I have written exhaustively about my perspective on time hurdling towards you rather than away from you, and every time I turn around I see just how accurate that feels; I remember nothing of the future and long for everything of the past. The important things seem to be behind me and getting further all the time.

As much as I want to return to Southeast Asia, to feel the sun on my skin and taste and feel it all for the first time again, I know I can’t recreate what was. I can’t make the same dish twice, no matter how carefully I measure the ingredients or retrace the recipe; the moment has changed, and so have I. So, instead of chasing the exact taste of the past, I take the crux of the dish and rework it into something new: something unfamiliar and exciting, made from the same ingredients but existing in the present.

After two months away, I was absolutely thrilled to get back to baking. To say that I was inspired while abroad would be an understatement. Here are some destinations I visited and the desserts they inspired, whose recipes will be coming soon:

1. Hanoi, Vietnam

As the second-largest coffee producer in the world, Vietnam is bound to serve some creative cups. There’s the classic, sweetened with condensed milk; refreshing cold coconut cà phê dừa with coffee poured over coconut slush, and even cà phê muối or salt coffee topped with a salty-savory foam. Arguably the most iconic, though, is Hanoi’s famous cà phê trứng, or egg coffee, with a whipped foam of egg yolks, sugar, and condensed milk, invented—as all good things are—from necessity, due to wartime milk shortages.

You can find cà phê trứng in nearly every café in Hanoi (of which there are plenty). Surrounded by this ingenious combination of creamy, rich egg yolks and deep, bitter robusta coffee, I was inspired to make flan—but of course, I couldn’t stop there. This is a yolk-enriched sweet brioche bun baked with creamy espresso pastry cream and topped with an all-yolk espresso flan. The recipe uses over an entire carton’s worth of egg yolks, but luckily I had a significant amount that I needed to use up after some other recipe testing I was doing. And I must say: for this decadent dessert, it is entirely worth it.

2. Hong Kong, China

Unlike Vietnam, Hong Kong is known for a different style of café: the cha chaan teng. Rather than coffee, these casual cafés serve tea with your meal, which should always feature a warm bolo bao (pineapple bun) filled with a slab of cold butter.

Although I can’t recreate the short, curt service and fluorescent-lit charm of a cha chaan teng in my own kitchen, I still want to start my morning with the comforting flavors served in the iconic cafés. The combination of a sweet and crackly crust against a pillowy bun inspired these bolo bao muffins, which are additionally filled with a creamy salted egg custard center.

3. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Another country, another breakfast. Malaysia’s kopitiams offer an unconventional yet ingenious meal: strong kopi, kaya toast, and soft-boiled eggs. Kaya is a coconut and pandan jam, fragrant and rich with a custardy sweetness that makes it especially addictive.

I’m a sucker for anything pandan-flavored, and the fragrant kaya and salted butter, sandwiched between two thin toasts is unassuming but incredible. As with the other dishes on this trip, I didn’t want to just recreate this breakfast exactly, as much as I wish I could chase the flavors and feelings of an early-morning kopitiam breakfast. This cake is admittedly a much more extravagant way to showcase the flavors of kaya than to simply slather it between slices of bread and butter, with kaya jam and pandan kaya mousse instead sandwiched between two layers of coconut cake, all covered in a fluffy frosting and shredded coconut.

4. Taipei, Taiwan

We’ve had egg coffee in Hanoi, hot tea in Hong Kong, and strong kopi in Kuala Lumpur; now, we’re in Taiwan for a new breakfast drink—cold, creamy soymilk.

That same soymilk is the foundation for douhua, or tofu pudding, one of Taiwan’s most beloved sweet treats which can be found across China and even in Vietnam. Silken and delicate, it’s typically served with a sweet ginger syrup or chewy mochi toppings, and its subtle soybean flavor is remarkably comforting. I wanted to take that softness and transform it into something decidedly less traditional: a tofu pudding cheesecake. The gingersnap base perfectly complements the soft, melt-in-your-mouth chunks of tofu cheesecake, suspended in a lightly sweet ginger jelly.

This recipe (along with the others) will come in later articles, but for now, there’s one more destination…

6. Siem Reap, Cambodia

Rather than any particular dish, it was the vibrant color of the lotus flowers in Siem Reap that inspired this dessert. Their brilliant pinks and delicate gradients were impossible to miss, blooming and blossoming from the water, their petals unfurling in layers of color.

Lychee is a similarly pink fruit, with a similarly delicate flavor. Its gentle aroma is easily lost when baked, but this plush loaf cake features an ample amount of lychee juice as well as a crackly lychee glaze, which preserves its floral fragrance and bright, fruity sweetness. The result is a moist, soft cake that is delicate without being muted, with enough lychee to make its presence unmistakable.

Lychee Loaf Cake

Ready in 2-3 hours. Serves 1 9x5” loaf.

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Why, then, now that my universe has shrunk back to the suburbs of North America, does it feel so terribly cold in the absence of the expanse of Southeast Asia’s summer sun? Does this not defy the laws of thermodynamics? Should this smaller space not send cells striking, singing with each collision?

If (lovingly) lawless Hanoi was maximum disorder, then I suppose that these rows of clean-cut lawns must be the scattered particles in the dark expanse of the end of the world.

And yet I am so glad to be home.

Returning home, I stand slicing end-of-summer strawberries under the long sideways cast of sunrise through the windows. This is no lentil soup, but to me it’s still a kind of comfort food. After over two months of travel, I return to my usual life, begin again. I am better this time. I will be better.

My kitchen is undergoing renovations for the first time since I was born. I have baby pictures at these same countertops, memories of these same smooth tile floors under every shoe size I have ever worn. I received news of college acceptances here, alone under the computer glow. I received news of my grandmother’s death here, my parents standing across the kitchen island, voices soft and shaky. I celebrated nearly every birthday here, one to twenty.

It’s a bit jarring, seeing a wall blown out and cabinets missing, but it’s been done to let the light in. Later, we will replace the countertops, rearrange some shelving, be rid of grout and grime. Begin again the story of the kitchen. New memories to be made, a clean slate.

August is the final sunset of summer, the perfect golden glow of every beautiful piece of peak-summer produce bowing out. A grand finale: each sun-yellow, juicy peach and nectarine has all of summer’s best memories spilling out, running rivulets down your arm. The melons split their thick shells open and reveal the brightness within. There’s sweet corn and tomatoes, quintessential summer, alongside early autumn’s apples and pears.

You can have it all. (“You may do this, I tell you, it is permitted—”)

In anticipation of the upcoming semester, or whatever you may be returning to after your time in the sun, allow yourself to bend to the changes. Whatever happened last year cannot touch us, and whatever will happen—will happen. Allow the walls to come down, let the light in.

Treat yourself to something a bit decadent. These tiramisu brownies, like August, are at the junction of bright summer’s lightness and autumn’s heavy weight. The fluffy ladyfingers and tangy frosting and the deep and fudgy brownie pair perfectly for a delicious intersection of two desserts.

(The recipe includes homemade small-batch ladyfingers, but you can also just buy some. Keep it simple, or kill some time. Whatever you want.)

Tiramisu Brownies

Ready in 2 hours, plus chilling. Serves 1 9”x7” or 8”x8” pan.

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I will dearly, dearly miss Vietnam. There is a sense of belonging here, for me, even though I was born and raised in the United States and am only half-Vietnamese and only half-speak the language. Last night I cut into a perfect green mango and ate it smothered in muối ô mai—a salty plum and tamarind chili seasoning—and I know now that there are parts of yourself that are scattered all around the world, and you absolutely have to go in order to find them. Go anywhere. Discover and see and experience and taste as much as you possibly can.

In light of all that seeing, I haven’t had much of a chance to write about it all, but I do still want to give you a recipe. More posts about Manila (hint: ube), Hong Kong, and more are on their way to your inboxes, so stay tuned for exciting new recipes in the weeks to come!

Thank you, as always, for reading. I hope you enjoy this recipe, too.

Earl Grey Blackberry Cheesecake Muffins

Ready in 2 hours. Serves 9 jumbo muffins.

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Color crawls into every corner, slips onto every street. Newlyweds pose for pictures in a pale pink palace, the bride’s lace trim somehow still standing out against the crisp white interior walls. Waiters dish a motley spread of curries onto a bright green banana leaf, patrons’ orange oil-stained fingertips dipping and pinching and pushing. A red-and-gold temple shines at the top of a hill against a wide and empty sky during blue hour. LED lights stretch across a bridge at night, illuminating the overpass. There is the rainbow of color, the rainbow of people, the rainbow of desserts.

The onslaught of rain that christened my arrival seemed to reveal the world’s largest rainbow. As the clouds parted and the skies cleared on my first full day in Malaysia, I stepped into a pop art piece.

The desserts of Kuala Lumpur are almost as colorful as the city itself. Between gilded temple roofs, vibrant street murals, and bustling markets, trays of jewel-toned kuih add another splash of color to the landscape. Each tiny sweet is its own little bite-sized work of art.

If you asked me to name one place where you could eat a different dessert every day for months, Malaysia would be high on the list. The country is home to a rainbow of unique sweets. Across Malaysia and neighboring Singapore and Indonesia, you’ll find an incredible range of desserts that blend indigenous traditions with Chinese, Indian, Arab, and European influences, creating one of the richest and most diverse dessert cultures anywhere. Kuih is the Malaysian word for these bite-sized snacks and sweets: a vibrant collection of steamed, baked, fried, and layered delicacies.

