Just watched this earlier today, and actually came to post the link. The explanation given by the food scientist at the end matches up perfectly with the advice from Martha Stewart.
Yeah with bakeries i make it a point to be familiar with it by slowly buying pastries before buying cakes from them. I’m sure things happen where just bad cakes are made, but i buy cakes very infrequently and i try to buy from reputable places when i do need to.
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I love Julia Child. Everything about her. Her work, her attitude, her recipes, her autobiography.
The first time I made a proper Pâte Brisée was a revelation and a half. Finally, a pie crust worthy of the name.
I re-watch her early years on YouTube (etc.) and she’s such a delight. Fearless. No ego. Big heart. So committed to transmitting technique and her reasoning behind her choices.
This fits with my own experiences also. The comments section at the bottom of the article(s) always makes me laugh. People are so funny in the Graun’s comments, especially when decrying whatever travesty might be in the recipe Cloake is tackling. Her Stollen recipe comes very close to my German mom’s, is slightly more tender.
I am not a good baker but I do get better with repetition. It’s taken me a very long time to get decent results, edible even, from baked goods where I follow the recipe to the letter.
Thank you for posting. I learned a lot!
Its very hard to find people in this space who are concerned with teaching you how to cook. Rather than churning out recipes. The latter is useful. The former is vital.
Are you familiar with Micheal Ruhlman? His website is often interesting, and he posts some good recipes often with a healthy dose of snark and a focus on how purportedly difficult things are not. His greatest enemy is Snackwell cookies, which somehow still exist.
And while his website isn’t much more than a personal blog filled with ephemera. His books are frequently among the best technique focused texts for a popular audience. And have from what I’ve been told started to turn into default text books in culinary schools. Particularly Charcuterie and Ratio.
Charcuterie is the book about curing meat. When he published it the only advice you’d find on curing meat at home was “don’t” and “its too hard/dangerous”. Or from hunting and sporting publications. All that home made bacon and duck prosciutto is his fault.
Ratio takes the concept of professional bakers ratios and lays it all out. Even extending it outside baking. Professional bakers do not use recipes, everything is boiled down to ratios. And many basic elements of savory cooking operate the same way in the professional space. Having been a professional bartender for far, far too long everything in bartending is based on ratios. Its this incredibly basic, necessary concept in professional spaces. And Ruhlman is the only writer who’s bothered to try and instruct the public about it.
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Wow, lentils eh? Never heard. Cool!
I ate this one in December:
Tasty. Fairly fudgy. I hate the taste of stevia so yes to using actual sugar. The black bean inclusion means I can rationalize that these brownies are particularly nutritious. There is no black bean flavor because the cocoa does its work marvelously.
NB: If using canned beans, make really sure that the only ingredients in the can are beans and water and maybe salt! Do not use the beans if garlic, onion powder, cumin, etc. are listed on the label.
Nope. [Clicks around a bit, lots of interesting stuff.] What’s this? Hey cool!
Ok hang on, has he got a foot pedal operating that faucet? Or is that a motion-activated valve? (sigh) Questions for another day.
I tended bar for a few years in addition to working the back of the house in the hot sweaty sharp knives-filled kitchens. I agree ratio and proportion (and portion control in the case of food industry) are totally where it’s at. Roux. Bloody Mary. Pie crust. Vodka tonic. Bearnaise sauce. Everything.
The German side of my fam has bakers in each generation, going back more than 100 years. I am probably the worst baker and yet the only or nearly the only baker in my generation, as near as I can tell.
Low slow natural fermentation of doughs was a big revelation.
Baking in a wood-fired oven has been another revelation.
I am hoping to build myself a cob oven sometime soon. I think baking brownies in a proper low-heat wood-fired oven would be delicious: slightly smoky, chocolatey, and I could make several large batches at a time.
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I work in R&D in the food science industry. The general consensus mentioned above is correct in that less eggs/more fat = fudgy brownies. I use conconut oil for the additional fat and as a replacement for some of the butter. If you have legal access to canna oil, that would work great too. Pro tip: Melt 6-8oz of dark chocolate and mix into the batter.
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Pro tip 2: After tabletop cooling spread ganache over them and then put them in the fridge for a few hours.
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I do love the reloaded episode with old Alton making fun of young Alton.
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