Gnocchi Guru Evan Kleiman Dishes on Italian Staple

Evan Kleiman mixing Beet-Ricotta Gnocchi.

When I heard that KCRW Good Food host, author and chef Evan Kleiman was going to teach a class on making gnocchi at New School of Cooking in Culver City, I just had to sign up. I've been an avid listener to Kleiman's radio show since its inception in 1997; it's a smart, provocative and deeply satisfying mix of interviews, reviews and culinary exploration that excites the brain as much as the taste buds. 

A sheet of potato gnocchi shaped by the students.

The "Good Food" host, who often mentions her deep love of Italian cooking, has authored several cookbooks on the subject and ran a beloved L.A. restaurant, Angeli Caffe, which closed in 2012 after 28 years.

Until I took this class, I'd never attempted to make gnocchi (pronounced nyawk-ee). In fact, my household has become rather carb-phobic of late, with pasta and gnocchi seldom making an appearance. When gnocchi does show up, it's often the shelf-stable potato variety from Trader Joe's--quite good, but, no surprise, fresh is far superior.

"I don't believe in giving out recipes before class," Chef Kleiman announced as about 16 of us, perched on stools next to stainless-steel counters, looked on. "You have one opportunity to watch me and the rest of your life to look at the recipe."

Point taken. Our teacher was fun to watch--completely absorbed in what she was doing, yet imparting little gems of wisdom along the way to the room full of would-be sous chefs. Three hours sounds like a fair chunk of time, but it passes rather quickly when you're making three types of gnocchi, plus a meat sauce (Ragù alla Bolognese). 

Semolina Gnocchi (Gnocchi alla Romana).
These are baked rather than boiled.

Of course it was Evan Kleiman who did most of the work, assisted by several members of New School's culinary staff. We pitched in when asked--cutting out semolina gnocchi (Gnocchi alla Romana) with small round cookie cutters; mixing the potato, flour and egg gnocchi (Gnocchi di Patate) with bench scrapers and our hands; shaping the small beet and ricotta "gnocchetti" into tiny pink balls and rolling them in flour. It was particularly satisfying when we finally sat down to sample the bounty we'd help create.

Mixing potato and flour for Potato Gnocchi.

Here are a few tips I gleaned from the class, though I'm sure there are many more I can't decipher from my beet- and flour-stained notebook.

1. The key to success in making gnocchi is allowing the mixture to stand for several hours or overnight--usually in the refrigerator--to absorb the liquid. (This is also true of other dumpling-like doughs, such as matzo balls.) If you don't allow the mixture to chill enough, it won't hold together in the hot liquid.

2. Always do a "boil test" with a few gnocchi before dumping all of them in. When they float to the top, they're ready. Make sure that water is at least simmering when you put the gnocchi (potato or cheese) in.

3. Making potato gnocchi is a more like making pie dough than kneading bread. When you add flour, you want to mix it in to create a dough, but avoid working it so much that you activate the gluten, as you would when making bread.

4. Ms. Kleiman used baked beets that were peeled and grated in her beet-ricotta gnocchi, which created gorgeous fuchsia-colored little rounds of cheesy dough. Golden beets, spinach or carrots would be good alternatives--and would add their own beautiful hues.

5. The ricotta cheese gnocchi can be made with almost no flour or with almond flour or potato flour if you want to make them gluten-free. 

6. The key to ricotta gnocchi is using the right ricotta. "Don't use American ricotta as it's too wet and will require too much flour," Kleiman said. (Her preferred varieties are listed in the recipe below.)

7. A pressure cooker is invaluable for cutting the time required to make an excellent sauce that tastes like the flavors have melded for at least a day, even though it has only cooked for an hour. Kleiman's favorite brand is Fagor, which claims that its pressure cookers can reduce the cooking time as much as 70%.

Potato gnocchi are particularly satisfying to make because "you never have to measure anything," Kleiman said. You just rice baked potatoes (minus skin) in a food mill or ricer with fine holes, dust with flour while still warm, add egg and mix with care (see Step 3 above). It's also possible to leave out the egg.

And finally, as she watched her class making gnocchi for the first time--some rolling the balls of dough a little too small, others a bit too large, some making it too wet, others kneading too much--Kleiman seemed undismayed.

"Cooking's a craft. You only get good at it by using your hands over and over again," she said. "It's very satisfying if it comes out right. If it doesn't, you eat it anyway. You eat your mistakes." 

Below are Kleiman's recipes for Beet-Ricotta Dumplings, Potato Gnocchi and Ragù alla Bolognese.  All are taken almost verbatim from the handout our hard-working chef finally allowed us to have after we'd watched her create culinary magic in front of our eyes. 

Fuchsia or magenta? Whatever you call it, the gnocchi are delicious!