Of course, no Malaysian dessert spread feels complete without something warm to drink. Whether it’s kaya toast and soft-boiled eggs at breakfast or a plate of pandan kuih in the afternoon, chances are it’s paired with either teh tarik or a strong cup of Malaysian kopi. Teh tarik, literally “pulled tea,” is made by pouring hot black tea and sweetened condensed milk back and forth between two vessels, creating its signature frothy top and silky texture. Malaysian kopi, often brewed from beans roasted with butter or margarine and served sweetened with condensed or evaporated milk, offers a richer, more caramelized counterpart. Together, these drinks reflect the same cultural blending found in Malaysia’s desserts, where everyday ingredients like tea, coffee, and condensed milk have become beloved staples.

Similar tea traditions, this time hailing from Thailand, inspired these Thai tea condensed milk scones. They're a bit of a cross-cultural mash-up: buttery, tender, and soft scone dough is infused with the warm spice and vanilla notes of Thai tea, then filled with sweetened condensed milk that bubbles and spreads during baking for a caramel sweetness reminiscent of the creamy condensed milk-sweetened drinks served across Southeast Asia. They're perfect with a hot cup of tea, or, naturally, a glass of frothy teh tarik.

Thai Tea Condensed Milk Scones

Ready in 30 minutes. Serves 6 large scones.

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Outside, the sun beats down on the unprepared Occident, and as I cross a busy street beside a figure shrouded in a UV-proof robe down to their fingertips, I become acutely aware of the sweat accumulating in the waistband of my shorts. The forecast calls for thunderstorms all week which I know without checking because the clouds are a deep grey-blue and the air is thick with electricity and ghosts.

Two days after I land, my ears are still popped. A sinus infection, my mother says, but I had not been concerned which maybe is concerning. Everything is muffled and my voice comes out rough and nasally, which makes speaking even harder than it has already been. My average words per day are “thank you” x5, sometimes in more languages than one, and “sorry,” and that is usually all. I always clear my throat before speaking to avoid the voice cracks of disuse. As with most maladies, I ignore signs of potential illness until it goes away.

As I meander across Asia, a Japanese man tries burnt ends and brisket in Texas while the comment section warns him of gout. Ranch dressing makes the news—the World Cup seems to be something we drink it out of. Perusing a grocery aisle with only six varieties of soda and practically no cereal, my mouth misses Mountain Dew, and a Brit in Buc-ee’s taste tests ten types of beef jerky. I am just glad that they are having fun. I navigate to my next location, the optimal path expanding over my Google Maps like yarn unspooling.

Summer strips us of routine, shakes out any semblance of schedule. I do not do well with too much free time, which I know from time spent analyzing it. Every summer, the abyss of the afternoon is appealing at first, the long stretch of empty calendar days. Start by making a bucket list, check off an item or two. Do the laundry. Doomscroll for a few hours, maybe. Soon the mornings succumb to sleep, then the early afternoons, then the time of the year with the longest days suddenly slips into mere minutes. A lack of routine, I find, is a dangerous game.

I am now running across the world with time pooling in the soles of my summer shoes. Mary Oliver asks, in a poem aptly titled “The Summer Day,” what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

In the eye of the next big city, there is a strange and not entirely unwelcome quiet. (It is not just the sinus infection.)

There is an invisible barrier between me and the world. The bubble of popped ears, the peeling open of a mouth dried shut. I am always looking outside myself, eyes blown wide and staring, perpetually, and every object is impermanent. In the midst of a loneliness epidemic, I have been alone for a rather long time and am unafflicted by signs of infection.

Or perhaps I am just unconcerned. Is this something I can ignore until it just goes away? Or will loneliness proliferate, webbing through the veins under my skin and entangling itself permanently? I watch messages ping through my friends’ group chat, auto-scrolling down down down as I say nothing. I find a building emblazoned with the same name as X and take a photo that is never sent. I spend an entire bus ride working up the courage to compliment a woman’s long silk skirt, translating it back and forth between languages until the bus stops and she steps off. Perhaps loneliness is not a strain of disease that the body can fight on its own—I go out into the world, I look for answers, I phone a friend.

What do you call it, freedom or loneliness? (Bukowski). My answer tends toward the former, and spares no sympathy for the latter.

The alone-ness does not deteriorate into loneliness. Consider it a silent retreat, or a nascent form of hermitude. I am really quite happy.

The heat of summer is a bell curve. A sharp improvement in the first few sunny days, then dwindling optimization as the sweat becomes uncomfortable and makes the body yearn for AC. And yet the summer sun seems to be soaking through the produce, sweetening it.

The markets I currently have access to offer much different produce than back home, and, even moreso than visitors’ praise of the food during the World Cup, the shelves of fresh berries and tomatoes back home give me a strange sense of patriotism. Here, it’s rare to see a strawberry at all, let alone one even remotely as large and juicy as the ones at home. The little punnets of blueberries I see for sale are nearly triple the cost of an entire watermelon. You’ll have to enjoy the summer berries for me—macerate them with a sprinkle of sugar, bake them into a pie or a pastry, scatter them across cream and cake, pluck them right off the vine.

In Southeast Asia, the King of Fruits reaches its peak harvesting season, its sharp green shell splitting open over a sidewalk table, its smell indiscernible from the dumpster nearby. The people crouched on the little plastic stools pick through it with gloved hands like vultures over a rotting carcass. Past the tropical propane, sweated onion smell, it has a custard-like texture, with notes of sweet vanilla and caramel and an undertone of savory meat and garlic. Take a bite of the steak smothered in onions and the crème brûlée at the same time. Its complexity is at fault for its divisiveness: there are over fifty chemical compounds that amalgamates its aroma.

And perhaps one of my favorite fruit family of all has reached its peak: stone fruits. This almond apricot loaf cake utilizes dried apricots, so we might both be able to bake it, despite the lack of apricots in the Vietnamese grocery stores near me. It’s incredibly plush, with a tight and tender crumb studded with chunks of chewy dried apricot, and the crunchy, toasty almond topping pairs perfectly with the cake’s softness.

Crunchy Almond Apricot Loaf Cake

Ready in 1-2 hours. Serves 1 9” loaf.

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Although I am not technically in Vietnam all this time for leisure, the hustle and heat of Hanoi has made my time thus far feel distinctly tropical-vacation-esque. As I approach the one-month mark, though, it occurs to me that I may have traversed every corner of this big city. I walked along both Hoàn Kiếm and Hồ Tây lakes and saw them under mid-afternoon heat, then saw the sun sink and shatter, sparkling, across their surfaces; watched the shopkeepers unfold tables laden with trinkets, then saw the night market come alive with neon lanterns; ate breakfast with the businessmen, then dinner with the drinkers; mused the Museum of Literature, then the Museum of Ethnology, the Museum of Pottery, the Museum of Women, the Museum of the Old Lady Wrapping Bánh Giò with Wrinkled Hands, the Museum of American Tourists in KFC; counted stars through the cloud cover of rainy season, then breathed in the exhaust and burning charcoal and bong smoke. The hinterlands are home, the fringe are familiar.

A trip within a trip, then. I had a weekend in Ninh Bình, as I mentioned briefly in my last article, which was a lovely, nature-filled change of pace from the city life. This past weekend, though, I traded one city for another and headed to Taipei, Taiwan.

I stayed in Taipei for two-and-a-half days, two nights: a distinctly inadequate amount for such a sprawling city. Admittedly, there were so many things I wanted to do and see and eat that I had to be rather selective and strict with my schedule—which meant a few 6 A.M. wake-ups and a few swift sights, but also the satisfying feeling of maximizing every minute of a short and sweet trip.

[pics]

If there was one thing that got me excited to get out of bed at the crack of dawn, that fueled me for a busy day of exploring and sightseeing, it was a good, hearty Taiwanese breakfast. Taipei may be famous for its night markets, but I quickly became enamored with its mornings. Before the crowds gathered and the afternoon heat settled in, breakfast shops were already humming with activity: office workers grabbing soy milk on their way to work, retirees chatting over wraps or rice.

As a baker, though, my attention was inevitably drawn to the breads. Soft milk breads, flaky pastries, sweet buns stuffed with red bean paste: every soy milk shop offered a range of carbs, breads within breads (bread-ception).

There’s one Taiwanese breakfast spot that’s the most famous of them all: Fu Hang Soy Milk. At 7 A.M., a mere hour and a half after the place opens before sunrise, I still stood in an hour-and-fifteen minute line before even entering the building. Through the wide, open windows into the kitchen, I saw a woman pulling hot 厚餅 (hòu bǐng, or thick flatbread) from a deep, tandoor-style oven. At another station, oil sputtered as 油條 (yóu tiáo, Chinese crullers) emerged golden and crisp from bubbling vats. At a third table, workers deftly stuffed and shaped various other kinds of 餅 (bǐng, a broad category encompassing breads, cakes, pastries, and flatbreads).

Ordinarily, I might have been irritated by such a long wait, but I found myself entranced by the choreography of the production line. The queue moved slowly enough that I could watch each act unfold, start to finish: dough being mixed, rolled, filled, baked, and fried in a continuous rhythm honed by years of repetition.

I ordered a 厚餅夾蛋 (hòu bǐng jiá dàn, or thick bread stuffed with scrambled eggs) alongside a large bowl of their signature cold soy milk. The bread was delightfully warm and fluffy on the inside, with a thick, deeply browned crust along the bottom where the dough had baked directly against the walls of the custom-built tandoor oven. The top glistened, lacquered with a sweet glaze and scattered generously with sesame seeds, catching the morning light as it emerged fresh from the kitchen. Paired with the cool, lightly sweet soy milk, it was a remarkably simple breakfast, each component amassing to a meal that was much greater than the sum of its parts.

