WELCOME TO OUR KITCHEN: Grace Lin, Author Of CHINESE MENU
Welcome to our kitchen. We're veteran cookbook authors Bruce Weinstein & Mark Scarbrough, authors of thirty-six (and counting) cookbooks. You can check out our latest, THE LOOK AND COOK AIR FRYER BIBLE here.
We're delighted with the book on this show this week. We offer a warm welcome to best-selling author Grace Lin. She's written a new, illustrated book, CHINESE MENU: THE HISTORY, MYTHS, AND LEGENDS BEHIND YOUR FAVORITE FOODS. Not only is this an informative and entertaining book, it's also a feast for your eyes. Get your copy here!
In this episode, we've also got our trademarked (not really!) one-minute cooking tip. And we'll let you know what's making us happy in food this week.
Here are the segments for this episode of COOKING WITH BRUCE & MARK:
[01:07] Our one-minute cooking tip: Always read the comments for online recipes.
[03:18] Bruce's interview with Grace Lin, author of CHINESE MENU.
[25:50] What’s making us happy in food this week? Challah for Rosh Hashanah and Bruce's floating matzo balls.
Transcript
Hey, I'm Bruce Weinstein, and this is the podcast cooking with Bruce and Mark.
Mark:And I'm Mark Scarborough, and together with Bruce, we have written 36, who could possibly ever believe such a thing?
Mark:I'm not me, the author.
Mark:I can't believe it.
Mark:36 cookbooks, including the upcoming, or depending on when you're listening to this, the already published Look and Cook Air Fryer Bible.
Mark:It's out in November of 2023, and it includes 704 photographs.
Mark:An unbelievable effort on our parts to photograph every step of every airfryer recipe.
Bruce:Hence the title, Look and Cook.
Mark:Yeah, hence the title, Look and Cook.
Mark:We actually hope that we can write other Look and Cook books down the road.
Mark:That would be great.
Mark:We'd love to write a Look and Cook cookie book.
Bruce:So buy this one and then we get to write another one.
Mark:Yeah, we'd like to get out of the airfryer.
Mark:And, and write looking cook cookies.
Mark:That's the one I wanna make.
Mark:Mm-hmm.
Mark:Because I love cookies.
Mark:Okay.
Mark:Anyway, this is our podcast this week and we have got, as is traditional, our one minute cooking tip.
Mark:We have an interview with Grace Lynn in the podcast, and we're gonna tell you what's making us happy in food this week.
Mark:So welcome to our kitchen.
Bruce:Our one minute cooking tip this week is this, when you look up recipes online, and we all do that.
Bruce:Absolutely read.
Bruce:People's comments.
Mark:Oh, this is really important, and this has become important for Bruce and me right now.
Mark:Because we're working on a project, and we've been doing some research on how to do certain things online.
Mark:And I've found a bunch of recipes that are pretty obscure, and the topic is pretty obscure.
Mark:So, I've been messing around looking at people's recipes online, and I send him, I text him, Well, look at this guy's recipe, or look at this person's recipe.
Mark:And I always say, and look at the comments because the comments tell you what people think about that recipe.
Bruce:Yeah.
Bruce:First of all, if enough people put a comment saying this recipe doesn't work, well, then, you know, you probably shouldn't even look at that recipe.
Bruce:But if most of the comments are, this is good, I liked it, but then you get, you know, a handful that agree.
Bruce:It was too sweet or a handful that agree it needed more salt.
Bruce:Then you can start to say, all right, well, before I even make this, assuming I'm going to make it for a dinner party or for whatever, you know, you're probably gonna have to adjust the salt or the sugar.
Bruce:So it's good to know ahead of time.
Bruce:What might need adjusting in a recipe?
Mark:Yes, it's really important.
Mark:And I know a lot of bloggers go through and nix negative comments from their recipes online.
Mark:So really, I think those are not comments that you can trust because people edit their comments.
Mark:But I think when you're out at like Epicurious or those big sites, food 52, I think the comments are often a good guide for what's going on in the recipe itself.