Evan Kleiman's Preface to the Beet-Ricotta Recipe:

I'm giving you the recipe for the Beet Ricotta because they are so special, but really the recipe is the same whatever condiment you use (like sautéed zucchini). The only difference is how much additional flour you might need to add because of the additional moisture in the "condiments." Or you can make them totally plain. When I do that, I always add a little grating of fresh nutmeg. The default finishing of all these gnocchi is melted or brown butter and Parmesan. You can add sage to the butter or a sprig of rosemary for flavor.

You can make the "batter" up to 2 days ahead, and you can form the balls one day ahead. Because the moisture content of the ricotta varies, always make a tester of your mixture before you form all the balls.

These beet "gnocchetti" are a revelation. The color is intense, the flavor earthy and sweet and the texture has that kind of disappearing "cloud in the mouth" effect--the perfect recipe when you need to wow people, especially those who think they hate beets. Boy will they change their minds! 

Beet-Ricotta Dumplings 

Serves: 6-10 depending on appetite and size of menu

Ingredients:

2 medium or 4 small red beets, washed

2 pounds dry Italian ricotta*

2 whole eggs

2 cups grated imported Parmesan cheese, plus more for the table

Coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 cup (more if needed) all-purpose flour, plus extra for dredging

1 pound butter

2 bunches fresh sage leaves removed from the stems

*Use the Angelo & Franco brand from Whole Foods or the Gioa brand at Italian markets.

Directions:

1. Wrap washed beets in aluminum foil and place on baking sheet. Bake in 450 degree oven until tender--approximately 45 minutes.

2. Remove from the oven and let beets cool. Slip the skins off with your hands. Grate beets into a mixing bowl on the large hold of a box grater. 

3. Add the ricotta, eggs, Parmesan cheese, salt and pepper to the beets.

4. Mix slowly in a stand mixer with a whisk attachment or with a spoon until combined. (Beware of colorful splashes from the bowl!) 

5. Add 1 cup flour and mix again. Set the mixture aside for a minimum of 2 hours in the refrigerator. It can be made up to two days ahead.

6. To form the gnocchetti, roll a small walnut-sized piece of mixture into a little ball.

7. Drop it onto a shallow pan (pie pan or cookie sheet) covered with enough flour to coat all sides of the balls.

8. Lay each dumpling on a parchment-lined baking sheet, lightly covered with flour. Continue forming the gnocchetti until all the mixture is gone. You can then refrigerate the little dumplings up to one day in advance.

9. Just before you are ready to serve, melt the butter together with the sage leaves in a skillet. Let the butter lightly brown. The sage leaves should be nice and crispy. Set the brown butter and sage aside while you cook the gnocchetti.

10. Slip the gnocchetti into a pot of simmering, salted water. Wait until they float to the surface of the water and continue to cook for an additional minute. 

11. Using a slotted spoon, remove the gnocchetti from the water as they are done. Place them on a serving platter. Once all the gnocchetti are on the platter, top with melted butter and crispy sage, plus a liberal dusting of Parmesan cheese. Serve to oohs and aahs!

Sheets of gnocchi awaiting their hot bath.

Potato Gnocchi 

(Gnocchi di Patate)

Ingredients:

2 pounds mixture of russet and Yukon or other yellow-fleshed potatoes, scrubbed

300-350 grams 00 flour or all-purpose flour, plus extra for kneading and rolling

2 teaspoons kosher salt

2 eggs, beaten

Making potato gnocchi.

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Prick potatoes and place directly on metal oven racks.  Bake potatoes until soft and yielding.

2. Remove baked potatoes from oven and carefully remove the peel.  The potatoes will, of course, be very hot.  Press through a food mill or potato ricer onto a floured board, preferably wood.


3. Chop up the potato further using a bench scraper, then sprinkle flour and a little egg over dough that isn't too wet. The goal is to control moisture so you don’t have to add too much flour, which has gluten and will cause tough gnocchi in large quantities.

4. Cut off a manageable chunk of dough and roll it into a 1-inch diameter snake.  Cut snake into pieces between 1/2 and 1 inch.  You may lightly score with fork tines or poke your index finger into each pillow making an indentation or you can use them as simply little pillows.

5. Lay the gnocchi on a parchment or plastic wrap lined tray and refrigerate until ready to use.  They should be cold.  You make also freeze them on the tray for later use, collecting them when hard for storage in a zip bag.

6. To cook, bring water to a boil, add salt, then turn heat to a simmer.  Add the gnocchi (if frozen do not defrost).  Gnocchi are done when they rise to the top of the water.  I usually let them cook another few seconds. 

7. Remove from water with a slotted spoon.  Lay spoon on a towel to collect additional water.  Serve on a platter with sauce of your choice.  You may also sauté them in butter like spåtzle after they are boiled.

Ragù alla Bolognese in a pressure cooker.

Ragù alla Bolognese*

Ingredients:

1 ounce dried porcini or 1 tablespoon porcini powder

2 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 celery stalks, peeled and minced

2 carrots, peeled, trimmed and minced

1 onion, peeled and finely diced

Salt to taste

2 peeled garlic cloves, minced

2 lbs ground chuck or ground meat (not lean)

½ lb sweet Italian sausage

1 cup red wine

Small handful finely chopped Italian parsley

3 sage leaves, coarsely chopped

2 cups water or broth

1 can tomatoes in juice, blended 

Additional salt and pepper to taste

*Recipe calls for a pressure cooker, but I assume you could cook it without one just by adding more time. 