There were plenty of other absolutely delicious food stops I made on my trip, but I won't get into all of them here. Taipei rewarded almost every turn with something worth eating, and I could easily fill an entire article with night-market snacks, noodle shops, and soy milk stops alone. But this is a baking blog, not a thorough Taipei itinerary—though, given enough time and reader interest, I could definitely deliver one!

Now, this recipe doesn’t have much to do with Taiwan in the slightest. I wrote these recipes before I had any idea which countries I would end up visiting during my time in Asia. That said, Taipei bears plenty of Japanese influence, a legacy of the island’s history and one that’s still visible in everything from the architecture to the food. So perhaps it’s not entirely inappropriate that today’s recipe is inspired by isobeyaki.

Isobeyaki is a Japanese preparation in which mochi is grilled or toasted, then wrapped in nori and brushed with soy sauce. The combination of savory soy sauce, briny seaweed, and chewy rice cake is simple but deeply satisfying. These scones borrow those same flavors, folding nori into the dough and incorporating a sweet-and-salty soy sauce glaze for a subtle umami richness.

And after spending a weekend waking up early for Taiwanese breakfasts, I can attest that these scones are particularly well-suited to the first meal of the day. Paired with a cup of coffee, tea, or even a glass of soy milk, they’re savory and satisfying enough to fuel a morning of sightseeing, whether you’re exploring a new city or just making it through your commute.

Isobeyaki Scones

Ready in 1-2 hours. Serves 8-9 small scones.

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There is an art to doing it alone: you find your own rhythms and patterns, wandering and exploring at your leisure. You lose yourself, or whatever image was superimposed onto you, removed from stultifying schedules and deadlines and identity pressures. You learn your core values and listen to your unobstructed intuition.

I lost and found myself in the clutter of the city.

Week two in Vietnam, and I have yet to get tired of Vietnamese food.

Back in America, it’s hard to find much beyond the classics: phở, bánh mì, or grilled meat with either bún (vermicelli rice noodles) or cơm (rice). The appetizer menu usually features gỏi cuốn (“spring rolls”) or chả giò (fried “spring rolls”). I can tell you from a lifetime of experience that Eden Center in Falls Church, Virginia has a truly impressive range of authentic and delicious Vietnamese dishes, but outside of the few large Vietnamese diasporas in the U.S., you generally have to know what you’re looking for in order to find the true diversity of the cuisine.

In the heart of Hanoi, you can find a wide range of Vietnamese dishes—still, somehow, one city can’t capture the full breadth of the Northern, Central, and Southern cuisines of Vietnam. If you’re only going to Hanoi, though, dishes you absolutely must try, beyond phở and bánh mì, are bún chả and bánh cuốn, among others. If you’re staying for a while, seek out the lesser-known bánh giò or bánh đúc nóng. Here are some of my favorite spots—so far.

For bún chả: The quintessential dipped-noodle dish, popularized as an American tourist attraction by Obama and Anthony Bourdain’s televised dinner at Bún Chả Hương Liên, right here in Hanoi. From firsthand experience, I can tell you that this particular spot is dramatically overrated—perhaps it was good back when they first came, but quality seems to have dropped as prices and demand rose. The broth lacked flavor, and the nem hải sản (seafood roll) was oleaginous.

If I’m being entirely honest, the very best bún chả I’ve had on my trip so far was not in Hanoi at all, but a two-hour train ride away in beautiful Ninh Bình, a destination I would absolutely not miss if you’re traveling all this way to Vietnam. Ninh Bình is a popular tourist destination, and so naturally the majority of restaurants in the heart of Tam Cốc cater to the Western palette. On my last day, though, I took a Grab (think Vietnam’s Uber equivalent) away from the noise to a little local eatery full of Vietnamese businessmen on lunch break and an assortment of Vietnamese families and longtime residents.

The bún chả there was noticeably different from the version served in Hanoi. Rather than a bowl of broth containing grilled pork belly slices and small pork meatballs, Ninh Bình’s take, known as bún chả quạt, typically features a single large, flat square of grilled minced pork served separately from the dipping sauce. The rice noodles (bún), too, are different: instead of being served loose, the noodles are pressed into sheets called bún lá and cut into neat squares, making them easier to pick up and dip into the savory nước mắm sauce.

At Bún Chả Quạt Ngõ 5, the pork patties are charcoal-grilled to order right at the front of the restaurant. The result is a beautifully charred exterior with crisp edges that give way to a juicy, flavorful interior. The noodles, too, were a highlight, holding their square shape even after being drenched in dipping sauce, and with a springy and bouncy texture that made for a satisfying bite.

If you don’t have time to make the trip to Ninh Bình, there’s no need to worry—bún chả is abundant all around Hanoi, from humble streetside Bún Chả 74 Hàng Quạt to the slightly more upscale Bún Chả Hà Nội. If you happen to be visiting the Bát Tràng Pottery Village just outside the city, Bún Chả Quán Ngon 124 is delicious a hole-in-the-wall nearby.

For bánh cuốn: These delicate Vietnamese-style steamed rice rolls, similar to Chinese cheung fun, are made from thin sheets of steamed rice batter and typically filled with seasoned minced pork and wood ear mushrooms. They are often served with fresh herbs, crispy fried shallots, and a savory fish sauce-based dipping sauce. Many vendors also serve them with slices of chả lụa, a classic Vietnamese pork sausage, for an extra layer of flavor and texture. In some variations, the rolls are served unfilled, appearing as broad, paper-thin sheets of rice noodle folded into layers that are perfect for soaking up the accompanying sauce.

At Bánh Cuốn Bà Hoành, you can try a variety of bánh cuốn styles: filled or unfilled, and served alongside accompaniments such as chả lụa, grilled pork belly, or meatballs. Each sheet of bánh cuốn is steamed fresh, one at a time, as orders roll in. The restaurant also offers an extensive selection of traditional Vietnamese snacks and side dishes, including bánh bột lọc—chewy tapioca dumplings filled with shrimp and pork—and both sweet and savory versions of bánh rán, Vietnamese-style fried doughnuts.

For Bánh Đúc Nóng: This is one dish I had never tried in the States; it’s a lesser-known Vietnamese comfort food made from a soft, warm rice cake served in a savory broth. The rice batter is cooked until it forms a smooth, mochi pudding-like texture, then ladled into a bowl and topped with minced pork, fried shallots, and sometimes mushrooms or herbs, all brought together with a light, flavorful fish sauce-based broth.

Just around the corner from a street full of cute local clothing stores is Bánh Đúc Nóng Trung Tự, tucked in a dingy alleyway and dishing out massive bowls for less than a dollar. This bowl is all about textures: soft, slippery mochi; hot, rich broth; crumbles of ground meat; bouncy wood ear mushrooms; crunchy fried shallots. Bánh đúc is better than a cheese pull.

For Bánh Giò: Vietnamese cuisine has many delicious things that come wrapped in banana leaves, and though they’re all quite good, one of my favorites is bánh giò—a soft and silky rice flour dumpling with a deeply savory, satisfying meat filling, steamed in a banana leaf folded into a neat triangular prism, which lends each bite a gentle, grassy aroma.

For a large and loaded plate of bánh giò, go across the street from beautiful West Lake (Tây Hồ) to Bánh Giò Cô Béo, where both the tables and chairs are little plastic stools and there’s a steady flow of locals eating piping hot bánh giò alongside refreshing Vietnamese-style pickled cucumbers and an assortment of different chả. The cucumbers add the perfect sharp crunch and acidity, cutting through the soft, pillowy dumpling, and though all the chả were bursting with flavor, my favorite was the chả cốm, which is mixed with young sticky rice—fragrant, chewy, and addictively sticky.

Other dishes and restaurant recommendations:

• Xôi, or sticky rice often served with with mung bean and fried shallots, from Xôi Yến. You can choose from three kinds of sticky rice and any combination of toppings, and it comes with crunchy pickled cucumbers. I recommend the xôi xéo (turmeric sticky rice) and ordering the thập cẩm, which has a little bit of everything—chicken, pork floss, Chinese sausage, chả, patê, a pan-fried boiled egg, and more.

• Phở cuốn, a dish somewhere between phở and bánh cuốn, featuring sheets of soft, bouncy, uncut rice noodle—thicker than bánh cuốn and closer to what you’d find in actual phở—wrapped around stir-fried beef and fresh herbs like cilantro, basil, and lettuce and paired with a sweet-and-salty nước mắm. I enjoyed mine with a waterfront view at Phở Cuốn Hưng Bền, but just down the street are two other spots that are just as popular, Phở Cuốn Chinh Thắng and Phở Cuốn 31.

• Chả Cá Lã Vọng is one of the few iconic Hanoi dishes I still haven’t tried here in the city, partly because I’m convinced that when I finally do, it won’t quite live up to my mom’s version. The dish features turmeric-marinated fish, pan-fried tableside and piled high with fragrant dill and green onions, then eaten with rice noodles. You can find it at restaurants like Vua Chả Cá (which has multiple locations) or Chả Cá Hề, though be aware that most places don’t offer single-serving portions and tend to be on the pricier side. I also can’t say for certain whether these restaurants’ versions are geared more toward tourists than locals. Still, given its place in Hanoi’s culinary canon, it’s a dish well worth seeking out.

As I eat my way through the city, I’ll continue to share my favorite bowls of bún and broth and breads. Vietnam’s food scene is endlessly rewarding, and it always feels like there’s another tiny plastic stool waiting around the corner.

If you’re looking for a little taste of Vietnam back home, these pâté chaud pithiviers put a fun twist on a Vietnamese bakery classic. The filling features the holy trinity of Vietnamese savory flavors—ground meat, fish sauce, and wood ear mushrooms—a combination that appears in countless dishes, from bánh giò and bánh cuốn to bánh chưng and steamed buns. Wrapped in buttery, flaky pastry, they’re a Vietnamese-American bakery staple that’s the perfect introduction to Vietnamese flavors.

