Kneading by hand: A heavily enriched dough, like this one, will naturally be on the stickier side. Using an electric stand mixer for kneading will be a lot easier, but it is not impossible to knead this dough by hand. All you need is an extra 1/4cup of bread flour on standby.
Gai mei bao is my favorite baked bun. There, I said it. I love a good pineapple bun as much as the next person, but I’m in the minority that enjoys a buttery, coconut-heavy cocktail bun a little more. Cocktail buns originally were created as a way for bakers to salvage day-old buns. The stale buns were ground into crumbs, then mixed with sugar and shredded coconut as a filling for fresh dough (like a“cocktail” of bakery leftovers). Nowadays, bakers make the filling fresh.
This is my favorite cake of all time. I love it when we have to judge this round on The Great British Bake Off! The perfect lemon drizzle has a light and airy sponge and a sharp, zesty crunchy topping. My version has quite an intense lemony flavor, but other than that it’s a total classic and I don’t think you should mess with those classics. The only thing to remember is to pour over the drizzle while the cake is still warm.
Priya Krishna’s One recipe is inspired by her colleague and friend, Tejal Rao of the New York Times. In Tejal’s recipe, Roasted Squash With Coconut, Chile and Garlic, squash is the star. But Priya switches up the vegetable, anything from cabbage to potatoes, when she makes this dish, as the main component of the recipe is truthfully the aromatic base of coconut, chili, and garlic. Keep these ingredients on hand and this dish may very well become a treasured staple for you as well.
Daniel almost always has steaks sitting in the freezer, but he rarely has the forethought to plan on cooking one (and setting it out to defrost) the night before. One evening, after a particularly vigorous jujitsu match (he wrestles competitively), he was famished and had a strong hankering for a steak. Without the time or patience to defrost one, he tossed the seasoned, though still frozen, block of icy beef under the broiler for ten minutes. To his surprise, the steak cooked beautifully this way, with rendered, crispy, golden fat and a deeply browned crust. As with all meat cookery, resting the steak for a few minutes when it comes off the flame is key to redistributing the juices and getting an even medium-rare cook temperature from edge to edge.
This is the most popular snack in my house. It used to be my favourite snack growing up and now it’s my kids’ favourite, too. My mum would always keep a box of papdi in the cupboard and refill it as soon as it was empty. I make them often but not as often as she did, as I find they disappear faster than I can make them. No one can ever have just one.
Since the whole-wheat flour absorbs more water than white, the dough benefits from a longer resting period after the initial mix. The rest for the basic country dough is 25 to 40 minutes; 40 minutes to an hour is good for whole wheat. Some bakers favor an overnight rest for whole grain—a technique worth exploring as long as you wait to add the leaven until you begin to give the dough turns.
This popular southwestern dish boasts rich bites of pork in a sauce dominated by green chiles. For our version, we used a combination of Anaheim and jalapeño peppers.
For a classic sourdough bread recipe, we used a mixture of bread flour and whole-wheat flour for complex flavor. Sifting the whole-wheat flour removed excess bran, ensuring a light and airy loaf. For convenience and deep sourdough flavor, we let the shaped loaf proof overnight in the refrigerator. Baking it in a covered Dutch oven trapped steam to provide a crisp, crackling crust. We prefer King Arthur all-purpose flour here; if you can’t find it, you can substitute bread flour. For best results, weigh your ingredients. If you have a banetton or a lined proofing basket, use that rather than the towel-lined colander in step 3. Do not wait until the oven has preheated in step 6 to start timing 30 minutes or the bread will burn. [Ed note: For more advice on sourdough starters, please follow this link for an audio segment with Bridget Lancaster of America's Test Kitchen and a sourdough starter recipe courtesy of Cook's Illustrated. You can also try this recipe for Almost No-Knead Sourdough Bread.]
Smoky and spicy chipotle peppers plus Cucumber Yogurt Dip make for an entirely different condiment, one that you can use on almost anything that calls for mayonnaise or ketchup.