Funny she should mention that. There’s a cookbook writers forum on Facebook and this week they’ve been discussing whether or not it’s fair to write recipes that suggest or recommend a standing mixer. I tend to write  along these lines:  “Combine egg whites and salt in the bowl of a standing mixer (or, if using a hand-held mixer, in a large mixing bowl).” The stand mixer is preferred but if you don’t have one, here’s an alternative. But I wonder how many readers actually own a Kitchenaid or Bosch or the like. They’re  relatively expensive and they take up counter space. Is it fair to recommend them? On the other hand, the results are so good and they make baking so easy. If anyone has thoughts to share, I’d love to hear them.

Turkish candied apples

But the exciting thing for me is that I’ve learned of a whole new way to preserve apples. It makes me want to do an international edition of the book, looking at apple traditions around the world. If anyone out there knows of a recipe for these Turkish apples, please send it my way.

Happy Easter and Happy Pesach to everyone who celebrates! We’re visiting family in Miami for a few days. I’ll share any food discoveries in my next post.

There are those moments in life—maybe your wedding, your graduation, finishing a marathon (not that I’d know)—when you want to just stop what you’re doing, take it all in, and know that you’ll remember it for the rest of your life. Standing at the corner of 41st and 5th last night, looking across at the NY Public Library amidst all the noise and brightness of people and taxis and skyscrapers, I felt like I could’ve stepped off the ground and flown right up to the rooftops. I’m so glad I got to toast the night with wonderful Scott, my agent Joy Tutela, and my friend Adeena Sussman, who helped me with recipes and advice and is an amazing food writer and stylist in her own right.

Me and Adeena

I managed to remember  most of my thank-yous in my acceptance speech (including a spontaneous declaration of love for my editor), but I forgot to thank the IACP judges. These volunteers sift through hundreds of cookbooks every year to come up with their list of finalists and winners. As anyone working in media knows, we’re all working at capacity these days. So to spend hours as an IACP volunteer is really a labor of love.

This book was definitely a labor of love, too, in that I loved every minute of working on it. Also in that it probably won’t make me rich. But it has given me back more than I could’ve possibly understood at the outset. It forced me out onto the stage, literally, past my dread of public speaking. It brought me into a community of apple lovers, readers, cooks, farmers, cider makers, authors, and editors. And it gave me one magical, magical night.

Yesterday I had the pleasure of speaking to a group of sophomores at the John O’Bryant school in Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood. Their teacher, Ian Doreian, contacted me several weeks back to say that his students were going to do a special workshop on food writing and would I like to come in and discuss what I do? Of course! The kids were bright and welcoming and meeting them was a wonderful treat.

The class

Ian Doreian

We talked about cookbooks, restaurant criticism, and writing in general.  And there was one fact I particularly wanted to share: not far from where we were standing, the first Roxbury Russet tree sprung up around1635. It’s the oldest American apple still being grown today, a richly flavored keeper, and you can find it at heirloom orchards like Nashoba Valley Winery in Bolton, Massachusetts, Alyson’s Orchard in Walpole, New Hampshire, and Scott Farm in Dummerston, Vermont. I promised to bring some apples in the fall so the students can taste them.

The one thing I couldn’t offer was the specific site of that first orchard. I’ve looked into it, but I have yet to get a clear answer. But right near the school, I did find something very special. Ian had directed me to Fort Hill, one of Boston’s most historic neighborhoods (and famous for its distinctive 1869 water tower).

Fort Hill Tower

He had noticed the remnants of an old apple orchard on Highland Street. I drove over to see it.

Old Highland Street apple tree (look for the thicker trunk in the center)

The old trees were untended, scattered among newer growth, and I doubt they are bearing much. And, of course, none of them date back to that original orchard. But they are living proof of the agricultural heritage of this area.

And here’s more proof.

Bartlett Street

Bartlett Street was once the site of an 19th century fruit orchard owned by Enoch Bartlett. On this property were some old British pear trees called Williams, but Bartlett renamed them after himself. And thus we had the Bartlett pear, now available in most any supermarket.

I’m anxious to dig deeper into Roxbury’s fruit history, and maybe even plant some new Roxbury Russet trees on the O’Bryant campus through the Boston Tree Party. If we can pull that off, this apple will have truly come full circle.

