Orts & Reports: Hermits and Home
3 Small Bites
Small Bite #1: A Recipe
I made hermits for the first time and they’re easy and taste like October and refreshingly not pumpkin spiced and everyone loves them. The recipe is from a vintage issue of Cook & Tell, natch. Oddly, my mother makes no reference to the Yolanda the treat is named after. Yolanda, if you’re out there, please check in.
Small Bite #2: A Podcast
In a serendipitous convergence of cooking and telling, Katerina Pavlakis, a Welsh-based kitchen coach with Greek and German roots for a truly full-flavored experience, recently featured our kitchen table conversation on her new podcast, At Home with The Intuitive Cook. We spoke about vintage recipes (including the above-noted hermits), creating community through shared food stories and how cooking feels like home.
Pair the full podcast with a hermit-baking session…
…or check out this quick hit while you’re eating a hermit. Short attention span peeps, we hear you.
Small Bite #3: A Gadget
From the What To Do When Your Brown Sugar Is As Hard As A Brick Even When It’s In An Airtight Container And You Live In A State With 5% Humidity Tip File:
👩🍳If you’re in a hurry to soften brown sugar—as in, you’re baking cookies right this very second—place a wet paper towel in with the sugar and microwave for 20 seconds. Pro Tip: Be sure to remove the paper towel before baking. 👩🍳
👩🍳Preventative measure: Order this brown sugar bear for a mere $6. It really works! 👩🍳
Hermits do bring back fond memories! I had gotten my first cookbook, Fannie Farmer’s Boston Cooking School. It was freezing in our Cambridge, MA apartment, so my roommate and I baked these hefty, spicy, raisin-studded cookies and ate them warm right out of the pan. They do seem like a perfect fall cookie. Thanks for sharing. I think I’ll do as you suggest and listen to the podcast while making them!😄 🍪
I love hermits. My mom always put a small piece of bread in with the brown sugar to keep it soft. The bread never turned moldy, I guess it was preserved by the sugar.