Mark:Okay.
Mark:So that's our one minute, which took longer than one minute.
Mark:It always does.
Mark:One minute cooking tip.
Mark:I don't know why we lie every week.
Bruce:It's called the one minute plus cooking tip.
Mark:Okay.
Mark:Anyway, so I'm the one minute cooking tip.
Mark:Um, next Bruce has an interview with Grace Lynn.
Mark:She is the author of the book, Chinese menu.
Mark:She's actually a children's book author.
Bruce:She is a children's book author and an illustrator.
Bruce:And she is so bubbly.
Bruce:I loved speaking with her and I cannot.
Bruce:Wait to share this interview about Chinese menu, all about the history and myths behind your favorite Chinese dishes.
Bruce:I am so excited to have you here.
Bruce:Welcome, Grace.
Bruce:How are you?
Grace:Good, how are you?
Bruce:Grace, your book is great because it starts even before you order or eat anything.
Bruce:Right up front, you talk about the history of chopsticks and some chopsticks etiquette.
Bruce:What are some of the do's and don'ts when using chopsticks at a restaurant or at someone else's house?
Grace:Yes, there are many things that you should not do with your chopsticks, uh, but probably the one biggest thing that a lot of people don't realize is that you shouldn't take your chopsticks and stick them straight up and down in your bowl of rice, because when they're, when they're sticking straight up and down, it looks like incense sticks.
Grace:And incense sticks is what you have at a temple or to honor the dead.
Grace:Uh, and you don't want any kind of whiff of honoring dead during your meal.
Grace:Like it just brings up bad, it just brings up bad luck thinking about the dead while you're eating your meal.
Grace:So that's, that's a big thing is, uh, do not stick your chopsticks straight up in your bowl of rice.
Grace:Another thing that, uh, it's probably less known, but people tend to do it, uh, inadvertently, is uh, what they call grave digging.
Grace:Is that when someone comes around with, you know, we have the communal food and then um, you kind of, when people like, oh, I just want the broccoli.
Grace:And so they go through that big communal food and take just the broccoli out.
Grace:So that's considered very rude to like, kind of like, Dig through that main, that communal dish to get what you want.
Grace:So, don't grave dig either.
Bruce:The same goes for tea in your book.
Bruce:What are some rules we need to know when serving and sharing tea with others?
Grace:Oh, serving tea.
Grace:Tea is such an important part of Chinese culture.
Grace:Uh, there's so many tea ceremonies.
Grace:It's such a way of showing honor.
Grace:Uh, so, tea actually has a proper way of being served.
Grace:Usually, the host serves the tea, so whoever organized the dinner will serve the tea, and you have to, what you're supposed to serve the tea to the oldest person in the party first, and then to the youngest, and then the host last.
Grace:Uh, traditionally, in Chinese culture, To be considered the oldest was an honor, you know, like being the older, the older you were, the more revered you were.
Grace:So if you mistakenly gave somebody the cup, uh, as thinking they were much older than they were, they would take it as an honor.
Grace:So that's a, that's a difference in customs from here in ancient China.
Bruce:When I go to Chinese restaurants, I'm always offered jasmine tea, even though I'd rather have the good strong.
Bruce:oolong that I see so many other tables get.
Bruce:What's the difference between the two teas and which do you prefer?
Grace:Well, it's so interesting that you say you would prefer to have the oolong tea because I actually prefer the jasmine tea.
Grace:Uh, it's very easy to tell the difference between jasmine and oolong by the smell.
Grace:Uh, that.
Grace:flowery aroma of the jasmine tea gives it away, like, so quickly.
Grace:Um, usually jasmine tea is green tea.
Grace:Not always, but usually it's green tea.
Grace:So it's actually a little bit healthier than the oolong tea.
Grace:Uh, the oolong tea probably has a little bit more, uh, caffeine.
Bruce:You write about something you call Tender ears.
Bruce:You say they're China's first dumplings.
Bruce:Well, what exactly are they and what's the story behind them?
Grace:Dumplings are called tender ears.