Patê sô/Pâté chaud Pithiviers

Ready in 2 hours, plus chilling. Serves 8 large rectangular pâté chaud, or 12 smaller pithiviers.

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I have been in Vietnam for barely over a week and I have eaten fresh fruit the likes of which I could never imagine. Golfball-sized lychee, perfectly crisp rose apples, deeply golden fresh jackfruit, smooth and sweet ripe mango. The range of fruit here is completely different from what I’m used to in America, where summer means berries and stone fruit. Here, though, durian is abundant, and fruits like mangosteen, mango, jackfruit, lychee, and longan are my grocery store go-tos. Green grapes and apples are easy to find as well, but they’re noticeably more expensive than local produce. The most common stone fruit I’ve encountered is mận hậu, a tiny little deep purple plum with a sweet-tart flavor that stains your lips and fingertips with violet juice. Pineapples and papayas are also popular, with a much sweeter flavor than in the U.S.—I’ll admit that I’ve never been much of a papaya fan back home, as they often have a slightly funky, stinky-sock aftertaste, but here, they’re so sweet, juicy, and fragrant that I find myself reaching for them surprisingly often.

Vegetables, rau, are central to Vietnamese cuisine: nearly every dish is served alongside a heaping bowl of gorgeous greens and herbs: assorted lettuce, lá lốt (betel leaves), mint, cilantro, Thai basil, perilla leaves, bean sprouts, as well as a little calamansi to squeeze over for a little hit of citrus. I find these a perfect way to add freshness and balance to the rich broths and grilled fatty meats. The Vietnamese also do pickles extremely well, with things like daikon and carrots adding a sweet-sour crunch to bánh mì and more. IAs much as I’m enjoying the produce here, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t missing heirloom tomato season back in the States. Slice one open for me, and sprinkle it with some fancy flaky salt.

As I sink my teeth into a life-altering lychee, my mind wanders immediately to its potential applications in baked goods, but the Vietnamese know that there is nothing you could do to improve on such fruit.

Euro-American desserts commonly feature fruit that has been sugared and cooked and generally improved upon: crisps, crumbles, and cobblers; upside-down cakes and fruit-studded loaves; cooked into curds and folded into custards. The majority of these methods, if not all, can be traced back to methods of preservation, developed to sweeten, soften, and transform fruit that is sour or spoiling. Though there are a plethora of baked, steamed, or boiled desserts in Vietnamese cuisine, you’ll notice that they often feature flavors like mung beans or pandan or rice or tapioca—ingredients whose flavors and textures are similarly enhanced through cooking. Fruits, however, often appear in desserts in their raw forms, a category of food in and of themselves without any alteration necessary.

The most common style of Vietnamese dessert is chè, a sweet soup that appears in a rainbow of forms. There is warm chè and cold chè; chè with beans or jellies or fruits or a little bit of each; syrup- or coconut milk-based chè; red and green and yellow and white chè. Even under the same name (chè bắp, chè chuối, chè Thái), no two bowls are alike, each with different components and ratios.

Many cold varieties of chè incorporate fresh fruit: longan floating in lightly sweetened syrup, slices of jackfruit tucked between strands of jelly, cubes of mango or lychee nestled among crushed ice and coconut milk. What is striking is how rarely the fruit itself is transformed: rather than being baked into a pie, stewed into a compote, or reduced into a jam, it is left largely intact. The role of the dessert is not to alter it but to frame it, surrounding it with textures of jelly, bean, ice, and coconut milk that accentuate rather than obscure its qualities. The fruit remains recognizably itself.

My chè fruit tart upholds this philosophy, framing a field of blooming fruit in a pale, crisp, toasted coconut pâte sucrée, cushioning it on soft and smooth coconut crème pâtissière. Both the crust and the custard contain minimal egg yolks, balancing them out with whites for a lighter flavor to allow the fruit and the subtle coconut to shine. In America, particularly in early summer, fresh jackfruit, lychee, and longan is expensive and hard to come by. Instead, canned fruits are more commonly used—but if you can find it, splurge on some fresh fruit for this tart.

Ché Fruit Tart

Ready in 2 hours, plus chilling. Serves 1 8” or 9” tart.

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Though Southeast Asian desserts and flavors have been slowly infiltrating the American public (see: Starbucks’ “oob” latte), the idea of sweet beans, rice, or noodles in cold dessert soups is still rather foreign to most. The gateway drug to the delicious, perfectly balanced sphere of Southeast Asian not-too-sweets seems to be mango sticky rice, a staple on the menus of local Thai restaurants, and something just different enough that it’s not too intimidating.

It only felt right that one of the first recipes I wanted to share before this summer’s travels is inspired by that quintessential Southeast Asian dessert: mango sticky rice. This tart takes everything I love about the original—sweet ripe mango, creamy salty-sweet coconut, and that comforting richness of sticky rice—and transforms it into something buttery, bright, and perfect for summer baking. With a crisp white toasted coconut tart shell, an extra fun rainbow twist, and plenty of fresh mangoes, this tart bridges the 24-hour gap between Southeast Asia and my hometown on the East Coast. I’ll be sharing plenty more recipes inspired by my favorite flavors and desserts this summer, so stay tuned for travel updates and more!

Rainbow Mango Sticky Rice Tart

Ready in 2 hours. Serves 1 9” tart, plus some extra!

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As with all accumulating tensions, my stressors needed a release. With no pots and pans or baking soda and salt in sight, I funneled my feelings through an old, unfrequented aperture: writing. I figured that if I absolutely must be sitting and pretend-pressing keys on my laptop, I may as well project my conscious outside, where my physical form would much rather be. And so The Baker’s Almanac was born, my little place to dream about baking and being outside while I sit and study.

Here I am a year later, writing (read: procrastinating) in the exact same spot I was this time last year. The same wooden chair, the same sound of papers shuffling, the same sun and lack of sun.

But I’m not really in the same spot that I was, am I?

I think if you were to flicker between the two still-lifes, superimposed, you would notice the little shifts: my shoulders are a bit higher, perhaps, a little bit more space taken up by my frame, face unfettered. The unbelievability of a life well-lived, the renaissance vase and the brimming bowl of fruit, the whole body spilling out across the table, replacing the image repeatedly with the relief of its overlay. The rain is still coming down outside, the clouds a blank sheet unfurling in every direction, the same chorus and reverb, ephemera under light like degraded film, and nothing has changed except for myself who has been moved against her will by none other than her will.

Say I never took that chance, put all my flimsy faith into believing—in myself, of all things, not particularly powerful nor reliable, and who has made no miracles happen—say I was still in exactly the same spot that I was a year ago, say I was still. Say it is not human nature to keep flailing toward the future, as self-destructive as we are, say we are not all predisposed to survival, say the choice was never really ours. You are here, you have been handed the lease on your life, and it comes unfurnished, it comes as-is, character and charm and creaky floorboards, and someone is holding a camera: by the time the shutter flashes, you will be smiling.

Looking more closely at the still-life: it seems the fruit is entirely different, too, the same greens and berries as before but more bountiful now. Last month had early-season strawberries and blueberries, but this month they’re joined by blackberries and raspberries, all-around more vibrant and plush. Richard Siken says: “Pink, orange, red, orange dreaming red,” and I think dreams do then come true, the way the sun circles the garden and throws shadows which exist only because there is light, or light which can only be bright relative to shadow, whichever perspective you prefer. Stone fruit is coming into season, starting small with cherries and apricots. I project myself out from my chair into another chair, a beach in the tropics somewhere, and suddenly the pineapple in my mouth is sweeter—perspective, again. The low hum in the library of collective dread. I love it here, and memory renders me a kid in a candy store, eager to pull as many books as I could carry—perspective.

Soon I will have a sweet, summer-ripened mango in hand, smooth ataulfo, and hot summer sun where the light comes before the shadow (perspective). In the interim, we can mimic the tropics here in perpetually-forty-degree-Ithaca with these piña colada lamingtons, blossoming with pineapple flowers. Perspective can project you there.

Piña Colada Lamingtons

Ready in 5-6 hours. Serves 9 lamingtons.

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I have taken to drying all flowers I receive in this way, finding that in preventing a flower from aging in the slightest, its death is somehow more vivid, more lifelike: a petrified bouquet sits in an ever-empty vase, standing strong, and beside it, an arrangement jammed into dry floral foam begins to sharpen around the edges.

The cakes of the zeitgeist are in full bloom: flowers are en vogue, from maximalist floral fields on sheet cakes to delicate, budding mini cakes. But tulip- and lily-laden treats turn toxic, and these inedible blossoms are single-use and one-dimensional, offering no flavor or depth beyond beauty.

Flowers on cakes are often accessories, final touches meant to impress at first glance and then be removed (or politely avoided, picked around) before the first bite. In the same way, the leaves and buds of flowering fruits are often discarded and forgotten, but even these byproducts are bursting with flavor. Fig leaves, peach leaves, and citrus blossoms can be candied, shredded, or steeped in liquid to add unique flavors to bakes. Fig leaves lend a creamy, coconut-like vanilla scent when warmed in milk or cream. Peach leaves bring a subtle almond bitterness, reminiscent of amaretto. Even blossoms themselves, often admired only for their beauty, can be steeped into sugars, vinegars, or syrups that preserve their fleeting fragrance.

