Baking Illustrated (2004)
528 pages, $35

The Cook’s Illustrated staff consists of the most notorious perfectionists in all of American cooking, led by the criminally insane mastermind Christopher Kimball (or CK1, as he is known in the underground hip-hop community). In thirteen years of publishing CI, Kimball has never once compromised his culinary principles or removed his bowtie.

How do you know when you’re reading the work of America’s Test Kitchen? It’s sounds something like this:

* “Despite the easy promise of a gingham-lined basket of warm, cuddly blueberry muffins, much can go wrong from kitchen to table.”

* “Too often, however, coffeecake muffins fall terribly short of their potential.”

* “The first few recipes we tried confirmed our worst fears about oatmeal scones.”

* “Baking an unfilled pie pastry, commonly called blind baking, can turn out to be the ultimate culinary nightmare.”

* “Cooks who slather the apples in their pies with butter, cinnamon, and sugar do themselves and the apples a disservice.”

* “It would be lovely if this recipe worked, but we found that it doesn’t.”

All of these observations can be found in _Baking Illustrated_, which is not much of a self-esteem builder but is CI’s best and most coherent collection of recipes. I’m skeptical of the idea of “best recipes” (though I certainly own plenty of other CI books) but baking is where CI’s take-no-prisoners recipe testing approach works best.

Two recipes in here are among my all-time favorites. The chocolate cream pie is made with an Oreo crust and an smooth, rich filling. And the calzones are easier than you’d expect and make a superb dinner–especially the sausage and broccoli variation. But those are just two recipes in a 500-page book. It’s really hard to think of a common baked good not found in this book. Cobblers, slumps, betties, buckles, grunts, they’re all here. (Along with cakes, pies, cookies, pastries, tarts, and spanakopita.) The only recipes that haven’t done it for me are the brownies (stick with Alice Medrich) and the pizza (see Peter Reinhart).

And as you bake, keep in mind these sage words from Christopher Kimball’s preface:

> An angler friend of mine once spent an hour watching a trout pool well populated by unsuccessful fishermen. He concluded that the fish were feeding off of mating insects, found a reasonable facsimile in his fly box, and proceeded to reel them in. One might say that baking is much the same.

Quick kitchen tip: If your carotid artery is being constricted by a bowtie, try WD-40.

Unbeknownst to me, there was already some kind of lard revolution afoot before I started rendering my opinions on it. (Sorry.)

Last August in the New York Times, Corby Kummer noted that NYC health officials have advised restaurants to stop cooking with trans fats. Great, says Kummer: bring back lard.

> Chefs and short-order cooks can do everyone a favor–even the guardians of the public health–by reaching for the fat that everyone knows tastes the best: lard.

Then Pete Wells, writing in the December Food & Wine, called lard “the new health food” and starting cooking everything in it:

> From my experience with bacon grease and some memorably fatty Flying Pigs Farm loin roasts, I had the idea that anything fried in lard would take on a sweet, rich, porky essence. Yet my friends and I agreed that our food bore no trace of pig. The chicken tasted exactly like chicken and the scrod just like scrod (whatever scrod is; I’ve never been sure). We might have wondered why I had bothered if we hadn’t been completely entranced by something else: the texture.

The texture is due to lard’s fatty acid profile–its mix of saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated fats. All lard is good in this respect, but the best lard for frying, the mildest but most conducive to crispy goodness, comes from leaf fat, the soft fat surrounding the pig’s kidneys.

My upcoming winter cooking season is looking lardier than ever. Our Broadway farmers market finished a couple of weeks ago, so we’ve been going to the University market on Saturdays. I asked the woman at Skagit River Ranch if she had leaf fat, and she brought me some the following week, two and a half pounds for about $6. It’s even organic.

Here’s what I’m thinking about. Lard piecrust, of course. Empanadas. Sweet potato fries, an Iris favorite. Maybe some *rillons de porc,* crunchy pork confit as served at Le Pichet; the recipe is in the new book Charcuterie, by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn.

Of course, not everyone is jumping on the lardwagon. Here’s nutritionist Ed Blonz:

> For example, if given a choice I would prefer using tortillas made with lard than ones made with partially hydrogenated vegetable oil. If, however, ones were available that were made from (un-hydrogenated) vegetable oil, I would choose those above the others.

I have just the cookie to bring to Ed’s holiday party.

I’m sitting in a cafe that specializes in cupcakes, but I’m having burgers with Laurie and Iris in a few minutes, so right now I’m drinking a cup of tea and just thinking about sweets.

Like pretty much every other kid in the world, Iris enjoys sweets of all kinds. She likes sticky buns, cookies (except very crunchy ones), donuts, and cupcakes. Her eyes glaze over in anticipation when she hears me mixing up a chocolate malt. And once I let her eat some of a Reese’s Peanut Butter cup, but I think that may have been going too far.

Earlier today, Iris was reading the Martha Stewart Holiday Cookies magazine again. She now has favorite pages in it, like the one with the giant madeleine and the chocolate-chip cookie closeup. But the part she likes best is the table of contents, which has photos of all the cookies. She likes this part because she understands that contained within the magazine are instructions for making *every single one of these cookies.* I think maybe she’s expecting us to make them all. Before Christmas.

Don’t get the idea that I’m stuffing Iris’s face with pie 24 hours a day. At the same time, I’m not trying to keep her away from sweets. I enjoy something sweet on a daily basis, and as long as she is eating well otherwise, I see no reason she shouldn’t do the same. To do otherwise wouldn’t be fair, and would definitely backfire. In fact, I feel weird about depriving Iris of anything I enjoy eating, except for things like beer and, for that matter, beer nuts.

Beyond the fact that chocolate malts are delicious (especially if you know the secret, which is to use way more malt powder than looks right; 1/4 cup per serving isn’t overkill), I like the effect that sweets have on our relationship. Getting along with a toddler isn’t always easy, but you can always say, “Hey, let’s take a step back and have a cookie,” and things will usually look better after that to both of us. Cookies, however crumbly, are the unshakable common ground between child and adult.

I’m not talking about using sweets as a bribe or punishment, which I think is obnoxious and probably an early stop on the freight train to Eating Disorder Island. I hope I never hear myself saying to Iris, “If you behave on the bus, we can get a donut.” Anyway, it’s cute when Iris tries to climb the bus pole and compliments other passengers on their shoes.

Ah, I see Laurie and Iris coming up the street. Good timing, because a few more minutes on this topic and I would have made a reference to Proust and his madeleine, which is grounds for ejection from the Association of Food Journalists.