Grace:And if you look very carefully at the dumplings that you get in a Chinese restaurant, there's many different kinds of dumplings in Chinese cuisine.
Grace:But the ones that we are most used to are the ones that are kind of boat shaped.
Grace:And not only are they kind of boat shaped.
Grace:You'll also notice that they are kind of shaped in a person's ear and that was done on purpose because dumplings, these kinds of dumplings were invented by an ancient Chinese doctor who invented them as a cure for people's frostbitten ears for their tender ears.
Grace:So, uh, one day, In the winter, this doctor was walking through his village and he saw a lot of the villagers were suffering from these frostbitten ears.
Grace:So he went home and he created these dumplings.
Grace:He filled them with all these warming herbs and spices and warming meats.
Grace:And he thought if people ate these dumplings.
Grace:It would warm them up from the inside and it would cure their frostbitten ears.
Grace:So he went and he made these dumplings ear shaped to remind people what this medicine was for.
Grace:And he went and gave it to all the villagers.
Grace:Now the villagers ate the dumplings and I Do not know if it cured anybody's, uh, frostbitten ears, but they love the dumplings so much that we still eat them to this day.
Bruce:Most people have heard stories about Marco Polo and pasta.
Bruce:Some true, some not.
Bruce:But in your book, you talk about a story I've never heard.
Bruce:Marco Polo and scallion pancakes.
Bruce:What's that about?
Grace:Now, this story, I love the story.
Grace:This story was one that I was told as a child and I truly believed it, but upon doing this book, I have found out that it's completely not true.
Grace:Um, so, uh, all your Italian listeners, rest easy.
Grace:There actually is no correlation between scallion pancakes and pizza, but the story is so much fun that I had to share it.
Grace:Uh, so, The story goes that Marco Polo came to China, and he, and everybody knows the story how he stayed in China for such a long time, and while he was in China, he enjoyed the scallion pancake, and he loved the scallion pancakes so much that when he returned to Italy, he longed to eat them again.
Grace:Unfortunately, he had only eaten the scallion pancake.
Grace:He had never seen it made or made it himself, so he did not know how to eat it.
Grace:one made scallion pancakes.
Grace:So he employed all these chefs from all over to try to make the scallion pancake, and he'd describe it to them, and they'd all tried, uh, and none of them could make the scallion pancake.
Grace:But on one of their many attempts, uh, one of the chefs did, did invent the pizza.
Grace:According to the legend, it was the onions that were really throwing them off, the scallion, scallion onions, and they kept putting them on top.
Grace:And so, uh, and then I think one chef was like, well, let's put some, some tomatoes too.
Grace:Let's throw my own, my own artistic license in there.
Bruce:Many people have heard of bird's nest soup, but I doubt many Americans have tried it.
Bruce:What is it, and why is it so expensive?
Grace:So you might see bird's nest soup here in the United States on restaurant menus, and um, what you should do is check the price.
Grace:If the price is affordable, then it is probably not real bird's nest soup.
Grace:It's probably, they've, they've made like, kind of like these noodle, noodle pasta kind of imitation bird's nest.
Grace:to, to kind of, uh, make the bird's nest soup now, nowadays to make it affordable, but the true real bird's nest soup will have an astronomical price tag because the reason why it's real bird's nest soup is because they actually use a real It's a bird's nest.
Grace:It's a cliff swallows nest.
Grace:Um, and this is my gross you out, but it's made from, uh, the, the, the, uh, swallows spittle.
Grace:Now, this is a, this seems like a very, very strange.
Grace:strange thing to make soup out of, but there's a big long legend behind it.
Grace:Um, what happened was that there's a Chinese ship that was sailing the world and it got stranded on this Rocky Island and, um, all the crew and the captain were starving and, uh, they did not have the strength to continue because they were so hungry, but the captain was a very determined man and he saw some.
Grace:cliff swallows flying in the sky.
Grace:And he's like, follow those swallows, wherever they go, they go, there must be food.
Grace:So they followed the swallows to these high, high cliffs, and they saw the swallows disappear into the cliff, into the cliff caves.