Beyond the store-bought edible flowers like rose and lavender, there are also some floral flavors you can forage in the springtime: magnolia trees are blossoming and bringing a blend of ginger and citrus; cherry blossoms, or sakura, carry the almond-y benzaldehyde; even bright yellow (weed-adjacent) dandelions have a honey-like hint. These, plus various other wildflowers including milkweed, lilacs, violets, elderflowers, and more can all be steeped and syrup-ed and sugared and stirred into baked goods for special spring flavors.

In Spring, there’s so much more in season than just fresh produce. I used dried hibiscus tea to give this cheesecake a shock of pink color and a very subtle floral flavor. It’s a creamy, crunchy, chewy dessert that feels as light and bright as the season itself, proof that flowers don’t have to be frozen in time on a shelf to last.

Preservation doesn’t always mean keeping something exactly as it was. The rose on my shelf is intact, untouched by time, but it’s also fixed there, unchanging, untasted, a memory I can only look at. In the kitchen, though, flowers shift and steep and dissolve, their flavors drawn out and carried into something new, keeping something by letting it become something else.

Hibiscus Mochi Basque Cheesecake

Ready in 1 hour, plus cooling time. Serves 1 6” cheesecake.

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In the same way that corporations capitalize on the cheer and community that these holidays foster for some people, I have a tendency to find baking inspiration from them, too. It’s a little like seasonally inspired baking: you take what the world offers at a given moment and turn it into something of your own. (Chocolate mini eggs are in season. I have harvested them bountifully from the grocery store shelves, where they sit in neat little rows, a tidy plot of candy.)

Despite the story that red-40 Dr. Pepper-flavored Peeps and twenty-dollar Dubai chocolate Easter eggs may tell, holidays aren’t all corporate slop. At their core, they can be so endlessly endearing: across the world, thousands of people converge on the same cultural traditions, whether or not they know their origins—little chocolates in the hearts of pastel plastic eggs, cooking ham and midwestern mayo salads, congregating en masse at mass. There’s something tender in it, almost adorable, watching strangers in distant cities perform the same ritual choreography, as if by doing the same odd, earnest things on the same days, we might feel less like isolated subjects and more like points of impetus on the latticework of humanity.

Amidst the TikTok algorithm, I get a slideshow with #nostalgia, and somehow this other individual whom I have never met and do not know, along with the thousands of others in the comments, also grew up with Doodle Jump on their iPod touch and with grandparents that owned the same Corelle butterfly gold dinnerware set. Obviously, a lot of this just ties back to corporate slop and the way certain objects proliferate, how the aesthetics of an era are distributed and absorbed, how corporations seed our environments with identical artifacts until they become memories in themselves, etc. etc., but there is comfort and familiarity in the feelings and shared experiences that we come to associate with these items.

The loneliness epidemic, exacerbated by a loss of “third spaces” and a general rising sense of individualism, feels in many ways like a rupture in that shared rhythm—a thinning out of the informal, incidental ways we come into contact with one another. Understanding other cultures and thereby other perspectives is incredibly important amidst the current climate: it seems that humanity is forgetting that diversity and difference are not barriers to connection, but the very conditions that make it possible. Beneath the surface, we are far more alike than we imagine. No matter how unfamiliar the country, culture, custom—you can always find, somewhere, a shared memory. Nearly every cuisine, across geography and history, has somehow separately arrived at its own version of a dumpling: dough wrapped around filling, repeated endlessly in different forms.

If nothing else, we all have in common the need to eat. Food thus becomes an accessible entry point into one another’s lives, a tangible and sensory means of truly understanding a culture or perspective that is not your own. When you taste my mother’s homemade bún riêu, you are taking a tiny bite from every bowl I have ever eaten in my lifetime, and every bowl that was ever eaten before. Do not hesitate when you lift the spoon to your mouth, and certainly do not fear sitting down at a table with people who may not immediately seem to have anything in common with you. Celebrate the holiday, eat the food, lean into the unfamiliarity of it all. The world is much bigger than just your plate.

And so, I find myself drawn to baking in the interstices of holidays I do not observe. It is my own participation in this lattice of living, a way of having a taste of the traditions of thousands of others. Do not fall prey to manufactured attempts at new traditions, thrust at you by brands (see: Pepsi’s attempt to make “pilk” the new Christmas drink); instead, try to bake, cook, fold, stir, season, and let the process and people be your transportation to the wider world.

Anyway, all of this to say that I made hot cross bun-inspired cookies on Easter even though I do not actually really celebrate Easter. But I love the warm spices of hot cross buns, the dried fruit and white chocolate of it all, and even though my first time ever having a hot cross bun was a mere few months ago, there was still something nostalgic in them: a fleeting taste of someone else’s memories.

Hot Cross Cookies

Ready in 1 hour. Serves 11 cookies.

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Three tabs have half-finished applications to various internships and scholarships; an exam lurks on the horizon, a cruel two days after break; I have 1,668 unread text messages and triple that amount in emails. I could force myself down and find reasons to deprive myself, arbitrary self-flagellations to prove to the world that I am trying my best. Instead I will do exactly the bare minimum, respond to one single time-sensitive email and submit one paltry assignment for the sake of pretense, all while the water laps at my chin and threatens to rise. With no justification, I will take my break.

I am settling in to being happier.

In my mind, the trajectory of self-actualization is something like the square root of x; improvement happens fast and then levels out, not necessarily hitting a wall but never hitting the same stride that you started with. You get comfortable in your joy and then your set-point goes up, too, and suddenly you need more to feel particularly happy rather than just everyday-happy.

As things plateau, it can be hard to stop expecting the old intensity and not mistake stability for emptiness. But there’s an alternative way to read the curve: what if the goal isn’t to keep increasing the slope, but to deepen the experience of the plateau? What if self-actualization, at its later stages, is less about acceleration and more about texture? The richness of ordinary moments, the ability to sustain meaning without novelty.

You do not need to prove to anyone why you deserve contentment; in the wise words of Mary Oliver, you do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting, and you certainly do not have to be good. I am happy and I am allowed to be so. It’s spring.

The idea that April is valuable only for what it can provide (May flowers) is reductive. Discomfort is justified through promises of future beauty. To dwell in the showers and ignore these sunny days is not going to make May any more satisfying. You can be happy now, and you can be happy in a month, too. There is no emotional compound yield on misery.

And maybe the most convincing rebuttal to this asceticism is not philosophical at all, but material—mundane, even—sitting in the produce aisle, indifferent to whatever narrative you’ve constructed about deferral and reward. Berries are coming back, beautiful and bejeweled, and the other day I bought a tall crowned pineapple and the most cheerful citrus, and as each blueberry bursts between my teeth, the question of whether or not I deserve it hardly crosses my mind. The cherries will be better later in the month, but they are also quite good now, here in the liminal category between false springs and rainstorms, and I can sometimes spend a little bit too much on two pounds of green grapes because they are so big and so crunchy and there is no moral weight to living.

I really hope you treat yourself well this spring and I am not saying that because I think you deserve it. I think I am a worse person than I am willing to admit and I think we all are and I think the wild geese are heading home again. Good thing none of us have to be good.

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(Would you deny your younger self lunch because they were “bad”? Didn’t think so. Feed your inner child a little nostalgia with these almond butter & jelly blondies!)

Almond Butter & Jelly Pretzel Blondies

Ready in 1 hour. Serves 9 blondies.

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(The recipe—a highly requested one, no less—is at the very end, for those who would rather I keep it relevant.)

I’m Remi. I like baking (obviously) and writing (clearly), and I started The Baker’s Almanac as a way to hold onto both while I was away at college—far from my home kitchen, but not, as it turns out, from the urge to keep making things.

I’m currently a college student studying computer science, which means most of my days are spent thinking in terms of logic, structure, and systems. Baking, for me, fits into that world more naturally than you might expect. A recipe, at its best, isn’t so different from a well-written program—it’s clear, instructive, and just flexible enough to adapt when something inevitably goes slightly off.

I’m not professionally trained, and I don’t think of this as a polished, authoritative space. If anything, it’s more of a working notebook that happens to be shared. I care about getting things right, but I also care about making them approachable. You’ll find detailed notes, small adjustments, and the occasional aside about why ingredients behave the way they do or why processes are a certain way, because understanding the “why” makes the “how” a lot less intimidating.

Somewhere in all of that, there are a few other things about me that don’t quite fit neatly into baking but still end up getting worked into the dough. Outside of baking, I also like to cook, but am quite new to it all and tend to have a much more planned and measured approach contrary to a seasoned chef’s improvisation. I appreciate having both the modes of structure and spontaneity, though, and it’s quite fun to explore different cuisines and cultures through food.

I was a foodie long before I was a baker, having been raised in a multicultural Vietnamese-Filipino household with well-traveled and worldly parents. My tastebuds tend toward southeast Asia, accordingly, but I’ve also developed a deep appreciation for other cuisines; Ethiopian/Eritrean, Chinese, and Indian food also rank high among my favorites. My favorite flavors often seep into my baking like a banana’s volatile transfer: persimmon, pandan, even the homemade pâté chaud/bánh patê sô that I made five batches of during winter break alone.

As evidenced by my seasonally-inspired writing and baking, I tend to think about seasonality more than I probably need to given that I go to school in upstate New York, where the seasons swing from one extreme to the next with short transitions. Winter is my favorite, which I have to clarify carefully, because I sometimes write about it with an undercurrent resentment that suggests not much more than frozen sidewalks and slightly stubborn fingers, but I find it to be a beautiful and surprisingly bountiful season, if you know where to look. There’s something about winter at Cornell that feels clarifying.

In between textbooks, I’ve been reading Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain, which feels like an odd but not entirely incompatible pairing. It’s a reminder that kitchens, unlike equations, don’t always resolve cleanly—and that’s part of what makes them worth returning to. Another kitchen-centric recommended read that feels relevant is Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto. You’ve probably noticed my penchant for poetry, too, which appears quite often in the monthly editions of The Baker’s Almanac; my favorite poets include (but are far from limited to) Richard Siken, Mary Oliver, and Ada Limón.

