Iconic Desserts
The Splendid Table: Conversations & Recipes For Curious Cooks & Eaters
American Public Media
4.3 • 3K Ratings
🗓️ 12 October 2018
⏱️ 51 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Pastry chef Stella Parks, best-selling author of BraveTart: Iconic American Desserts, talks with Francis Lam about the origins of our favorite classic desserts. She shares the history of and her decadent recipe for red velvet cake. (Spoiler alert: there's red wine in it!) SAVEUR writer Leslie Pariseau takes us to India for a grand religious pilgrimage centered around a sweetened rice dish as devotional offering. Biographer Adam Federman shares his thoughts on the life of Patience Gray, one of the most important food writers you have probably never heard of; his book is Fasting and Feasting. America’s Test Kitchen shows us how to perfect a wicked good Boston cream pie at home. And expert halva maker Lisa Mendelson explores modern twists on the traditional treat.
Broadcast dates for this episode:
- October 6, 2017 (originally aired)
- October 12, 2018 (rebroadcast)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Our common nature is a musical journey with Yo-Yo Ma and me, Ana Gonzalez, through this |
| 0:07.0 | complicated country. |
| 0:08.7 | We go into caves, onto boats, and up mountain trails to meet people, hear their stories, |
| 0:14.4 | their poetry, and of course, play some music, all to reconnect to nature and get closer to the things we're missing. |
| 0:24.5 | Listen to Our Common Nature from WNYC wherever you get podcasts. |
| 0:34.6 | It's The Splendid Table from APM, American Public Media, the show for curious cooks and eaters. |
| 0:41.3 | I'm Frances Lamb. |
| 0:43.3 | We have a sweet show for you this week. |
| 0:54.9 | We'll talk cakes inspired by history with a brilliant pastry chef. |
| 0:58.4 | We've got Boston Cream Pie with America's Test Kitchen. |
| 1:01.4 | We've got an incredible story about a pilgrimage in India to cook for a goddess, and we'll |
| 1:06.2 | hear about an iconic writer who mused on both feasting and fasting. But let's get to dessert first. |
| 1:13.6 | When I was in culinary school, 15 years ago, I knew a woman named Stella. |
| 1:29.8 | She was a pastry chef in the making, and we really didn't know each other that well, |
| 1:34.0 | but she was smart and thoughtful, and at some point, I went through a really rough patch |
| 1:39.0 | where I really needed a friend, and she was there, and she showed me true kindness. |
| 1:46.7 | Well, she graduated not long after, and we fell out of touch, but eight years later, we found each other on the internet. She'd |
| 1:52.0 | become that pastry chef, but even more she'd begun writing a quirky, terrific blog, and eventually |
| 1:57.9 | got more and more into writing about the science and history of desserts, |
| 2:01.3 | getting inspired by how classic cookies and cakes and pies and puddings were made in the past |
| 2:06.7 | and then reimagined those recipes for the present. |
| 2:10.3 | And just a few months ago, I was so thrilled to see her first cookbook, Brave Tart, debut on the New York Times bestseller list. |
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