Grace:And so the captain ordered his men to climb up to those cliff caves and to find the food.
Grace:When they climbed up there, what did they find?
Grace:They found the swallows nests.
Grace:These, uh, these nests made of spittle, and so they plucked those nests, and they brought them down, and the captain ordered them to make them into a soup, and so they did, and they ate it, because they were starving, but They were surprised that when they ate it, it actually tasted very good.
Grace:And not only did it taste very good, it invigorated them so much that all of them were able to continue on to their journey.
Grace:So they kind of believed that, that these, this, these nests gave them like almost supernatural strength.
Grace:And so these nests kind of had this.
Grace:mythical, um, mythical legend about them, about eating them and giving you, like, strength and power afterwards.
Grace:So that's why it became such an important part of Chinese cuisine.
Bruce:Grace, would you say that rice or noodles are more embedded into Chinese culture?
Grace:Oh, that is a very interesting question, because here in the United States, we definitely can, we definitely correlate rice with Chinese cuisine, and that is because the first immigrants from China here in the United States were from southern China, they were most likely Cantonese, and southern China, they have a So, yeah.
Grace:So, yeah.
Grace:Very, very strong rice eating culture, but Northern China actually is more of a noodle eating culture.
Grace:They have more wheat, and so you can't really say which one is, which one is China, because China is such a huge country, like are they a rice culture or are they a noodle culture?
Grace:But you could definitely say that they are both, and depending on where you are, like if you're in Northern China, it'll be more noodles, and if you're in Southern China, it'll be more rice.
Bruce:Grace, what's a knife cut noodle and how did it come about?
Grace:Sure, we're just, um, starting to see this knife cut noodle here in the United States in like the last, like, five to ten years.
Grace:You'll see them at restaurants and they'll be like, knife cut noodles.
Grace:Um, and even, somebody told me that they saw them at Trader Joe's the other day, so, you know, it's really getting popular.
Grace:Now, The knife cut noodle has a very interesting story behind it, uh, because it was born out of a time of strife in China.
Grace:Uh, so Mongolia is a country above China and, uh, for a time, the Mongolians came down and they took over China.
Grace:And that was during the Yuan, the Yuan Dynasty, uh, when the Mongols ruled China.
Grace:Now, when the Mongols ruled China, they were very, very, uh, distrustful of the Chinese people, the Han Chinese people.
Grace:And because they were, they were sure that the Chinese people wanted to rise up and rebel, and they were right, because they did want to rise up and rebel.
Grace:And so, to make sure that they could not rise up and rebel, uh, They, the Mongol rulers put on very, very strict rules for the Han Chinese.
Grace:And one of those, these strict rules was that there could only be one knife for every 10 families.
Grace:So ten families had to share one kitchen knife, which made things very, very inconvenient.
Grace:And the story of knife cut noodles goes that there was an elderly couple that really wanted to have noodles for lunch one day.
Grace:Uh, and, uh, but they needed the knife to make the noodles.
Grace:Uh, but when they went to go try to find the knife, they realized that they were like the last one in the ten family, ten family list, and it would be a long time before they would get the knife.
Grace:So, the husband, on his way home, very sad and being like, I'm so hungry, uh, found an odd piece of metal on the ground.
Grace:Um, it was not a knife, but...
Grace:He thought, well, maybe this will work.
Grace:So he brought it to his wife and said, can you use this instead?
Grace:And she said, maybe, because she was really hungry too.
Grace:So she looked at this odd piece of metal and she realized she could not use it like one would use a normal knife.
Grace:So she had to come up with a way to make noodles using this odd piece of metal.
Grace:So what she did was she made, she pressed her dough into kind of a block of dough.
Grace:And then she took this odd piece of metal and she kind of shaved pieces off of this dough into the boiling broth that would, and cooked it into noodles that way.
Grace:So that became the knife cut noodle, which, uh, is.
Grace:Ironically, funny, because they were created not using a knife, but now they make it using a knife.
Grace:Cutting off pieces of dough with a knife into hot broth.
Grace:, Bruce: I love tofu.
Grace:All kinds.
Grace:Pressed tofu, silken tofu.
Grace:What's the legend behind the invention of tofu?
Grace:Yes!
Grace:There's a great story behind tofu.
Grace:Tofu.
Grace:Uh, so tofu was invented by, uh, in the Han Dynasty by, uh, Prince Li An.
Grace:Uh, he was a prince, but not only was he a prince, he was a great believer in Daoism.
Grace:Now, Daoism was a belief system that...
Grace:actually really believed in immortality.
Grace:They thought if you, if they could find the right immortality pill, the right immortality potion, if they could find the right mixture of something and ingest it, they would live forever.
Grace:So Prince Leon believed this as well.
Grace:So what happens with Taoists is most Taoists were pretty much experimental chemist.
Grace:And Prince Leon was also an experimental chemist.
Grace:So he spent a lot of time dabbling with all these different potions and herbs and spices trying to create some kind of immortality elixir.
Grace:Now, Prince Leon was also a very good son because he had a mother who was quite elderly and who had lost all her teeth.
Grace:And one of the things she was so sad about, about losing her teeth was that she could no longer eat her favorite soybeans.
Grace:And she was so sad about that, that Prince Leon felt bad.
Grace:And he said, I'll, I'll find a way for you to eat your soybeans, mom.
Grace:Just let me think about it.
Grace:And so he took his chemistry skills away from immortality elixirs just for a moment.
Grace:And he.
Grace:created soy milk for his mother so she could drink soy milk and she could have her soybeans that way.
Grace:Well, she loved it and he was very happy.
Grace:He's like, I'll make you some every day.
Grace:Don't worry, mom.
Grace:And so, uh, every morning he would make the soy milk and then he would spend the rest of the day, uh, trying to figure out how to make it immortality elixir, mixing up all these things, uh, all these potions and liquids.
Grace:Well, one day.
Grace:Uh, he did as he always did, made his mother's soy milk, and then mixed up all these chemicals and trying to make an immortality elixir.
Grace:Well, somehow, he must have accidentally spilled some calcium sulfate into his mother's soy milk.
Grace:Now, he probably didn't call it calcium soy sulfate, but that's what we know it was now.
Grace:And whatever that calcium sulfate did to that...
Grace:Milk turned it into tofu.
Grace:It solidified it and made it into tofu.
Grace:So when Prince Leon went to get the milk for his mother, he saw that the milk had turned into a solid.
Grace:Now, Taoists who dabble in immortality elixirs have no fear of ingesting strange substances.
Grace:So he tasted this, uh, solid soy milk and he found it delicious.
Grace:And that is how tofu was created.
Bruce:Let's talk about a famous American Chinese dish, General Tsao's chicken.
Bruce:It's ubiquitous on every American Chinese restaurant menu.
Bruce:Was there really a General Tsao who created this dish?
Grace:Well, there was a General Tsao.
Grace:Uh, he was a real general.
Grace:But he never tasted this dish.
Grace:He probably, he never knew of this dish's existence.
Grace:And it's not even really known if General Tso even liked chicken.
Grace:So, uh, this General Tso's chicken has a very interesting backstory.
Grace:Um, it was most likely invented in Taiwan when Taiwan was known as the Republic of China.
Grace:Now Taiwan was having a big state dinner, which the United States was coming to.
Grace:And, uh, so the chef of that state dinner, wanted to really impress all these diplomats coming in.
Grace:And so he created a new chicken dish.
Grace:He, and this chicken dish, he was very proud of.
Grace:He knew it was delicious.
Grace:And he wanted to give this chicken dish a name with a lot of gravitas, a name that would give it a lot of respect.
Grace:Now, this chef was from the Hunan province of China.
Grace:And, uh, one of the local heroes there was General Tso, and so he's like, okay, I will call it General Tso's Chicken because he's my local hero.
Grace:That's a name with a lot of respect, a lot of gravitas.
Grace:And so he named this chicken dish General Tso's Chicken.
Grace:And then from there, it just exploded to popularity.
Bruce:I want to end the conversation the way my meal ends in a Chinese restaurant.
Bruce:With Fortune cookies.
Bruce:Yes.
Bruce:. Where'd they come from and are they served in China?
Grace:Well, the Fortune cookie is a very, very interesting food here in the United States.
Grace:Before I go into the story, I just want us to give my proper homage to the Fortune cookie because the fortune cookie is actually what inspired my book Chinese menu, um, back in 2000.
Grace:For, um, I did a picture book, a book for kindergartners and first graders called Fortune Cookie Fortunes.
Grace:And when I researched that book, I found out that fortune cookies are completely Asian American invention.
Grace:If you go to China and you ask for a fortune cookie, they will not know what you're talking about.
Grace:Or if they do know what you're talking about, they'll say, Oh, you mean the American cookie, because it has absolutely no, um, no relevance there in China.
Grace:So, uh, when I found this out, I would tell my friends the story.
Grace:I would tell my friends this fact and all of them would always say in kind of this tone of disgust, Oh, so fortune cookies aren't even really Chinese.
Grace:And that would really bother me because, um, I am Asian, but I was born here in the United States and I actually had a hard time embracing my heritage.
Grace:And so I could see a lot of people saying the same thing about me, like, Oh, she's not really Chinese.
Grace:And like I said, that really bothered me because I am very proud of being Asian American.
Grace:And I felt like, Hey, People shouldn't put down the fortune cookie for being an Asian American food.
Grace:They should, they should give that fortune cookie some respect.
Grace:And so, uh, that led me to doing this entire book, uh, Chinese Menu, which is all about American Chinese food, which I hope, um, gives, gives this American Chinese food some more respect.
Grace:And also hope that by giving this food more respect, uh, this food that is American, but has Chinese roots more and more respect.
Grace:It also causes readers to give the people in their lives who might be American with Chinese roots more respect as well.
Grace:So, that is my homage to the fortune cookie.
Grace:But I will tell you the story now.
Grace:So, uh, the fortune cookie, as I said, is not a Chinese invention.
Grace:It's a completely Asian American invention.
Grace:And in fact, it's probably...
Grace:A Japanese American invention.
Grace:It was probably invented by a Japanese person in San Francisco, but unfortunately, it was probably invented around the time of World War II, and because of Japanese internment, the Japanese Americans were not able to exploit this invention for their own gain.
Grace:But the Chinese Americans were only way too happy to take this invention and to, and to, uh, use it for their Chinese restaurants.
Grace:Now, uh, because it was World War II, uh, many soldiers, uh, would deport from San Francisco, and they would usually eat at a Chinese restaurant on the way out.
Grace:Because it was very inexpensive, and they would often get this fortune cookie, all of them would get a fortune cookie.
Grace:And so, when the soldiers came home, and they went to, home to New York, and New Jersey, and all their other places, and they went to eat at Chinese restaurants, they would ask for the fortune cookie.
Grace:And the Chinese restaurants would, after they figured out what this fortune cookie was, were more than happy to get it in their restaurants as well, and that is how The fortune cookie, this Japanese American invention, became ubiquitous with Chinese American food.
Grace:Now, um, the, the root to Japan has to do with a, a cracker called a senbei, uh, but There is a very, very tenuous route to Chinese culture.
Grace:So there are some, some, a small segment of the population that says, it's not a Japanese invention, it's a Chinese American invention.
Grace:And they talk about that in terms of the mooncake, they say that.
Grace:The fortune cookie came out of the moon cake.
Grace:And when, uh, during the Mongol Rule, which we talked about earlier, uh, during the Mongol Rule, when Chinese people actually smuggled messages inside moon cakes so that they could actually revolt against their Mongol overlords.
Grace:So, uh, so you could see there's many different, uh, to of the Fortune cookies.
Grace:So we don't know.
Grace:quite where it is, though I do think it's probably Japanese.
Bruce:Grace, you are a delight to speak to.
