the cook stack

As I attempt to get my massive cookbook collection in order, I am challenging myself to cook three recipes from each book to determine if the book even belongs in my collection. Why keep books that I would not actually cook every single recipe from?

Because I must follow a system, I am beginning with the books in my collection published in the now long-ago year of 2009, the year I began collecting cookbooks. I have 12 cookbooks from that year and have cooked at least one recipe from 6 of them.

In no particular order, the books are as follows:

• Momofuku by David Chang
• The Craft of Baking by Karen DeMasco
• Stir by Barbara Lynch
• Ad Hoc at Home by Thomas Keller
• The Pioneer Woman Cookbook by Ree Drummond
• Peter Reinhart’s Artisan Breads Everyday by Peter Reinhart
• Salt to Taste by Marco Canora
• Asian Dumplings by Andrea Nguyen
• Savory Baking by Mary Cech
• Rose’s Heavenly Cakes by Rose Levy Beranbaum
• How to Roast a Lamb by Michael Psilakis
• My New Orleans by John Besh

I have flagged three recipes in each book to make over the next few weeks. These are recipes that I think I (and most of my family) would like. If we do in fact like them, I will keep the book. Otherwise, the book will be taken either to a donation center or Half Price Books.

I previously wrote about Stir by Barbara Lynch, which I decided to keep. The next book on the chopping block is The Craft of Baking by Karen DeMasco. This is a fairly standard general baking book with chapters on breakfast treats, cookies, cakes, pies and tarts, custards, and frozen desserts. The three recipes I tried are:

1. Back-to-School Raspberry Granola Bars
2. Maple Custard
3. Cacao Nib Granita

So, without further ado, here are the results! *If you don’t feel like reading the whole post, I determined I need a tie-breaking fourth recipe. Results from that coming soon in a separate blog post.*

Recipe 1: Back-to-School Raspberry Granola Bars

I picked this recipe because they were advertised as “lunchbox friendly”. They have plenty of sugar, but not a crazy amount of sugar, and also have oats and pecans. Do I feel guilt-free packing these for my daughter’s school snack? No, but I do feel a whole lot better than packing a processed granola bar with just as much, if not more, sugar.

The recipe itself is rather simple and mostly a one-bowl affair (after butter is melted and pecans are toasted). Oats, flour, sugar, butter, pecans, and a few other ingredients are mixed together then packed into a layer at the bottom of a square pan. Then, raspberry preserves are spread on top, followed by another layer of the oat mixture. Making layers in desserts always feel fancy to me; it’s like a pro move where I get to feel like I know what I’m doing with an offset spatula. Anywho, next everything is baked, the bars are cooled, and cut into squares.

These were … very okay. The flavor is good, they feel hearty, the bar consistency was good (i.e. not too crumbly and also not too hard to cut), and they held up well in a lunch box. My daughter had a positive reaction. My hesitation in saying “wow! These are great!” comes from my philosophy that, if I am going to have a sweet treat and put added sugar in my body, I want it to be *amazing*. These were good but not amazing. The best part of this recipe was actually the incredibly expensive jar of raspberry preserves I bought. I would rather just eat the preserves for my sugar intake for the day.

So, recipe #1 from The Craft of Baking is okay.

Recipe 2: Maple Custard

I have been on a maple kick lately and creamy desserts are my favorite. I have also historically had trouble with making homemade custards, puddings, panna cottas, etc. They often do not set well. I thought this recipe would be a good test of the cookbook – can I make a successful custard? Oh boy, this recipe was on the challenging side and had several issues. First, I had to boil maple syrup until reduced and thickened. I do not think I ever got the syrup reduced and/or thickened, even with boiling for nearly double the time in the recipe. Then, I mixed the heavy cream and eggs per the recipe’s instructions. As the recipe claims is possible, I poured this custard mix into ramekins and left them in the refrigerator until the next evening when I could bake the custards in a water bath.

I had far too much custard mix for six ramekins. Each ramekin was filled to the brim (which later turned out to be a mistake), and I still had custard mix leftover. I also baked the custard from cold and used room temperature water for the water bath but did not adjust my baking time accordingly. As a result, the custards were set on top but the insides were totally raw (see picture!). I deemed this dessert inedible.

I did scrape off the tops of two of the custards to eat, and they did taste nice and have an appealing texture. They are certainly one-dimensionally maple, for better or worse. I honestly felt a bit sick after eating these. They are so rich, so maple-y, so … um … raw.

I think my maple kick is over now. I was quite disappointed because these were two nights of work, and the expensive, and delicious, bottle of grade B maple syrup that I bought for this recipe got basically all thrown away.

Recipe #2 from The Craft of Baking is not good.

Do you notice a trend here? The raw ingredients (expensive raspberry preserves and maple syrup) have been better than the finished product.

One more chance, Karen! Let’s try the cacao nib granita next. I picked this one for my husband, who is gluten- and lactose-free. The granita does have milk, for which I substituted our lactose-free milk, but otherwise I could follow the recipe exactly. First, the ingredients are brought to a boil, then chilled, strained, and frozen. The following day my three-year old and I processed the frozen chocolate mix in our food processor until smooth and re-froze.

The whole family ate the granita for dessert, and we all enjoyed it very much. My husband said it had a nice flavor, and my four-year-old called it a “winner!”. The recipe introduction describes this granita as like a fudgesicle, which is somewhat accurate. My memory of fudgesicles our that they are a little bit creamier. But, the flavor here is I am sure more sophisticated.

So, what do I do now that recipe #3 is: good? I have one not good recipe, one okay recipe, and one good recipe. I think I need a tiebreaker. I am going to try the Lamington Cupcakes, the cover recipe in this book. If that is another winner, I will hold onto this book. Stay tuned….