Desayuno

I have still not quite adjusted to a kitchen that is stocked for one person. All my life I have been in kitchens with food for six or eight. As one person it is difficult to keep five kinds of cheese on hand. Or to have ten pounds of various fresh produce. It would go bad before I could ever eat it. But sometimes the best recipes are the ones born of limited or seemingly mismatched ingredients.

This recipe came from having half a salt cod, a large plantain, a handful of pecan pieces, and some leftover black bean soup in the fridge. Well, it came from that and a desire to make something I had never made before. Read more

I spent December at home, between jobs, and devoted the whole month to concocting new plans to fatten up my parents and sisters. This recipe for chocolate cakes from Louis XV’s pastry chef Becary, posted at La Tartine Gourmande, seemed to work best. My family is always glad to have me back at home for a while, but I get the feeling their stomachs are a bit relieved when I leave. Read more

In response to Teresa’s orange tart, I offer a dessert that is both complex and inelegant. But it is very good.

I had my first gob (I did not name them) less than a month ago, but I already consider myself a devoted fan. The concept is simple: A soft, cake-like chocolate cookie, filled with vanilla cream. It almost sounds like something you would buy wrapped in plastic at a corner store and regret eating. But home made, with the tang of buttermilk and the richness of good cocoa, it’s a thing of beauty.

The original gob is from a friend’s old family recipe, and my only modification is in form: I have made them much smaller. As someone commented the first time I made the recipe myself: “this isn’t a cookie, it’s a commitment!” And it was. As a generous dessert, or a light meal, the cookie was well portioned. But for a snack, it was just too daunting. I made the next batch about 1/4 of the original size, and they were perfect. Two bites each, and you can always have a second. After brief consultation, it was named “the goblet.”

(My best friend immediately doused one in brandy and ignited it, to create a “goblet of fire.”) Read more

When I was little I didn’t have a very good sense of holidays and special occasions. Sure, I loved Christmas as much as any kid, but at five years old, as far as I was concerned Christmas was something that had happened three times in the history of the world. It couldn’t be counted on, and it was unrealistic to try to think far enough in advance to see it coming next time. Being told that my birthday was in eight months was like being told that Ghana is to the west: Entirely true, but I’d never make it all the way there, even if I packed a lunch. No, I celebrated smaller and more frequent holidays: Beach day; dad letting me ride on the hood of the car up the driveway day; going to the movies day. And perhaps the most important of them all was baking day. Read more

What looks like a pear, is textured like a pear, and tastes like a pear? It’s guava juice! These handy bottles are sold at almost every corner store in Dakar and are an excellent way to start the day. Thirty humid degrees in January? Sandy wind blowing in from Mauritania? There is no way you are going to find a bottle with a clean top. But who cares! We’ve got guava juice!

I have had New York bagels at five thirty in the morning when they were still almost too hot to touch, and I have had Montreal bagels right out of the oven on the coldest day of my life. These are not those. But they are fun to make, and any bagel is good right out of your own oven.

This recipe is based on the one in the New York Cookbook. At least, I think it is. The first time I made bagels, that was the recipe I used. Read more

In my lazy but obstinate pursuit of glamour, I am always happy to run into things that both look fancy and are easy to make. This creamy orange tart doesn’t need luxury ingredients or excessive preparation, but the result is smooth and delicate. It is even a little small, like really expensive bottles of perfume. The recipe was adapted from Billy Grant’s Very Lemon Tart on a day when we had no lemons, but a big net of Valencia oranges. Read more

While I can hardly claim to have invented the idea of putting onion in a pastry, I tend to think of this recipe as my own creation. It is one of the first things I ever made that did not at least start with someone else’s instructions. It is also, after all these years, still one of my very favorite things, both to cook and to eat. And with store bought sheets of puff pastry, I can have it ready to eat in less than an hour. Read more

One of the first things I learned in Dakar is that if you want lunch, you need to woo Suzanne. She calls the office first thing in the morning and asks who will want to eat; four hours later she comes in, carrying a tower of fragrant tupperwares. After one week here, I have found that the longer you chat with Suzanne, the more generous your portions are. For dessert, if you’ve been very nice to her you can have Jus de Bissap, a sweet tea made with hibiscus flowers and served ice-cold. Read more

I love to make crepes. There is something about the process of it, the flipping, the folding, or maybe the friends lining up with plates. I made up this combination on New Year’s eve, having decided at eight PM that we needed to have something that tasted good. We can’t be in Paris every New Year’s eve, but we can eat like it! Even with frozen berries, it turned out very well. (Despite that, I have included a variation here for fresh strawberries. Because if you have them, you should use them.) In any case, here it is: The last thing I cooked in 2006. Read more