I don’t watch much TV or movies, which is less of a stance and more of a habit that never quite formed. But I do have a soft spot for Studio Ghibli films, particularly Kiki’s Delivery Service—partly because it happens to involve a bakery in a way that feels both aspirational and strangely familiar. I find myself returning to it when I feel like I’m hitting a bit of a wall and need to remember what to do with my hands.

My musical taste leans toward artists like Ethel Cain, Phoebe Bridgers, Fiona Apple, and Mitski—which, on paper, might suggest a certain emotional register that I don’t think fully represents me. I’m not sure how to explain the gap between what I listen to and how I actually feel, except to say that I tend to enjoy art that feels to the absolute fullest. It turns out you can listen to something aching and hurting while still being, overall, quite happy. Those things are not mutually exclusive, even if they sometimes sound like they should be.

If there’s a throughline to all of this, it’s probably that I like making and feeling and learning, which is at its core what we’re all doing, and maybe that’s why my writing (hopefully) resonates with you. And if it doesn’t, if you’re just here for the recipes, I appreciate that a lot too—so here you go! Delicious, decadent, chewy-crispy cookies, best served warm.

Brown Butter Banana Chocolate Chunk Cookies

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Hope, by contrast, is far less photogenic. If optimism is a kind of confidence about outcomes, hope is a commitment to meaning regardless of outcome.

I’m taking risks this spring, putting steady hope in my own decisions and coming out of hibernation in my own way. You are more capable than you know—and I’m mostly telling this to myself, as if enough confidence and steadiness of voice might make it true.

If hope is a discipline, then perhaps self-regard must be one too. Not the loud, performative kind that, like optimism, is crisp and laminated and shiny, prepackaged as “self-love,” but the practice of treating yourself with deliberate care: resting when you’re tired, choosing environments that don’t shrink you.

There is a strange, almost insurgent audacity in deciding you are worthy of small, tangible joys—not because you have curated the perfect life-spreadsheet or earned some invisible certification of competence, but because you are still here, still buttoning your coat against the March wind, still facing the early-morning fog.

This spring, then, is a little rebellion: I will trust my own choices, grow upward alongside everything bright and living, and behave as if tending to my well-being is a responsibility rather than a reward. I will act as though the sun’s warm rays are reaching for me, as though I deserve the light as much as anyone else standing in it.

Hope, after all, is not just faith in the future; it’s believing you’re allowed to inhabit that future fully when it arrives.

There is hope young and lovely poking up through the soil: radishes and rhubarb and ramps, things that take root in dark places and push themselves up toward sun.

Every year I forget how quickly it happens. One evening it’s snowing, the ground locked, and by the next morning it’s gone, soft and yielding, with the purple heads of crocuses beginning to push through. It always feels a bit miraculous to me; to think that these little sprouts and seedlings know nothing of the sun and push through the darkness anyway. Treat early Spring’s produce gently; radishes raw with good butter and salt, the first fresh berries shining on a bed of fresh cream, handfuls of sweet peas folded into warm buttered rice.

And then, as if to remind us that sweetness can follow even the harshest cold, blueberries arrive—plump and dewy, their deep indigo skin catching the light like tiny gems. This Blueberry Almond Olive Oil Cake is what you make it: a one-layer snacking cake, easily elevated into something eye-catching and extravagant. Tender, fragrant, and just sweet enough, with the subtle nuttiness of almond flour and the silky richness of olive oil carrying the blueberries’ bright, tart, early-spring flavor.

In this cake, as in spring itself, there is patience and persistence, a reminder that small acts of care—whether for yourself or for the soil, the seeds, the fruit—matter. And when you bite into it, you taste more than almond and olive oil and blueberries: you taste hope rising, just as it always does, in tiny, miraculous shoots, ready to color the world again.

Blueberry Almond Olive Oil Marble Cake

Ready in 2 hours. Serves 1 8” cake.

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More specifically: with butter creamed to submission, sugar beaten into pliancy, eggs incorporated one by one like a Victorian courtship ritual. I say it with six-inch rounds of sponge, leveled with the concentration of a neurosurgeon and the emotional volatility of someone who absolutely will cry if the crumb tears.

Designing custom layer cake flavors for the people I love is my love language. Not in the Pinterest-board, rustic-bunting way, nor in a blasé domestic performance—I mean it in the anthropological sense: I have studied you like an artifact, analyzed your habits, catalogued your cravings, and then built a cake that maps your psychic soft spots and exploits them in butter and sugar.

Some people keep spreadsheets of their friends’ and family’s birthdays. I keep tasting notes.

For my dad, who drinks coffee like a devotional act and measures mornings by maple syrup and a burst of blueberries, I made a dark chocolate layer cake with blueberry curd filling, maple Swiss meringue buttercream, dark chocolate espresso ganache, and a blueberry-Oreo crumble coating. Each element was chosen to translate him, o man of few words: the chocolate, comforting and dependable, at a stable and secure 75% or higher, always; the blueberries, bright but never aggressive; the maple, a subtle homage to his breakfast table, where sweetness is never gratuitous. I made this cake not merely to delight him, but to map him, to translate his classic, patient, dad-like essence into layers and fillings. Each bite is a catalogue of his tastes, habits, and rituals, assembled with forensic precision. I spoke I love you in chocolate, blueberry, and maple—the anthropological truth of my father, crystallized in cake.

For my sister, elegant and esoteric, a soft-spoken big-city girl, fast-walking and always a few steps ahead, who insists she doesn’t have a sweet tooth but can’t drive by HEYTEA without getting some sort of five-component coconut boom, I would make a soft and fluffy chiffon brushed with jasmine tea, layered with coconut Greek yogurt mousse, dotted with sago pearls and mango coulis, and finished with a delicate veil of jasmine gelée. What I mean is: I see your restraint, your curated austerity, your choreographed independence. I also know you want to be held.

For my mom, who will always pack what I forget, who can sense my bad day from a thousand miles away, I have a large chunk of my notes app dedicated solely to extravagant cake concepts: an almond croissant cake with a mille-feuille of frangipane and puff pastry, a tall tres leches number with a layer of silky sweet flan, a Vietnamese coffee tiramisu layer cake with a condensed milk cream cheese espresso mousse, a sticky sweet cardamom caramel carrot cake studded with crystallized ginger and her favorite pistachios—but at the end of the day, she always much prefers to keep it simple, and so: a clean, white, light angel food cake, adorned with fresh summer fruit and a straightforward barely-sweetened whipped cream frosting.

I could go on endlessly about each syrupy-sweet basma slice and every tangyuan-fiending friend and every flavor of love.

Layer cakes are, at their core, architectural arguments. They are edible theses on structure and excess. A single-layer sheet cake says: I care about you, but I have boundaries. A layer cake says: I dismantled gravity for you. I negotiated with thermodynamics. I thought of a filling and a frosting and a hundred different components and how they would all come together to capture you.

Here is the thing no one tells you about baking as an act of love: it is absurdly specific. You cannot mass-produce intimacy. You can try—and God knows the cupcake vending-machine industrial complex has—but real devotion is bespoke. It’s noticing that your mother always scrapes the frosting off of supermarket cake because it’s “too sweet,” and then developing a stabilized whipped frosting that tastes like lightly sweetened clouds and the faintest tang of cream cheese and smiling when not a smear is left behind. It’s remembering that your best friend orders grapefruit cocktails and therefore infusing the syrup with zest and a scandalous amount of juice, so that the crumb tastes like summer and mild regret.

I observe. I catalog. I translate personality into flavor.

If you tell me you hate coconut, I will not make you coconut. I will, however, interrogate that hatred. Is it textural? Is it a trauma from a macaroon incident in 2017? Or is it that coconut feels unserious, and you are afraid of being unserious? There are people for whom I will toast the coconut until it is nutty and restrained, folded into a lime curd that suggests adulthood. There are people for whom I will not risk it.

Flavor design, at this level, becomes a kind of emotional cartography. You map sweetness tolerance. You chart bitterness thresholds. You test the elasticity of nostalgia. A layer cake is a controlled experiment in vulnerability: how much can you give someone before it collapses? How much can they receive?

There is, of course, a gendered subtext here. The kitchen as stage. The cake as offering. The soft power of sugar. I am aware that historically, women have been expected to express affection through food, through labor disguised as instinct. I am aware that butter has been weaponized as proof of devotion. I would like to state for the record that my cakes are not compulsory. They are chosen. They are, if anything, a mildly unhinged hobby that requires more spreadsheets than any sane person would admit to.

Because here’s the secret: I enjoy the control.

In a world where texts go unanswered and feelings are ambiguously punctuated, a cake obeys. If you measure correctly, if you respect chemistry, if you preheat with intention, the batter will transform. It will rise. It will brown. It will become something more stable than the conversations we keep postponing.

When I stack layers—cake, soak, filling, frosting, repeat—I am building a narrative with a guaranteed arc. There will be a climax (usually in the form of a ganache drip). There will be resolution (a clean slice revealing symmetrical strata). There will be applause, or at least the small, involuntary silence that falls when someone takes the first bite and recalibrates.

And yes, there is ego involved. Do not be fooled by the powdered sugar humility. To present someone with a custom-designed layer cake is to say: I have theorized you. I have rendered you edible. It is intimacy with a thesis statement.

But it is also profoundly tender.

Because to bake for someone at this level is to believe they are worth the time it takes for butter to soften properly. It is to trust that they will taste the lemon zest you grated by hand, that they will notice the hint of cardamom blooming under heat, that they will understand the joke embedded in the choice of passionfruit for the friend who fell in love too quickly and too often.

