N° 72: Squidgy Lil Green Things

Good morning,

I may have bared my soul in my last e-mail, but this time I’ll keep it strictly unemotional with a recipe*. Though it’s hard to suppress mild emotions—excitement, joy—for the colorful little cheesy, vegetal, gluten-free-optional puffs I’ve brought into the world. Put another way: whereas our last exchange was about pure nostalgia, this one is the opposite, as I’ve created a recipe that is (at least to my knowledge and experience, which of course have limits) new.

Speaking of new, here are a few recent happenings:

• New to me but closing soon (May 3) was “Come Together: 3,000 Years of Stories and Storytelling,” an exhibition at the Morgan Library. It’s not often you get to gaze at Joyce and Balzac manuscripts marked up with edits in their own hand and then turn around to study de Brunhoff’s early Babar sketches and spread layouts.

• Yesterday, a new cookbook store called Wild Sorrel opened in NY’s East Village. I looking forward to visiting it next week.

• Ahead of the Australian/New Zealand Anzac Day observance on April 25, I’ve published a recipe for the classic Anzac Biscuit in The New York Times. Here’s a gift link.

• Marie Frank’s debut cookbook, More Than Sweet, is out, and its recipes are sure to as be imaginative and mouthwatering as those she shares on her Substack. My copy is on its way, and I can’t wait.

• I first read about Ella Quittner’s book Obsessed with the Best in this thought-provoking interview, and it’s the first cookbook I’ve fallen asleep reading in bed in a long time. (To be clear: I resisted putting it down until my eyes closed; I was not bored to sleep by it.)

There’s more, but I’ll save it for next time we talk. Have a good weekend.

Brian

*Formal Assignment P.S. is for paid subscribers. It’s under $3 a month with an annual subscription.

RECIPE: SPINACH ‘GOUJOS’
(Cheesy Spinach Puffs)
Gluten-free option

If you’ve ever wondered what little green-chewy-cheesy clouds of joy would be born if you were to cross the French gougère1 with the Brazilian pão de queijo2—and add spinach—then the following recipe for what I call Spinach Goujos3 will surely satisfy. And in the more likely case that you haven’t wondered, you’re still bound to enjoy these paradoxical puffs: light as air, yet rich and cheesy, smooth and dry on the outside, full of moist, chewy bubbles inside. Snack on them; have them as a side with any meal; put them beside a cheese platter, make mini sandwiches or sliders of them.

Make them using whole wheat flour or, for gluten-free puffs, brown rice flour. The ones in all of the photos here were made with brown rice flour, and, as you can see, the lack of gluten had no negative effect on their structure or texture.

Yield: about 40-45 little buns
Total time: 45 minutes

INGREDIENTS: