Table of contents for 2018 Vol. 4 in SAVEUR

NORTH AMERICA 1. TOTOLAC, MEXICO Challah-like pan de fiesta, p. 20 2. REMSEN, NEW YORK Cooking with local lard, p. 23 3. THE CAROLINAS Heirloom rice bread, p. 26 4. QUEBEC, CANADA A colossal meat pie, p. 42 5. VERACRUZ, MEXICO Peanut-studded palanquetas, p. 50 6. SAVANNAH, GEORGIA Benne seed brittle, p. 50 7. WHITE HALL, VIRGINIA Inspired by country stores, p. 62 8. LANCASTER, PENNSYLVANIA An ode to lemon chiffon pie, p. 78 9. COBÁN, GUATEMALA Behind the cardamom harvest, p. 82 SOUTH AMERICA 10. CUSCO, PERU Daily bread at the market 11. BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA Grilled cheese bread EUROPE 12. MOSCOW, RUSSIA Multi-layered Napoleons, p. 27 13. GERMANY The origins of crumb cake, p. 34 14. LONDON, ENGLAND Traditional steamed pudding, p. 46 15. MURCIA, SPAIN Baking with…

WHEN DAVID CUAPIO’S GREAT-grandfather started making bread in the early 1900s, San Juan Totolac was just a tiny hillside village. He and his family would make their dough from wheat ground at the Spanish mill up the hill, mix in a little lard and piloncillo (unrefined cane sugar), and leaven the dough with pulque, a mildly alcoholic beverage made from the fermented sap of agave plants, which once proliferated in the region. They would load their bread into wooden crates, strap them to the backs of mules, and sell the loaves at whichever nearby village or town was celebrating a festival, usually tied to the local Catholic patron saint. Their customers called it pan de pulque, pan de burro (mule bread), or pan de feria (fair bread). In Totolac, they…

In Russia, where Christmas was banned in 1928 during Bolshevik rule and not reinstated until 1991, New Year’s Eve has long been the biggest celebration of the year. Russians put up decorative trees and prepare opulent feasts. And a towering Napoleon cake, often home-baked, is the highlight of the evening. In 1912, periodicals described a new pastry being prepared to celebrate the 100-year anniversary of Napoleon’s defeat. Inspired by the French mille-feuille, the single-serving triangles were filled with vanilla pastry cream and shaped to resemble the defeated emperor’s hat. The name stuck, but the cake has changed alongside Russia’s politics and economy. After the 1917 revolution, for example, elaborate desserts were branded “bourgeois,” and food shortages forced home cooks to adjust their recipes. Margarine replaced butter, rendering the previously delicate…

MEAT PIES FROM CANADA’S Quebec province, called tourtières, are thought of much like homemade pot roast is Stateside: a simple and satisfying dish for Sunday dinner, but one that can also anchor a celebration. While the humble tourtière reigns in Montreal, its country cousin, cipaille, is more dramatic. Cipaille’s deep-dish pastry is filled with game meats and the flavors of medieval France: cinnamon, clove, allspice, and nutmeg. The origins of this imposing pie are murky: Some argue its Anglo nautical heritage, comparing it to early published recipes for “sea pie,” which was developed to feed a literal boatload of British sailors. Others claim that the name refers to the traditional six layers of pastry and meats, with roots in the court of Catherine de’ Medici. Whatever its true origin, today…

Wyant’s Store is located in White Hall, Virginia, a town with a population just shy of 700, surrounded by farms and vineyards. The ancient clapboard building practically teeters on the side of a country road near the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Outside, there’s a lone time-warp gas pump. Inside, there are shelves of pantry staples—yellow mustard, evaporated milk—a few tables with folding chairs, and a menu that lists country-ham sandwiches and specials like smothered pork and cheeseburger “mac.” Opened by Adam Wyant in 1888, and still run by the Wyant family, the store hosts a group of locals practically every day for a meeting of what they have dubbed “The Liars Club,” a cover under which they can swap stories and trade tender insults over sausage biscuits and…

BEFORE WE CAN SEE THE cardamom plants, Amilcar Pereira and his men have to castrate the bulls. That morning, in a pickup truck on the bumpy mountain climb to the cloud forests of Guatemala’s Alta Verapaz, I was privy to Pereira the theologian. Our discussion about his new export company, 786 Gexsa, prompted a half-hour sermon on the roles of god and personal responsibility in family and commerce. He named his first business FedeAgro, a portmanteau of the Spanish words for faith and agriculture. “They’re both tiny things that get bigger.” But now it’s time for Pereira the cowboy—lasso, hat, pistol. He directs his crew to corner a bull and tosses a rope over its horns. A few more lassos and the bull is down, legs outstretched, suddenly silent and…

