Category Archives: New Products

The Joys of Boston Coffee Cake

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Moist, buttery and full of cinnamon, it's hard to beat an old-fashioned coffee cake.

Moist, buttery and full of cinnamon, it’s hard to beat an old-fashioned coffee cake.

 

It’s a good day when cake arrives in the mail unexpectedly.

I have friend and loyal Food Gal reader Abby to thank for the sugary surprise that arrived on my doorstep last week.

Having spent a summer in Boston interning at The Globe many years ago, I was quite familiar with Boston cream pie, which of course, is not pie at all, but custard-filled cake smothered in chocolate glaze.

But Boston Coffee Cake was new to me. And it is indeed cake.

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Tahini — Going For A Sweet Spin

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Tender, buttery shortbread made with tahini.

Tender, buttery shortbread made with tahini.

 

We use tahini liberally in hummus and salad dressings.

But why not take it for a spin in a sweet preparation?

After all, peanut butter swings both ways, in sweet and in savory dishes. With tahini being ground up sesame seeds, it has a beguiling nuttiness that also makes it quite versatile.

“Tahini Shortbread Cookies” does it justice in sandy, melt-in-your-mouth, buttery cookies that have the merest whisper of sweetness.

SoframizCookbook

The recipe is from “Soframiz” (Ten Speed Press, 2016) by Ana Sortun and Maura Kilpatrick of Sofra Bakery and Cafe in Cambridge, MA. Sortun, a James Beard “Best Chef in the Northeast” for Oleana restaurant in Cambridge, and Kilpatrick, who was named “Best Pastry Chef” by Boston magazine, showcase 100 recipes of both sweet and savory offerings at their popular modern Middle Eastern cafe.

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Let Michael Mina Jazz Up Your Backyard Burgers

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Home-made bison burger flavored with the new Bourbon Pub burger seasoning.

Home-made bison burger flavored with the new Bourbon Pub burger seasoning.

 

Bay Area Chef Michael Mina has so many restaurants around the country now that I can hardly keep track of them all. Now, he’s bringing a taste of his Bourbon Pub in Santa Clara to your backyard barbecues with his new line of burger seasonings and relishes sold at Williams-Sonoma.

I had a chance to sample one of the seasonings, the Classic.

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Dolce Delizioso — Loacker Wafer Cookies

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Loacker's Classic Chocolate.

Loacker’s Classic Chocolate.

 

It’s not often that I eat mass-produced, grocery-store cookies, preferring instead to visit an honest-go-goodness neighborhood bakery for just-baked treats. But I do make exceptions for Australian Tim Tams, and French La Mere Poulard butter cookies.

I don’t know what it is about foreign packaged cookies, but they are pretty irresistible.

Now comes Loacker wafer cookies.

First created by the Loacker family in the Italian Alps, and now manufactured in Austria, these multi-layered cookies are now more readily available in the United States. They have been made for more than 90 years, and are already sold in more than 80 countries.

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California’s Olive Queen Olive Oil

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You might just feel like a queen when you taste the Olive Queen's extra virgin olive oils.

You might just feel like a queen when you taste the Olive Queen’s extra virgin olive oils.

 

California produces 3.5 million gallons of extra virgin olive oil annually from more than 400 growers/producers, according to the California Olive Oil Council.

Rob Akins and Mark Berry of Olive Queen Olive Oil in Forestville are among the smaller growers. But they make up for that in quality. The oils they produce are exceptional, as I found out when they sent me some samples to try.

Akins and Berry moved from Southern California to Sonoma County to buy an old, forlorn apple orchard, which they replanted with olive trees.

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