Bruce:I could spend all day talking about the history and myths of Chinese dishes, but they're all in your book, Chinese Menu, the history, myths, and legend behind your favorite foods.
Bruce:Great.
Bruce:Good luck with the book.
Bruce:And thanks for joining me this morning.
Grace:Thanks so much for having me.
Mark:The book is illustrated sort of like a children's book.
Bruce:Every single thing she covers, whether it's general South chicken or chopsticks or tea or rice has a really wonderful illustration.
Bruce:She's.
Bruce:Very talented and very bubbly and very knowledgeable,
Mark:right.
Mark:And I think that that's something, you know, we've done a lot of interviews on this podcast and we've learned that there are people who are super Knowledgeable about things but also not very personable.
Mark:No, we've learned that there are people who are extremely personable some internet Influencers, extremely personal, but they're not actually all that knowledgeable about what they're talking about.
Mark:And then you hit these people like Gracelyn, or we just came off James Park a few weeks ago for Chili Crisp, and they're heavily knowledgeable and personable, which is an amazing combination.
Bruce:And a delight to speak to.
Bruce:These, I could just speak to them for hours.
Bruce:So that was a fabulous interview and we're going to come up on segment three.
Mark:On segment three, it is our traditional answer to the question, what's making us happy in food this week?
Mark:And I'm going to go first and say that we just are recording this slightly after Rosh Hashanah and we had a giant New Year's feast here.
Mark:I realized this is dropping as an episode after Rosh Hashanah.
Mark:But my gosh, Bruce made a turban challah, a challah that is round and sort of in the shape of a turban.
Mark:That was and
Mark:honey, and we were dipping it in honey.
Mark:Some people were And that challah, I kept saying, it's like cake.
Mark:I'm having a piece of cake.
Mark:It wasn't sweet, it was just the texture.
Mark:It was so firm and delicious.
Mark:I'm tender, but it held as a slice really well.
Bruce:I was so proud of that and I have to say that part of why that challah works so well is I am fortunate to have a 10 quart Instant Pot from the days when we were doing our Instant Pot books.
Mark:You may know that we wrote the Instant Pot Bible and Instant Pot Bible Next Generation and we at one point had about 20, no I'm not lying, about 20 Instant Pots in our house.
Bruce:And I've kept six of them and one of them is the 10 quart and I love it because it's big enough to hold a large mixing bowl on a rack and still put the cover on it.
Bruce:So when I bake bread, especially challah, which is an enriched bread with eggs and oil in it, I put the rack in the bottom of the ten quart, I pour some boiling water, I set the machine on yogurt, which keeps it at a steady hundred, hundred and twenty degrees, I put my bowl of dough in and I cover it.
Bruce:It's the perfect, perfect proofing box.
Mark:You cover the bowl with plastic wrap?
Mark:I
Bruce:don't even cover the bowl because it's so moist.
Bruce:See the grammarian here.
Bruce:You want to,
Mark:you cover the pot.
Bruce:I cover the pot and it's a perfect moist environment.
Bruce:It is the most perfect proofing box, and I do believe that by upping my proofing game like that, I have improved my home.
Mark:And I
Mark:should say that Bruce has a proofing setting on his oven, and he thinks this is better than the proofing setting on his oven, his 10 quart Instant Pot with a little boiling water in the bottom.
Mark:And obviously, you don't close the pressure valve.
Mark:You leave it open.
Bruce:I leave that open on purpose.
Bruce:The oven is great at holding a temperature of 100 degrees, but it's not a moist environment.
Bruce:Even if I find I put a bowl of water in there, it's not as moist as that enclosed, hermetically sealed Instant Pot.
Bruce:With the pressure gauge open.
Bruce:With the pressure gauge open.
Bruce:And then after I shaped the round challah.
Bruce:I put that back in there, too, on the rack and let it rise there,
Mark:which means you have to have it essentially to the shape of a 10 court.
Mark:Now, if you don't know, 10 court and spot is a giant instant pot.
Mark:I mean, really, honestly, can feed crowds with this thing.
Mark:So it's huge.