It is saying: I have paid attention.

In the time of layer cakes—this era of algorithmic affection and curated vulnerability—I choose flour. I choose the slow alchemy of creaming and folding and waiting for the crumb to cool before I dare frost it. I choose to express devotion in tiers, in fillings, in the precarious optimism of stacking something soft and asking it to hold.

Love, as it turns out, is not a grand gesture. It is a recipe adjusted for altitude. It is knowing when to add salt. It is understanding that sweetness without structure collapses.

And if that isn’t romance, I don’t know what is.

Chocolate-Covered Strawberry Coffee Cake

Ready in 2 hours. Serves 1 8” cake.

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And, like a suspension bridge, it’s rickety and somewhat precarious, stretched above the rushing river of everything we have already endured. It’s all loud and anxiety-inducing up here, what with the crashing waves of whatever winter did to us ringing in our ears, the simultaneous surge of hesitant hope as we begin to put the danger behind us and move towards steady ground, and the incessant fear of falling right back into deep water.

This winter has been uncommonly harsh, relentless in its cold and wind, each day a test of endurance. The world outside remains brittle and frostbitten: snow stacks stubbornly against fences, ice smothers sidewalks and streets, and the sky presses down with grey weight. Yet, even as the wind howls and the snow continues to pile, the month is already shortening beneath our feet, contracting. It’ll be over before we know it, this brief, compressed suspension, and we’ll find ourselves on the other side with the river still roaring below, but with steadier footing and maybe even a slight sense of satisfaction.

It sometimes gets worse before it gets better.

Still, though, the only way out is through. It’s hard and it’s rough and it’s so brutally cold but you’re never really alone, even as the wind screams and the streets lie empty, and the cold seeps into your bones and your own breath writhes away from you into the gelid vastness. There are eclipsed suns, pockets of warmth peering through—a neighbor’s light spilling onto the snow, the distant hum of a car struggling through the frost. A river still rushing under its frozen shroud.

You, too, keep moving, forward across February, step by step, heartbeat by heartbeat. You’re warm with breath and blood, heat radiating from your hands and lightening the cold around you.

There are things behind things behind things, jeweled pomegranate arils and passionfruit pulp under tough skins, sunshine spilling out after the knife-cut, sunshine if you seek it out, sunshine staining your smile. It’s all wrapped up in rinds and roots, sealed in the soil. Deep purple beneath beets’ brown, yellow-green avocado flesh subsumed by mottled skin, red and pink and white radishes buried under the dirt. Forced rhubarb and all its poetry—grown in utter darkness and emerging all the sweeter for it.

February’s light is inward-facing, held at the heart. When the juice runs down your wrist, when your teeth meet something sharp and sweet and sunny, the cold has not won. Sunshine is still here, waiting for the knife, waiting for you to cross over to it, waiting at the end of the bridge.

In tune with the season, this recipe is a suspension bridge, requiring patience as much as effort: several careful steps, then a long, quiet chill. The first bite tells you why—silky, bitter shards of chocolate so small they melt into the warmth of your tongue on contact; the tart-sweet and smooth pomegranate mousse and curd; the bright pop of pomegranate arils. Every texture lands exactly where it should, each flavor sharpened by the cold.

Time spent melting and folding, time spent scraping bowls, time spent letting the refrigerator do its steady work. The chill is a final ingredient, tightening the crumb, clarifying the contrast, turning separate elements into something cohesive and elegant. By the time you cut the first clean slice, the waiting has already done its work, and outside, winter will continue to pass.

Turn on your oven and find the warmth within, but continue to embrace the cold and see what beauty it brings. It has been a long winter. The only way out is through.

Pomegranate Stracciatella Cake

Ready in 4 hours, not including 4+ hours chilling time. Serves 1 8” cake.

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Different grains weren’t even the primary focus of this particular lesson—we didn’t get there until around three weeks in—but instead we were learning about maple, and the pancake experiments were merely vessels for the numerous types of syrups that we sampled, tapped straight from the Uihlein Maple Research Forest. We made three batches, identical in every respect except the flour: all-purpose, whole wheat, and finally buckwheat.

The first two behaved as expected. Familiar, cooperative, ultimately forgettable. The buckwheat batter, though, was instantly moodier, darker before it even hit the heat. It was also noticeably thinner, with much more spread and much less structure than the others. On the griddle, it released a nutty, almost mineral aroma, and the pancakes emerged a deep gray-black, strikingly unlike their pale, obliging whole-wheat and all-purpose counterparts.

There was also a batch of half buckwheat, half all-purpose pancakes, which had better structure and lift while still delivering that delicious buckwheat flavor. As a rule of thumb when substituting alternative flours in baking, your first test should rarely exceed a 25% substitution—that is, replacing no more than one quarter of the all-purpose flour with an alternative, so you can assess its flavor, structure, and hydration without overwhelming the recipe. Pancakes and waffles, however, are far more forgiving, since they rely less on gluten development, making a 50% substitution a comfortable place to start. Yeast breads are the least tolerant of change, so beginning with a 15% substitution helps preserve strength and rise while still introducing new flavors. Once you understand how a flour behaves, you can begin to push the boundaries.

The first two pancakes did their due diligence, acting as plain and unsurprising vessels for our little maple syrup flight. As sub-par pancakes tend to be, they were quite thick and slightly chewy, a little tough going down and erring on the side of overcooked. The syrup, to them, was a welcome and much-needed accompaniment, as indicated by the deep pools of it soaking through our flimsy paper plates.

My plastic fork cut through the buckwheat pancake differently, though: it had a softer give, with less of that rubbery resistance. From looks alone, these pancakes were similar in texture and thickness to the mochi pancakes from a Trader Joe’s mix my dad likes to make in a pinch (only when I’m not home to whip up a from-scratch batch, of course). However, they lacked the same bounciness as the mochi pancakes, which have a certain chew from the glutinous rice flour; instead, the buckwheat pancakes seemed to crumble slightly, yielding more easily to the plastic edge of the fork.

I later learned the similarity in appearance to the mochi pancakes (a runny batter that spread into near-perfect circles, and with little rise for a thin, a low-profile pancake) was because these 100% buckwheat pancakes were, like their mochi-pancake counterparts, naturally gluten-free, which meant there was no gluten network to tighten and toughen as the batter cooked. Instead of elasticity turning into resistance, the structure came from the grain itself, producing a pancake that was tender without being fragile, and cohesive without being chewy.

The first forkful surprised me. It was unlike any pancake I’d ever eaten, and yet, somehow, it felt familiar. By the second bite, I recognized where that familiarity came from: this nutty grain carried a flavor reminiscent of black sesame—nutty, toasty, and earthy, a flavor that had a subtle sweetness and that, to me, was a little addictive. Unlike the bland comfort of all-purpose or the timid warmth of whole wheat, buckwheat had a flavor of its own. The maple syrup didn’t mask it, instead conversing with it, highlighting the grain’s depth while softening its edges. Each bite felt strangely satisfying, like hearing a song you’ve always known played an entirely different and transformational way.

Later, I learned that buckwheat isn’t wheat at all, but a seed, more closely related to rhubarb than to any true grain. Somehow this made sense. It tasted like something that resisted easy categorization. In a class ostensibly about maple syrup, buckwheat had rewritten my sense of what flour’s purpose in baking could be.

That day, I went back to my dorm still thinking about those pancakes—not because they were indulgent or nostalgic (they were neither) but because they had opened my eyes to so many possibilities in recipes: the space that plain old all-purpose flour took now held infinite opportunities for flavor to be introduced.

Now, almost a year later, I’ll be a TA for that same cooking class I took freshman year—a pancake-shaped full-circle moment. As our first class on maple approaches, I once again have buckwheat flour on the mind.

Of course, I’ve baked with naturally gluten-free flours and grains before—the usual suspects and pantry staples like almond flour and cornmeal, as well as the more elusive coconut flour (read the deep-dive here), but before jumping straight into recipe development with buckwheat, I wanted to do a little trial run. I started with a banana bread recipe I’ve made countless times before, using it as a familiar baseline for comparison; I know its texture and flavor well enough to spot even subtle changes. And, because pure objectivity has its limits, I added a restrained hit of espresso powder alongside the usual semisweet chocolate chips, on the grounds that espresso and banana are, quite simply, a match made in heaven.

Rather than a full conversion, I opted for partial substitution, replacing a portion of the all-purpose flour with buckwheat. Buckwheat, after all, is assertive—aromatic, faintly bitter, and unmistakably itself—and I wanted to see how it behaved when sharing space rather than taking over.

The change was immediately legible in the batter. It felt thicker, slightly grainier, and noticeably less lofty; the usual loaf rises higher, often with a dome and a characteristic crack down the center, and while this version still rose, it did so more modestly, settling into a flatter profile. Once baked, the loaf emerged darker and more matte, its crumb tighter but not unpleasantly so. The buckwheat contributed a toasted, almost nutty depth that pulled the banana away from overt sweetness.

Structurally, the bread held together well, though it lost a bit of the springiness I associate with the original—less cake, more loaf. This wasn’t a flaw so much as a shift in genre. Slices felt sturdier, more inclined to be toasted, better suited to butter than to bare-handed snacking.

These changes made one thing clear: buckwheat is not a background player.

In these cookies, brown butter and black sesame enhance the buckwheat flour’s natural nuttiness, and a rainbow of white chocolate shards bring a balanced sweetness. The result is a delightfully chewy cookie that tastes both nostalgic and unexpected: proof that flour doesn’t have to be neutral to be versatile, and that sometimes the most interesting baking begins when you stop treating it that way.