I’m working with Aimee Seavey on a new Yankee cookbook with a “Lost and Vintage Recipes” theme. It’ll be out in October. And in the early stages, I have the pleasure of going back through 75+ years of the magazine’s archives and pulling recipes that seem interesting and relevant and worthy of being updated for today’s cooks. How fun is that? The trick is figuring out which recipes have been forgotten for good reason. There are plenty of those. Tomato casseroles made with ground beef and too much cheese, a blueberry slump with dumplings as dense as rocks. Tastes change over time, as do standards for recipe writing and testing. In the past, recipes were sometimes seen as outlines rather than precise instructions.

So back to 1953. Here’s the bound issue from the archives, and the recipe.

I’m sure you can imagine the thrill of finding this little gem. Brownies in a wha-? A dessert that combines my love of chocolate and multitasking appliances? Sign me up!

It was time get out the waffle iron and start cooking. Now, most waffle irons have a single heat setting, which ranges between about 330° and 390°.  I have a combined griddle/panini press/waffle iron, which I love for its space-saving efficiency. I set it for 375°.

The first step is to cream a stick of softened (salted) butter with 3/4 cup sugar.

I added 2 ounces of melted unsweetened chocolate, 2 eggs, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. The batter began to look creamy.

In a separate bowl, I whisked together 1 1/2 cups flour, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/2 teaspoon baking powder, and 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon. I added it to the wet ingredients.

And this is where I began to get a little nervous. The batter looked thick. Much thicker than any brownie recipe I’d ever seen.

I sprayed the iron with canola oil and dropped a heaping tablespoon of batter in the center of each of the four grids.

I closed the lid and waited 3 minutes. I opened the lid, and there they were. And they were…

AWFUL.

Leaden, dry, and with not nearly enough chocolate flavor, these brownie waffles were duds. But the idea was too good to give up. So back to the drawing board.

Comparing this formula with other traditional brownie recipes, I saw that I had used much less sugar and much more flour than most recipes. I decided to try it again with half the flour, another ounce of chocolate, and and extra 1/2 cup sugar.

Here’s what I got.

The extra chocolate and sugar were giving the brownies a richer, more fudgy texture, but clearly more flour was necessary to give the brownies enough structure to hold together. So I began adding flour a bit at a time and cooking up small batches until I got the right texture: one firm enough to hold together but still soft and chewy in the center.

And that’s how I got here. I love these brownies. The waffle iron gives them crispy ridges, but the inside remains rich and fudgy. They’re novel and fun and incredibly easy to make.

One important note: You need to let the brownies sit for a minute on the hot, opened iron before trying to remove them. Otherwise they’ll be too soft and likely to crumble.

Here’s the recipe:

Yankee’s Crisp-Chewy Waffle Iron Brownies

Total time: 40 minutes; hands-on time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup salted butter, at room temperature
• 1 ¼ cups granulated sugar
• 3 squares melted unsweetened (baker’s) chocolate
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs, beaten
• 1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
• ½ teaspoon baking powder
• ½ teaspoon table salt
• Vegetable oil for waffle iron

Method:

Preheat your waffle iron. In the bowl of a standing mixer, cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Add melted chocolate and vanilla and stir. Add eggs, one at a time, stirring well after each.

In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder and salt. Add dry ingredients to chocolate mixture and stir just until evenly combined.

When waffle iron is ready, spray or brush with neutral vegetable oil, such as canola. Drop a heaping tablespoonful of batter into the center of each grid on your iron. Close the lid and cook until the brownies are crisp and dry on the outside, 4 to 6  minutes, depending on the iron (check after 4 minutes). Open the waffle iron and let brownies sit for 1 to 2 minutes, until firm enough to remove (don’t skip this step). Transfer to a plate and sprinkle with powdered sugar. Repeat with remaining batter. Yield: 10 to 12 brownies.

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Now… I’d love to get your help, readers! I’ve only tested this recipe on my iron and temperatures and cooking times will vary, depending on the machine. If you try this recipe, will you please report back to let me know how it worked for you and how long the brownies took to cook? I’ll adjust the recipe accordingly. Thank you!

“We must have a pie,” [Mamet] wrote in “Boston Marriage,” his 1999 play about Victorian women struggling not to talk like Mamet characters. “Stress cannot exist in the presence of a pie.”

I also love how he described the pleasure of the all-American dessert:

“Apple pie is a weekend project to slow the baker’s heart rate and restore belief in happiness. The scent of fruit softening, kissed by cinnamon, of buttery crust, of sugar caramelizing — these can combine into a fragrance of redemption for the cook and everyone else. The taste delivers bliss.”

Of course, I would’ve loved it if he was profiling my apple pie instead of one by Kieran Baldwin, a pastry chef at the Dutch, a restaurant in Soho. But I’m sure hers is fantastic. I can’t wait to make it myself sometime soon.

The result? Never great. Meat, fish, and eggs cook unevenly and stick to the pan and I realize as I stand scrubbing at the sink that I didn’t save myself any time at all.

If you’re cooking anything over higher heat, always let the pan heat up for a few minutes before adding the oil. Why? As the metal of your pan heats up, the surface expands. Imagine microscopic little lines in the surface—small imperfections. If they’re swelling closed, and a chicken cutlet is sitting there on top of them, they can actually “grab” the meat. If the pan is fully heated and expanded, there’s nothing to stick to.

So if you’re going to pan fry or sear or sauté something, always preheat your pan heat for two or three minutes. And if you want to be even more precise about it, check out this fascinating video from Rouxbe.com (via Answers.com).

How to Properly Heat a Pan (the Mercury Ball Test)

I thought of them this morning as I surveyed my high-protein, low-carb breakfast options. Wintertime is my time to pare down and reset my eating habits and cutting out sugar and flour for a few weeks is the best way I’ve found.

Yankee ran a great recipe for shirred eggs back in 2003, during my first tenure at the magazine. It’s a gem. You line muffin cups with thin slices of ham and then fill them with eggs, cream, Parmesan, lemon zest, chive, and seasonings. Bake at 325˚ for 12 to 15 minutes and voila! Brunch is served.

Today, I tried a variation, alternately lining the muffin cups with bacon (the ultimate low-carb treat) and low-fat turkey slices. I didn’t use a recipe. Really, you just put a piece of meat, an egg, and about 2 teaspoons of cream and cheese in each. Sprinkle some pepper and herbs and you’re done.

I added eggs.

A bit of cream, some black pepper,  and a sprinkle of Parmesan.

Finally, some fresh parsley and thyme.

After 15 minutes in the oven, they were done.

Let the cups cool for 10 minutes and they’ll easily pop out of the cups.

The eggs were delicious and they’ll provide me with an easy breakfast for several more days. In retrospect, I should’ve pre-cooked the bacon first—just until lightly golden at the edges—so that it could crisp up more in the oven. Next time. Meanwhile, I encourage you to try out your own shirred egg combinations. Let me know what you come up with!

Great news today! The Apple Lover’s Cookbook has been nominated for two IACP awards: Best American Cookbook and The Julia Child Award for First Book.

Wow, wow. This is just such a dream made real. When I started writing,  I had this vision of a book that was layered with stories and beautiful photos and reference material and delicious recipes and really useful hands-on information about apples. I wanted people to see the beauty that I saw in this fruit. And thanks to the efforts of a lot of people beyond myself—most notably my editors Maria Guarnaschelli and  Melanie Tortorolli, the Norton creative team of Jan Derevjanik, Devon Zahn, and Ingsu Liu, the food styling of Michael Pederson and Tracy Keshani, and the photography of Squire Fox and Peter Thompson, and my agent Joy Tutela—I get to savor this wonderful moment.

Who knows if I’ll win anything. This may be my only chance to say these thanks.  It’s a cliché, I know, but I am truly thrilled to just be nominated.

Like the best of its kind, the Harrisville is part market, part eatery, part gallery, and part social hub (note the handy laptop available to customers). Incidentally, there were people all around me as I took this photo, but since they were eating, I kept them out of the frame.

The setting of the store couldn’t be more charming. Harrisville boasts remarkably well-preserved 19th-century mill buildings and homes and an abundance of beautiful lakes. Here’s the view from the porch of the store.

Inside, you can find grocery staples, wonderful breads, and the best eggs in the world, all brought in from local farms. There’s a rotating cast of suppliers, but today’s eggs are from Wellscraft Farm

But perhaps the best part of the Harrisville General Store is the incredible food: homemade soups, panini, burgers made with local beef, organic salads, pot pies, pizzas, cider donuts made fresh daily, towering carrot cakes, a wonderful mac n’ cheese.

Much of this baked good greatness is the work of M’Lue Zahner, whose daughter, Laura Elizabet Carden, runs the place. Laura was out today, but M’Lue was gracious enough to pose for a photo.

But as great as M’Lue’s sweets are, my real addiction at the moment is to the seasonal raw kale salad. This is not a joke. Tossed with walnuts, feta, and dried cranberries in a shallot-rice wine vinaigrette, it is sweet, salty, tart, nutty, and crunchy. A perfect mix of flavors.

So thanks, Laura and M’Lue, for all that you do to feed us so well.