“I WAS NEVER ALLOWED TO HAVE PIGS GROWING UP,” said Jennifer Romer of Slate Creek Farm in northern New York, as she slid ground pork fat into her oven to render. “My dad didn’t like them, so he always said no.” Romer grew up on a second-generation farm in sunny Central California. Now a homesteader who owns a vintage Sunbeam deep fryer and collects wire bail Ball canning jars, Romer also breeds Yorkshire, Duroc, and Hampshire pigs on sunflower-filled pastures above the Steuben Valley. It’s a harsh region north of Utica, home to a strong “waste nothing” hardscrabble ethic. Romer adjusted the oven temperature to 225°F and stirred the pan with a wooden spoon. “This is three pigs’ worth of leaf lard,” she said. “I’m breaking it apart to move…

BENEATH THE STREUSEL, German crumb cakes often have a layer of colorful fruit. “[It] can vary in different seasons,” Schuhbeck says, noting that apples, cherries, apricots, and prunes are popular. According to Beranbaum, adding fruit sparingly is key—a little moistens the cake, but too much causes sogginess. (She also suggests cutting larger fruits thick enough to retain a little bite.) At 20th Century Cafe, Polzine adds nuts to the crumb to complement the fruits. “Walnuts are so good with apple,” she says. “Or black walnuts with huckleberries, pistachios with apricots—just pair things you like.” Season the fruit separately, tossing with sugar, spices, or salt as needed. Cranberry Crumb Cake with Almonds and Oats SERVES 12 Active: 1 hr. Total: 2 hr. 10 min. (plus cooling) Fresh cranberries tenderize in the…

NEARLY EVERY CUISINE has at least one brittle to boast about. Crunchy, sweet, and quick to throw together, the candy comes in an endless array of textures and flavors. In Mexico, bricks of unrefined sugarcane give palanquetas a deep amber color and a chewy consistency. In India, peanut-studded chikkis are made with rich, caramel-colored jaggery. And in Peru, chancaca, a cane syrup often scented with citrus and cinnamon, brings that aroma to turrón packed with nuts or quinoa. At its simplest, a batch of brittle requires little more than melting sugar to a specified temperature and letting it set. The result is a glossy treat that shatters between your teeth before melting in your mouth. In China, cooks swirl the plain golden candy into intricate designs, like dragons and phoenixes,…

Salt-Baked Cornish Game Hens with Shallots and Orange Sauce SERVES 4 Active: 50 min. • Total: 1 hr. 30 min. Stuffing these petite birds with winter herbs creates an aromatic steam that flavors the meat as it cooks. A second round of roasting and a layer of sauce leaves them juicy and sweet. FOR THE HENS: Four 1-lb. Cornish game hensFreshly ground black pepper2 cups herbs, such as parsley, thyme, rosemary, and sage, chopped6 lb. (19½ cups) coarse sea salt or coarse kosher salt4 large egg whites20 medium shallots FOR THE ORANGE SAUCE: 2 medium shallots, peeled and finely chopped¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil1 Tbsp. all-purpose flour1 cup orange juice1 cinnamon stick 1 Preheat the oven to 425°F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with foil. 2 Prepare the hens: Rinse…

It always smells like Christmas in Pinerolo. Whatever the month, visitors to this little Piedmontese town 30 miles southwest of Turin are greeted by the season’s essential olfactory cues as soon as they arrive—baking spices, candied fruit, the slow rise of buttery dough. These seem to be in the very pores of the place, and it’s no wonder: Since 1922, Pinerolo has been home to Galup, a bakery-factory that specializes in northern Italian enriched breads, an operation that defines this small town—from its aroma to its employment options. It is mid-November, and the area’s smaller bakeries have just begun their year’s panettone making, readying for the seasonal wave of customers. But Galup has kept a steady pace—they make panettone (and other enriched breads, like pandoro and colomba di pasqua) year-round,…

1 Panettone Peddlers Mail-order options from these six producers restore panettone’s good name PANETTONE IS A PECULIAR HOLIDAY TRADITION. Beloved by some, it’s written off by others for the grocery-store versions that are so often cloying and dense, and filled with artificially dyed fruits. And yet a properly made panettone can transcend its middling reputation. (See “Panettone Town,” p. 72.) While some of the best breads rarely leave their remote Italian villages, these six stellar producers have made their loaves available to an international audience. —Alex Testere 1 RUSTICHELLA D’ABRUZZO Made by one of Italy’s best-regarded gourmet food brands, these hand-wrapped panettoni come in several different flavors, including the classic citrus and raisin, dried fig and chocolate, saffron and Sicilian orange, and black cherry. From $22; casa rustichellain.com 2 MANRESA…

