(Not) Recipes – FoodWatcher

Fluffy Cinnamon Buns with Pearl Sugar

Nothing is better than cozying up on the couch with a cup of tea and a freshly baked (and might I add, warm) cinnamon bun, especially if it’s homemade. There’s a sense of not only accomplishment–because let’s be real, yeast isn’t always the most forgiving of ingredients–but also a sense of satisfaction as you get to sit there and unravel the buttery layers, one by one.

It seems as though each person has their own preference for how a cinnamon bun should look and taste, and although there’s no wrong answer, I am and always will be a pearl sugar girl over vanilla icing. Pearl sugar is almost like a coarse, compressed version of powdered sugar, and not only makes for a beautiful decoration, but also adds a nice crunch and sweetness to baked goods. Although more commonly found in Scandinavia and other European countries, you can easily purchase it online.

How to Make Noodle Kugel Without a Recipe

Here at Food52, we love recipes—but do we always use them? Of course not. Because once you realize you don’t always need a recipe, you’ll make your favorite dishes a lot more often.
Today: Whether you grew up on your bubbe’s kugel or yo…

Here at Food52, we love recipes—but do we always use them? Of course not. Because once you realize you don't always need a recipe, you'll make your favorite dishes a lot more often.

Today: Whether you grew up on your bubbe's kugel or you have no idea what kugel is, you can (and should) make a perfectly sweet, family-friendly casserole that will have you noshing in no time.

How to Make French Toast—A Definitive Guide

It’s late, you just got home, and you’re hungry. You have some stale bread, some eggs, and some dairy. Or: It’s Sunday morning, and your kids are shrieking, and you want to cook something quick and easy that will get them all starry-eyed, quiet, and ha…

It's late, you just got home, and you're hungry. You have some stale bread, some eggs, and some dairy. Or: It's Sunday morning, and your kids are shrieking, and you want to cook something quick and easy that will get them all starry-eyed, quiet, and happy. Or: You're tired of salads and roasted vegetables and even meat and fish and you want something soothing, something easy, and something decidedly un-seasonal for dinner. Good thing you know how to make French toast.

The French call it pain perdu, meaning "lost bread," but "found bread" might be more accurate. As in, you don't know what to eat, so you look around. Your humble pantry holds just a few basics: milk, eggs, and, forgotten in a cupboard, a hunk of stale bread. It's an excellent find, because with a little alchemy, you'll soon have culinary gold.

How to Make Compote With Any Fruit You Have

Here at Food52, we love recipes—but do we always use them? Of course not. Because once you realize you don’t always need a recipe, you’ll make your favorite dishes a lot more often.
Today: Transform your season’s harvest into a simple, versa…

Here at Food52, we love recipes—but do we always use them? Of course not. Because once you realize you don't always need a recipe, you'll make your favorite dishes a lot more often.

Today: Transform your season's harvest into a simple, versatile compote, without fancy canning equipment—and without a recipe.

How to Make a Grain Bowl With Whatever’s in Your Fridge

I realize that I may be alone here when I say that bowls are my favorite piece of dishware. (What, you don’t have a favorite eating vessel?)
Hear me out: Unlike plates, which waste sauce and discourage you from mixing a meal’s different components, bow…

I realize that I may be alone here when I say that bowls are my favorite piece of dishware. (What, you don't have a favorite eating vessel?)

Hear me out: Unlike plates, which waste sauce and discourage you from mixing a meal's different components, bowls are vessels that empower you to layer multiple flavors and top everything off with a grand finale of dressing. Which brings me to grain bowls.

The Secret to New York City’s Best Mozzarella Sticks

I had been seeing the name all over New York City, first at Smorgasburg (an open-air food market in Brooklyn), then at Chelsea Market: Big Mozz.

Their specialty (in case you hadn’t guessed) is extra-large mozzarella sticks. Bigger than the kind you’d …

I had been seeing the name all over New York City, first at Smorgasburg (an open-air food market in Brooklyn), then at Chelsea Market: Big Mozz.

