Confection Perfection!

Scandinavian candies from Sockerbit, 89 Christopher St.,NYC: Soft toffee covered in milk chocolate (Dumle originals) and sugar-coated raspberry hearts.


You know how the croissants and danishes you find at most bakeries, coffee trucks and diners taste nothing like their fresh, flaky, and staggeringly delicious European counterparts? Well, I've just discovered a similar disparity with candy.

The candy is Scandinavian, and compared to their diabolically gluey and artificial U.S. equivalents (Chuckles, Jujubes, Dots, Circus Peanuts) these candies taste like fresh fruit. I also find that they leave you feeling ebullient, as opposed to anemic. These Scandinavian treats can be found in the West Village, at Sockerbit, a starkly white store where the sweet fragrance of fresh candy gently strokes the air.

The main attraction at Sockerbit: a panoply of loose candy in rows of clear plastic bins.

Stylishly dressed rag-doll Easter bunnies

Decorative egg tins in delicate hues can be filled with candy

Since it was my first time there, I selected a little bit of everything for my bag. The truth is, I've never been that into jelly or gummi candies. The only reason I went into Sockerbit in the first place was because my sister wanted to go. She likes candy a lot more than I do—I'm more of a dessert person. But, once there, not only was I charmed by the store's crisp Swedish aesthetic and pleasing scent, but the service is friendly too.

The store clerk told me that most of these candies are made with real sugar, not high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS). OK, that changes everything. Why does that change everything? Because ever since I read Fat Land by Greg Critser, I've become somewhat like the Lorax when it comes to complaining about the metabolic perils of HFCS in foods. We need to a return to a pristine food ethos. Bad ingredients equals bad food and is ruining our lives. In Sweden, said the candy clerk, natural sugar isn't as expensive as it is in the U.S. so there's no cost advantage to using manufactured sugars like HFCS. HFCS is everywhere in food in the U.S. But according to Wikipedia,"Wide scale replacement of sugar has not occurred in the EU."

The Sockerbit Website doesn't mention anything about sugar but it does advertise that its candies do not contain transfats, artificial colors, or GMOs (genetically modified organisms). Win, win, and win. Sockerbit also carries sugar-free candies and vegan candies.

My filled candy bag:

So, how do these candies taste?

Flavor, I tell you, flavor! As fresh and fruity as a bowl full of berries! And that's just half the story. There's also a carnival of textures: textures that marvel and entertain, tantalize and tease. I particularly liked the raspberry gummi hearts sprinkled with sugar, the foam mushrooms with light beige tinted caps and an ever so subtle coffee flavor, and little red monkeys that are tough and tiny but packed with a kind of bubblegum flavor. These monkeys are addictive and I don't know why!

To balance out the jellies with a little more substance, I mixed in soft toffees covered in chocolate (Dumle originals). Of course, like all things comestible, part of the excitement is in the search for and discovery of your own personal favorites.

As soon as I knew it, I had one piece of candy left. A sugar-sprinkled, blueberry-jelly and vanilla-foam gumdrop. As I beheld the sheer beauty of this miniature mold of jewel-like jelly, neatly set upon a layer of snow-white marshmallow, countless thoughts rushed through my head. But I settled upon this. Candy, mixed with love, does make the world taste good. And by love, I don't mean some intangible make-believe ingredient. I mean all-natural flavors and real sugar in the hands of a candy maker with a refined palate and a playful imagination. Think Wordsworth captured in jelly. The glory and freshness of a dream...

What more can you ask for in a gumdrop? Nothing more, and certainly nothing less!



Photos by Katherine Lee

Heaven Is a Vanilla Macaron

Image taken from online of a vanilla macaron from Ladurée (not one of the participating bakeries for Macaron Day NYC 2012)

Not only was today the first day of spring, but it was also Macaron Day. In honor of this, Francois Payard bakery, along with a whole list of other French bakeries throughout NYC, gave away free macarons! By 8:30am, there I was at a Payard on Houston, standing on a short line. After I ordered a cup of coffee, I was asked which flavor macaron I'd like to have.

I scanned the beautiful array of sprightly and speckled colors and picked vanilla. It came in a small white paper bag the size of a dress pocket. (Note to Self: The next time I wear a dress with pockets, buy a macaron for one pocket.)

Seated at a table, I took one bite of my petit macaron and, my God, it was AMAZING!! Do not underestimate the flavor power of a quality macaron. What a special treat. It was so good, I wrote a poem about it:

Heaven is a vanilla macaron;
A treasure, if ever, was one.
It looks as precious as a little spring lamb,
And tastes like a mouthful of sun!