YOU HEAR THEM long before you see them. The lanes off Charminar, the sepia-toned arch in Old City that defines Hyderabad’s skyline, pulse with the energy of thousands of people on a thousand missions: some browsing for bangles, others dealing delicate crystal bottles of ittar perfume, many simply searching for a good plate of biryani. But if you listen closely, amid the honking rickshaws and entreaties of women bargaining for lace, you can hear a measured beat: tak-tak-tak-tak, tak-tak-tak-tak. In a handful of workshops—most so tiny that you’d miss them entirely if you sneezed while walking past—workers hammer at slender, nondescript booklets, creating a percussive clattering. All day long, karigars, or artisans, pound cubes of silver into warq, the whisper-thin silver leaf traditionally draped on dishes in Hyderabad and beyond.…

FOR MANY OF ITS FANS, CRUMB cake is a time machine back to childhood. A thick square—even a packaged one—dusted with powdered sugar was a treat you could ask for at any time of day. “That topping on the Hostess crumb cake—I’ve always been obsessed with it,” says Michelle Polzine, who re-created a similar golden crumb at her Central European–leaning 20th Century Cafe in San Francisco. Baker Rose Levy Beranbaum, author of Rose’s Baking Basics, gleefully recounts discovering Drake’s crumb cakes in college. “I still love crumb cake as one of my top cakes,” she says. My own first was Entenmann’s, in a windowed box through which I could see the buttery crumbs. “It’s easy to make your own ‘house’ version,” says Dorie Greenspan, baker and author of Everyday Dorie.…

ALTHOUGH CONSERVATIVE BAKERS WILL TELL YOU NEVER TO mess with a cake recipe, crumb cake’s eggy, resilient batter can be added to and marbled with other flavors with minimal risk. The easiest add-in is unsweetened cocoa powder, which you can simply stir in to the classic batter. Or, to add a ribbon of flavor, stir in a small amount of apple butter, lemon curd, or seasoned pumpkin purée, cooked down to remove excess moisture and cooled. Chocolate-Pistachio Crumb Cake SERVES 12 Active: 1 hr. 5 min. Total: 2 hr. 5 min. (plus cooling) A little unsweetened cocoa powder in the topping and batter goes a long way to transform a classic crumb cake into a deeply chocolaty treat (that’s still tame enough for breakfast). Raw, unsalted pistachios add a gleam…

Whole fish are ideal for salt baking; the intact skin and head helps prevent too much salt contact with the meat, instead keeping it tender and moist. ON THE EDGE OF SAN PEDRO DEL PINATAR, a fishing village in the Murcia region of Spain’s Mediterranean coast, a vast, irregular grid of salt flats juts out into the sea. Seawater floods them each spring, then evaporates each summer, when workers come to rake out the white- and pink-tinged crystals and pile them in glistening mounds to dry in the sun. These salt flats, or salinas, were created during the Roman Empire and have been in use ever since, providing sal to help season, conserve, and even bake—as is the case for one of Murcia’s most famous dishes, dorada a la sal.…

Salt-Baked Shrimp with Caper Sofrito SERVES 4 Total: 1 hr. 20 min. Small green alcaparras—the edible flower buds of the caper bush—grow in abundance on the island of Menorca. Salt-cured and then stored in vinegar, they find their way into many local dishes. FOR THE SOFRITO: 6–8 medium ripe plum tomatoes (1½ lb.), or substitute drained canned plum tomatoes3 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil1 medium onion (6 oz.), finely choppedKosher salt1 medium garlic clove, minced (1 tsp.)¼ cup drained and rinsed capers in brine (1⅓ oz.) FOR THE SHRIMP: 16 shell- and head-on extra-large shrimp (2½ lb.)5 lb. (13½ cups) coarse sea salt or coarse kosher salt1 Tbsp. coarsely ground black pepper3 large egg whites 1 Prepare the tomatoes: If using fresh tomatoes, cut them in half crosswise. Scoop the seeds…

First, let me be clear: A lemon chiffon pie is not the same as a lemon meringue pie. You’ve probably had the latter—a baked custard capped with a stiff topping made of egg whites and sugar that’s toasted on top. Lemon chiffon is more like a mousse: There are still whipped egg whites, but you fold them into a sweet, tart curd, making for an airier, creamier pie. Then the whole thing is topped with whipped cream. “I think it’s much better than lemon meringue,” my mother said recently. We were in her kitchen, with my grandmother’s recipe laid out in front of us on the table. Lemon chiffon was my grandmother Mary Imm’s specialty at the restaurant she and my grandfather Albert owned and ran in the 1950s. It…