Their specialty (in case you hadn't guessed) is extra-large mozzarella sticks. Bigger than the kind you'd find in the frozen section of the grocery store, yet structurally sound and far more flavorful. Every time I happened upon one of their stalls, I couldn't help but grab a basket of fresh-from-the-fryer mozz sticks and devour them in five minutes flat.

What Is an Egg Cream, Anyway?

A well-made chocolate egg cream is hard to find. The beverage was invented by Louis Auster in the 1890s, and remained popular throughout the early 20th century. Famously containing neither eggs nor cream, the sweet treat was once poured freely by soda …

A well-made chocolate egg cream is hard to find. The beverage was invented by Louis Auster in the 1890s, and remained popular throughout the early 20th century. Famously containing neither eggs nor cream, the sweet treat was once poured freely by soda jerks in candy stores throughout Bay Ridge, a neighborhood in Brooklyn, and the Lower East Side of Manhattan in New York City. Recently, it’s been popping up on menus as a relic of the past or a novelty; but, if you order it, odds are you will be disappointed with the taste. Not many people know how to make it well anymore—egg creams often come out too chocolatey, too watery, too thin-tasting.

So what’s the secret to mixing an egg cream that rivals an old fashioned soda shoppe (because of course it has to be spelled with two p’s and an e on the end) without the use of a time machine? Before we get into how to make egg cream at home, here’s a quick primer on egg creams.

How to Make Cheesecake—No Recipe Required

At one end of the dessert spectrum is the cleansing, frosty sorbet—sharp and refreshing and crisp. At the other is the cheesecake, which, like a velvet turtleneck, is cushy and luxurious and really only appealing once the temperature drops below 60 deg…

Cheesecakes are beloved and legendary and I have to be honest: While wooed by my love of dairy products, I tend to find cheesecakes exhausting. Not making them—that part is fun—but eating them. It’s a heavy end to what’s often, come the cooler months, a heavy meal, and the cake itself is regularly too sweet and served in wedges so large they seem to float on the dinner table like cruise ships.

How to Make the Best Chicken Wings for a Crowd

Chicken wings have got a bad reputation for hanging around sketchy bars. It’s time to intervene. Because you can make chicken wings that are crispy and tender, that are doused in homemade hot sauce butter or your favorite spices, that are actually addi…

Chicken wings have got a bad reputation for hanging around sketchy bars. It's time to intervene. Because you can make chicken wings that are crispy and tender, that are doused in homemade hot sauce butter or your favorite spices, that are actually addictive and not at all dubious.

Our test kitchen director, Josh Cohen, shares his go-to method when making chicken wings for a crowd: He dry-brine-spice-rubs the night before, and slides them into the oven while "refreshing everyone's drink." Baking them on a foil-lined sheet keeps cleanup minimal, and his make-ahead blender BBQ sauce has guests saying, "Frank's who?"

How to Make Snappy Sauerkraut at Home (You Can Do It!)

Perhaps you have heard that the more we eat fermented foods—delicious things that are probiotic, like pickles, miso, yogurt, kombucha, sourdough, kimchi, and sauerkraut) the happier our guts tend to be. Perhaps you have also heard of the microbiome—the lush community of microbial flora and fauna of our bodies, which, among other things, seem to keep us healthy. If you and I have chatted about fermented foods before, you know that I am totally fascinated by the microbiome, by these good bacteria that animate us. (Aside: If I haven’t talked your ear off about it yet, check out this video from NPR. You will be astonished and fascinated and probably giddy. Then again, it could just be your microbiome talking.)

But I’m a cook, not a scientist, and I’m certainly not here to make any health claims. What I am here to say is that sauerkraut is delicious, colorful, and basically a blinking neon light in the often beige and heavy landscape of winter foods. There’s a reason kraut (and its cousins, kimchi and the deli pickle) are served with those buttery, starchy winter staples. And there’s a reason so many cultural foodways have some kraut variant, if not at their centers then certainly off to the side, to be heaped crunchily, tangily on top of whatever is at the center. It is also extremely easy to make. In fact, after a half-hour or so of active cooking, sauerkraut basically makes itself.