Thanksgiving Part Deux: Pain-in-the-A** Pumpkin Pie

And now, for the second pie I baked this Thanksgiving. A brilliant recipe for one of the most beloved of Thanksgiving desserts. But man, oh, man is this a complex pie to make. Which is why I dub this recipe, Pain-in-the-A** Pumpkin Pie. Is it worth it? Hale yes, this is one scrumdiddlyumptious pumpkin pie.

In spite of its nickname, I really did enjoy making this pie. It's a recipe from Cook's Illustrated, the most profound and informative cooking magazine in the world. Truly assiduous research and testing—all for the love of comfort foods, cookies, pies and desserts—along with editor and publisher Christopher Kimball's stirring monthly editorials that are like hymns to nature as well as great storytelling, make this publication an all-encompassing guidebook to cooking and to eating as a defining way of life.

But what really attracted me to this recipe were specific items on the ingredient list that seemed to pop off the page. For the filling: fresh ginger, maple syrup, candied yams. For the crust: cold vodka. I was intrigued to say the least. I was also feeling bored with Libby's pumpkin pie recipe which is also very good but this year I wanted something with a little more Thanksgiving muscle—and boy did I get it! The Cook's recipe is painstakingly designed to be rich in pumpkin flavor and silky and custardy in texture. It doesn't happen magically though. With this recipe, you really have to earn it.

After you finish making the dough, refrigerating the dough (for 45 min), and finally, rolling out the dough and placing and molding it into a pie plate, you have to stick it back in the fridge—plate and all—for another 15 minutes. After that, it needs to be pre-baked before the filling goes in. But, even the pre-baking isn't that simple. The dough-lined pie dish must be covered with foil and weighed down with weights, or as the recipe suggests, pennies. For me, the best part of this whole process was seeing my father's sheer bewilderment when he walked into the kitchen and found me arranging a pile of change onto a foil-covered pie dish, which I then proceeded to place in the oven.

The filling was even more complicated. There are two separate batches of ingredients to be combined, one of which—the yams, pumpkin and spices—is cooked over the stove for about 20 minutes. Once the cooked yam and pumpkin puree is combined with the heavy cream mixture, look out, the genius of this recipe becomes deliciously palpable. But the hard work isn't over yet. The mixture must be strained through a fine mesh strainer. I was so ready to skip this last step, but, obviously, it's crucial to the smooth, silky texture. Once that's finished, it gets poured into the crust and back in the oven it goes. Around 45 minutes later, cue the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, an amazing pumpkin pie is made! You just have to let it cool for 2 to 3 hours before eating it. Unless you're like me, and not good at waiting for pies to cool, then just serve it hot.

Thanksgiving Part I: Apple Pie—at Last!

Homemade desserts at the Thanksgiving table have a way of lighting up the room with their presence. Pies, especially, are like the candelabras of the soul. And with that said, I've finally found an apple pie recipe that I can wax rhapsodic about. It's a recipe I found in the Thanksgiving issue of Food & Wine, co-edited by Michael Symon and featuring an article with REM. Boy, I'd love to eat caramelized brussels sprouts in a beautiful rustic outdoor setting with Michael Stipe and Co. For a future issue, Food & Wine should do a Tea Time with Morrissey.

Back to Thanksgiving 2011. Here, without further ado, is a photo of the finished pie:

It's a little charred around the edges, I admit. I'm going to have to look into how to prevent that from happening. It can probably be prevented by covering the pie with aluminum foil until the last 15 minutes or so of baking. Oh well, maybe next time. What I loved about this pie is that the filling actually filled the pie! So, individual slices looked great on the plate. Also, the black edges didn't affect the flavor. To my great relief and extreme delight, it tasted like real apple pie, nothing more, nothing less.

I should also mention that I used different apples than what is recommended—the recipe calls for Pink Lady, Golden Delicious, Cortland or Jonathan but I used Granny Smith apples because they looked so bright green and pretty that I couldn't resist buying them. Each one looked just like this:

Consequently, the pie tasted a little tart the first day and necessitated ice cream—as does life in general. On the following day, the pie tasted much sweeter and didn't need ice cream at all. In other words, the ice cream only made it better.

The Space-Time-Cocktail-Continuum

Juan Carlos, master cocktail maker at Orsay

From what I understand about the Theory of Relativity, there's no mention of cocktails in it. Nevertheless, I've discovered my own way to expand time while remaining at rest. And by at rest I mean seated at an outdoor table at Orsay restaurant on the Upper East Side. Yes, cocktails are involved, exquisite cocktails, but this is not a blog post about drinking until your surroundings mutate into liquid pocket watches. This is a blog post about the art of killing time.

Located on the corner of 76th Street and Lexington, Orsay is a Parisian feast for the eye situated in a quiet area where it can be enjoyed without competing noises and hoards of people. Sitting in the open veranda area on a stunning Saturday in June, I caught up with a friend who is always super fun to hang out with, so the meal had a lot going for it from the start. I ordered the Croque Madame without ham, which some would say, and did say, is not a Croque Madame but a cheese sandwich. I wouldn't go that far, but I admit it was a crock Madame.

Now for the cocktails. The art. A meal with well-placed cocktails is like a well-punctuated sentence, it flows nicely. This brunch was well-punctuated. Juan Carlos, the mixologist at Orsay, is a masterful drink maker and cute (see pic). It takes a very skilled craftsman to understand the art of subtlety, and there is a delicate subtlety to Juan Carlos's enchanting libations. Needless to say, delicious cocktails that ingeniously mask the taste of alcohol behind the poetry of flavor can be treacherous. So sip cautiously and set your limits. Also, you wouldn't want to ascend and descend the marble stairs that spiral up to the restroom with impaired senses.

The Quintessential Cupcake

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The Devil's Food cupcake from Amy's Bread is the best chocolate cupcake in Manhattan.

I don't know if you've noticed, but New York City has a lot of freakin' cupcakes. Somewhat surprisingly, I've never made it my goal to sample every one. And the reason for that is, I'm so blissfully content with the cupcakes at Amy's Bread.

Basically, when I want a cupcake, I want just that, a cup-sized cake. Nothing outrageous, nothing pretentious; just give me something simple and pretty, wholesome, and yes, delicious. Finding old-fashioned cupcakes is not the easiest thing to do these days, as more and more bakers seem to be taking a Lady Gaga approach to cupcake making. Everyone's pushing the envelope. There are a lot of crazy concoctions out there, a lot of bold flavors, bright colors and frostings drizzled and bedecked with caramel, cookies and candy. Even bacon—bacon! Then there are Magnolia cupcakes, which I do love. But Magnolia cupcakes, with their pale pastel frostings and mildly sweet cake have a kind of ceremonious feel to them. Consequently, they don't speak to my soul the way the more traditional, homey cupcakes at Amy's Bread do.

Pictured above, is a Devil's Food cupcake from Amy's. Sometimes, I try scraping off a third of the frosting to cut calories but after one bite I'll spread it back on because it's so darn good. And the cake—oh the cake! It's the richest, most perfect, chocolate cake. The vanilla cake with pink frosting is also excellent.

Bottom line, if you're in New York City and want a classic, delicious cupcake, then find the nearest Amy's Bread. I obviously recommend the Devil's Food cupcake. But if you really want to be decadent, if you really want to be sinful, go for a slice of their Devil's Food cake!

Stovetop Peaches and Ice Cream

Fresh peaches cooked and served over ice cream

Juicy ripe peaches in the summer are a joyous occasion. Their sweet, delicate fragrance alone is enough to carry you adrift over the world in a Chagall-like dream. But there's one thing that's even better than fresh, delicious peaches in the summer and that's fresh delicious peaches with ice cream!

This is a ridiculously simple recipe that I picked up from Bloomberg Businessweek--of all places! Peel and dice 4-6 gorgeous peaches, place them in a skillet, sprinkle in a little bit of sugar, and heat until hot and bubbly. Serve over ice cream and prepare to make Bill Cosby pudding faces. My ice cream of choice is Blue Marble vanilla which is as bright white and creamy as soft serve. To borrow from Woody Allen, I don't love it, I lurv it.

Bloomberg Businessweek suggests that managers make this for their employees instead of the standard make-your-own-sundaes sprinkled with M&Ms. While I do love the recipe, I have to say, I couldn't possibly envision any manager I've ever worked for cooking peaches for anyone in the office. Also, I don't think many offices have stoves. Microwaves, yes, stoves, not so much.

I made this dessert a couple of times over the summer, including once for myself during Hurricane Irene. Like many New Yorkers, I stocked up on nachos and chips and water and braced myself for an indoor cataract to emerge from the ceiling. Fortunately, that didn't happen. So it was in a relaxed state of mind that I was able to sit down to a bowl of warm peaches and Blue Marble ice cream while watching The Conspirator. Great movie. Boy, can Robert Redford tell a story...