Mark:Okay, so that's what's making me happy.
Mark:And for this week,
Bruce:what's making me happy food this week was from the same meal.
Bruce:And believe it or not, Matzah balls made me happy.
Bruce:Oh, your matzah balls.
Bruce:I grew up in a family of Jewish cooks, most of them bad.
Bruce:And so the matzah balls were leaden cannonballs that sank in the pot.
Bruce:You chewed them, you hoped you didn't pull your fillings out.
Bruce:You got constipated for two weeks.
Bruce:They were disgusting.
Bruce:My matzo balls were light, and fluffy, and delicious, and the trick I discovered, don't make them ahead.
Bruce:Why does everyone in my family like to think it's good to make the food ahead and reheat it?
Mark:It's so gross, but the thing that grosses me out is when August rolls around, and people inevitably in our lives say, Oh, the brisket's done for Rosh Hashanah, it's in the freezer.
Mark:And I always think to myself, oh great, we're going to have Brisket oatmeal, because by the time it has cooked, it's a braised brisket in Jewish tradition, in American Jewish tradition, and it's a braised brisket.
Mark:And by the time it's cooked and then frozen and then thawed and reheated, it has no texture left to it.
Bruce:It's just mush.
Bruce:And the same thing with matzo balls.
Bruce:If you make them a week in advance and then you reheat them, they never re fluff.
Bruce:So I cook them.
Bruce:Right to order.
Bruce:Now, I also have to say, Mom, if you're listening, you're a good cook.
Bruce:I was referring to your mother and your mother in law.
Bruce:My grandmothers were terrible cooks.
Bruce:My mother's a good cook.
Bruce:So let me get that out of the way.
Bruce:So my matzo balls were really good.
Mark:They were unbelievably light.
Mark:It was, they were honestly cloud light.
Mark:And you know, if you know matzo ball soup.
Mark:You know, they can be like torpedoes and they are incredibly dense and gross.
Mark:And sometimes in really gross matzo ball soup, they sink in the bowl.
Mark:They don't even float in the bowl.
Bruce:And you need a knife to cut them.
Bruce:One of the guests at our, at our Rosh Hashanah dinner this week said that she used to go to a Seder every year in Passover and the person there offered two kinds of matzo balls.
Mark:He made light, fluffy ones.
Mark:And dense hard ones and you had your choice because some people like those hard ones.
Mark:They do.
Mark:Not me.
Mark:I like the really soft cloud like ones.
Mark:It was delicious.
Mark:I love the challah.
Mark:I love the matzo balls.
Mark:It was a carb fest all the way out.
Mark:Anyway, so that's our podcast for this week.
Mark:We are certainly glad that you joined us.
Mark:Let me say that it would be terrific if you could give this podcast a rating.
Mark:If you can somehow stick a rating on this podcast, that would be fabulous.
Mark:Let me also say that we have a semi weekly newsletter.
Mark:You can.
Mark:Find that newsletter on our website, bruceandmark.
Mark:com.
Mark:And there's a signup form there.
Mark:I do not collect your email.
Mark:So I have no clue whether I just see a number one person signed up this week, three people signed up this week, but I don't capture your email on purpose so that you can retain your privacy and you can.
Mark:Always re you know, uh, what do I wanna say?
Mark:You can always get off the mail list.
Mark:You always back at it, right?
Mark:Because there's always a, a button at the bottom that allows you to unsubscribe.
Mark:So again, I don't capture you, so I can't sell your email.
Mark:It's totally private.
Mark:But if you would like to have a bar semi-weekly, so amount like that newsletter cooking free and mark, that would be terrific.
Mark:And you can find it on our website, bruce and mark.com.
Bruce:You can also find cooking with Bruce and Mark on Facebook.
Bruce:We have a group.
Bruce:You could join the group.
Bruce:You can show us pictures of your matzo balls and your challah, because we'd love to share recipes and see what you're eating and see what's making you happy in food this week.
Bruce:And we will present another episode next week of Cooking with
Bruce:Bruce and Mark.