Black Sesame Buckwheat Tutti Frutti Cookies

Ready in 2 hours. Serves 10 medium cookies.

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The gift-giving games can be especially tough: draw a name from a hat, give them something without being able to ask what they want. I put down some easy, cheap baking gadgets on my wishlist; things I’d been wanting but that weren’t urgent enough to justify spending a few bucks on for myself, like a fluted removable-bottom tart pan (my springforms have been working just fine) and a cute little 5” frying pan that I’d really only have one use for. So, when I showed up to the Secret Santa, I expected one of those things, bought straight from the link provided, still in its shipping box.

Instead, I opened my box to see a bouquet; not of flowers, but of flours. Bags bundled together, tied with string, carefully arranged.

As I pulled them out one at a time, my mind immediately tossed together flavor pairings and ideas and baking concepts. Each bag weighed heavy in my hands, and genuinely I think Newton felt a similar way with the weight of the apple and then of the whole world all at once, a million ideas rushing forward and settling in the things in my hands. This particular bouquet would not wilt on a counter; it would be transformed, kneaded, and would blossom again into something better.

The first flour I tackled was coconut flour. This one was particularly intriguing to me—I love coconut desserts, but I hate the taste of coconut extract. It’s too artificial for me, too reminiscent of sunscreen.

Coconut flour, though, could have the potential to make desserts extra coconut-y, or so I hoped. It’s made from dried, defatted coconut meat, finely ground after the milk is pressed away. It smells faintly nutty, not perfumed, and when you dip a finger in, it clings to your fingertips; evidence of its thirst for any sort of moisture. Coconut flour is famously absorbent; it drinks liquid like sand on a sunny, tropical shoreline, thus requiring more eggs and more moisture in batters. It doesn’t behave anything like wheat flour and doesn’t pretend to.

My research for recipes with coconut flour came up largely keto, paleo, and gluten-free, with dense blog posts full of macros and substitutions. Everything was “surprisingly good,” which is never a phrase you want attached to cake. I wasn’t looking to make something acceptable or guilt-free, especially when guilt isn’t an ingredient, anyway; I wanted to use coconut flour because it’s delicious, not because it fits inside a nutritional loophole.

Then, I stumbled on a recipe by Serious Eats (Stella Parks strikes again!) that featured a blend of coconut flour and all-purpose flour, and boasted “all-natural flavor” with a notable lack of coconut extract in the ingredients list. It wasn’t even listed as “optional”. The recipe had rather few reviews, but a five-star rating, and Stella Parks is a very trustworthy source—I took a chance, bought some additional ingredients, and baked the cake.

I’m so glad I did.

Although I followed Serious Eats’ base cake recipe to the letter, measuring by weight as usual, I switched up the cake filling and frosting to fit my tastes, using my own trusty cream cheese whipped cream frosting but tweaking it to add coconut cream, and using toasted coconut flakes in the filling for a textural contrast. The cake itself was incredible—slightly dense from the lack of gluten in the coconut flour, but still so light. The coconut flavor was pure and clean, without a single trace of coconut extract’s artificial sunscreen aftertaste. Paired with all-purpose flour, the coconut flour could do what it does best: amplify flavor, add tenderness, and contribute gentle, unmistakably coconut flavor.

With the holidays in full swing, I started thinking about how this beautiful, snow-white coconut flour fit into my cookie boxes. That line of thought led me, almost inevitably, to Samoa cookies, a nostalgic cookie dating back to long before my older sister was a Girl Scout. With an ingenious, addictive blend of coconut, caramel, and chocolate, it was hard to think of any way to improve these other than to amp up the coconut flavor. A double-coconut version felt right—coconut flour and coconut oil in the shortbread dough, and coconut flakes and caramel on top for texture—and from there, the recipe practically wrote itself.

Double-Coconut Samoas

Ready in 2 hours. Serves 20 small cookies.

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Is this new beginning hopeful for you? In every New Year before this, I played at being perfect: this would be it, this would be the year I would become the version of myself I always envisioned. And taking out the trash before the clock struck twelve and brushing my teeth for a full two minutes would do that. Wearing clean clothes. Avoiding eye contact in the mirror, thinking nothing badly of her. Somewhere in the machinations of a well-adjusted individual, the butterfly effect would kick in, and the straightening of my posture by a couple degrees on an otherwise meaningless day in mid-winter would beget a year of effortless success.

My trashcan would fill up again in a week. Was there any point in emptying it to begin with? And same with the rituals of laundry, of mealtimes, of making the bed. I am going on my fifth year of diligent, unwavering Invisalign habits. I am proud to say I have never missed more than two consecutive days, and that I always clean it thoroughly with toothpaste and a dedicated retainer toothbrush. My teeth-brushing routine is similarly rigorous. Despite this I have had cavities. Take from this what you will.

Time does not slip through my fingers, nor does the world keep gently turning: time rushes at me and the world accelerates while I drag off the end of its back bumper.

What, then, of resolutions? Do I set goals just to forget them until I’m breaking them, just to add that thin film of shame to my failure?

It’s January first, and the year ahead is slate-grey and un-disappointed. I have been clawing around in the dark for a reset button all year, rubbing stains out with hot water and soap when bleach is really what I need, trying to force the end of a phase and re-enter myself without the weight of everything I’d already done wrong. Mondays and new months and bright mornings—I always started with my chin held high, but expectations of perfection set unobtainable standards, and I, lemming to cliff, inevitably raise my own bar before walking right into it.

The truth is that nothing is ever really over. Time is not rushing at and through me, nor is it slipping through your fingers. It’s piling up, accumulating like the endless trash and endless laundry, endless endless and with no bleach. We can never undo what has been done and we can never walk backwards out of the room and un-touch and un-wind and back-track out of this mess we made of it all even if we tried, even if we forgot ourselves and phased through the drywall into the other room where we were born before any of this ever happened. The reset I need is to unclench my fist and let the past slide out. And this could happen mid-day, mid-thought, mid-mistake. Even though the screen has GAME OVER in big pixelated letters all in your face and there’s disappointed sound effects blaring at you and probably the evidence of your death still floating somewhere behind the words, there’s still that little button somewhere on the screen that says, “play again?” Click yes.

January first feels like a reset because everyone says so. But so can January third, if I let it. So does an ordinary Thursday afternoon when I stop spiraling long enough to drink a glass of water, answer one email, make one tolerable decision instead of a perfect one. The reset button was never missing, I was just a little too engrossed in the loss to see it in the periphery. The best I can do is stop insisting that the next beginning will fix me, and start allowing beginnings that just let me keep going, imperfectly, inconsistently, and without the fantasy that this time I’ll finally get it right.

I didn’t write down resolutions last year, or the year before, even though I had some in my head. There’s less accountability that way. I did make an ins-and-outs list, which I think is a lot more fun and a lot less pressure.

To review my year, based on my ins-and-outs list: I did slightly more savory baking, but not nearly as much as I’d like (nor as much as my savory-loving sister would like, either) and I never made a personal website or bought a new boatneck top. And self-destructive tendencies stayed, and locking in stayed, and one of those two was necessary to survive the year and I won’t say which.

I threw dinner parties, though, and I’ve clearly been blogging (if this Substack counts). I minimized my overconsumption and bought probably a grand total of three new shirts all year—thank goodness for hand-me-downs.

Holding myself to standards of perfection has effectively given me the opposite reality. There is no life that will ever be perfect—at least, not while the trash can exists, and not while the laundry exists; time will always erode away the illusion. The very best version of myself will still have scoliosis and one eye marginally bigger than the other. And she will still have bad days and will still forget things and will still be ever-aging. She will still have embarrassed herself singing on stage in front of the whole school in sixth grade, and she will still have worn those terrible hot pink glasses for too many years, and she will still probably not have it any other way.

We are all going forward/the time will pass anyway/etc. etc., so we may as well make something good out of it. Things will never be perfect, but you can reset at any time. You don’t need the new year for that; change will come whether we like it or not.

For me, one way to reset begins in the kitchen: rhythmic turning and folding and rolling of puff pastry, gentle folding of dry into wet, careful portioning and pressing and piping. When you are a stress-baker and a boredom-baker and a happy-baker and a baker-baker who generally just bakes any time her hands are too still for too long, which maxes out around fifteen minutes, there is hardly enough time to grocery shop before the oven starts preheating again. Luckily, January puts some wonderful produce within reach.

Citrus is at its peak now: lemons, oranges, grapefruit sharp enough to cut through butter and sugar, whose zest, when worked gently into sugar with the tips of your fingers, releases fragrant oils that add delicious fruity flavor. Some other under-appreciated citrus also shines this time of year, like kumquats and pomelo. There is also plenty of beautifully imperfect produce, things that look a little off-kilter and alien-like but have incredible culinary applications. Fennel, kohlrabi, celeriac, broccoli, cauliflower: these are otherworldly in appearance and can be baked in so many different ways, whether slow-roasted, tossed into a quiche, or even transformed into dessert. Fennel, in particular, pairs well with citrus or can even be baked into a cake alongside almond, honey, or chocolate. Experiment with the season’s many potatoes and squash, or shred a different vegetable such as parsnips and replace the carrot in a cake.

January produce is not resolutions so much as they are raw materials: things to work with, not rules to follow.

If you are wondering where to begin, try starting with a needlessly elaborate breakfast, just for the fun of it. You can’t really have a bad day after a four-inch slice of caramelized french toast with chai-spiced cream cheese whip and maple syrup (and even if you do, there’s always that second slice).

Thick-Cut Caramelized French Toast

Ready in 20 minutes. Serves two 4” slices, or three 3” slices.

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