfast blahs
Try peanut butter in oatmeal, cream of wheat, pancakes -- and enjoy the surprise.