Directions:

1. Put the porcini mushrooms in a small bowl and cover with warm water.  Let dry mushrooms soak for 30 minutes. 

2. Sauté the celery, carrot and onions in butter and olive oil with salt to taste until they begin to soften.

3. While the vegetables are sautéing, put the ground meat and sausage in a bowl and add milk.  Stir to mix.  The meat should become fluffy.

4. When vegetables soften, add garlic and sauté until you smell the aroma.  Then add the ground meat and milk mixture and sauté until brown.

5. Add the wine, raise heat and cook off alcohol.  Add herbs, broth or water, tomatoes in juice and salt and pepper to taste.

6. Close the pressure cooker according to manufacturer directions.  Bring to high pressure and set to maintain pressure.  Cook for 1 hour, take off heat and let pressure reduce naturally.

A feast!

Thanksgiving Recipe: Cranberry Orange Nut Bread

With Thanksgiving just a few days off, here's a recipe inspired by a 2005 post for Orange Cranberry Bread from veteran food blogger Nicole Weston, whose class at New School of Cooking encouraged me to keep blogging, even when readers haven't always shown up. I've made a few changes to the recipe, adding walnuts and sherry and switching some of the white flour for wheat. I think Nicole's idea of mixing fresh and dried cranberries makes all the difference, and I might even add more of the dried! The orange zest and fresh orange juice give it a distinct citrus flavor, an excellent complement to other Thanksgiving foods. A loaf of this bread is certain to make an appearance at our Thanksgiving table on Thursday, possibly a variation on the recipe below, as I never like to make anything exactly the same twice!

Cranberry Orange Nut Bread

(Adapted from Baking Bites recipe)

About 12 generous servings

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup whole wheat or white whole wheat flour

1 cup sugar

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup fresh-squeezed orange juice

1 tablespoon orange zest

1 tablespoon dry sherry

2 tablespoons canola oil

1 large egg

1 1/4 cups whole fresh or frozen cranberries (if frozen, unthawed)

1/4 cup dried cranberries 

1/2 cup toasted walnuts, toasted, plus more for garnish

Mixing cranberries and nuts into the batter

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Grease a 9x5-inch loaf pan." 

2. Measure white and whole wheat flour, and put into a large bowl, along with sugar, baking powder, soda and salt. In a separate, medium-sized bowl, whisk together orange juice, zest, sherry, oil and the egg. Mix the two together until combined, but be careful not to over-mix.

3. Gently fold in fresh and dried cranberries and toasted, chopped nuts. Pour into prepared pan and place a few untoasted walnuts on top for decoration.

4. Bake for 45 to 55 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. The top should be a golden brown, but neither pale nor dark. Cool for about 15 minutes in the pan before carefully inverting the bread onto a wire rack. If you can stand it, allow the bread to cool completely before slicing. (Unfortunately, I seldom follow my own advice!)

   

*Note on baking pans: This is such a decorative loaf that you might want to make it for holiday gifts. If you want to divide the batter into smaller loaf pans, you can. I found the recipe filled one 8x4 1/2-inch pan and a second 5 1/2 x3 1/4-inch pan). By my calculations, it should be enough to fill three of the 5 1/2x3 1/4-inch pans if you prefer to make several small loaves.

Nutritional Info (each 3/4-inch slice)

Calories: 220

Fat: 6 grams

Carbs: 39 grams

Fiber: 1.5 grams

Protein 3 grams

Weight Watchers points: 6

Tinkering

1. Although the bread is great as it is, I thought I might add more spice to it next time--perhaps a half teaspoon of cinnamon and 1/4 teaspoon each nutmeg and ginger.

2. Speaking of ginger, in memory of my mother, whose pound cake with candied ginger was a staple at our house, I may add a bit of chopped candied ginger, along with the dried and fresh cranberries. 

3. If you want the bread a little less tart, reduce the fresh cranberries to 1 cup and add 1/2 cup of dried cranberries. Because most dried cranberries are slightly sweetened, they do balance the acidity of the fresh berries.

4. To make the bread even sweeter, sprinkle a little cinnamon and sugar on top, along with chopped nuts.

5. You can ramp the sweetness up even further with a streusel. Mix 1 tablespoon of flour, 3 to 5 tablespoons of brown or white sugar, 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, 1 tablespoon of butter and 1/4 cup chopped walnuts. Blend together the topping until crumbly with your fingers or a fork and sprinkle over the top of the loaf. Bake as directed. 

Disappearing fast!

Vanilla Bean Brown Butter Ice Cream

Sticky Toffee Pudding, Vanilla Bean Brown Butter Ice Cream & Toffee Sauce 

I recently attended  Nicole Weston's informative class on food blogging at the New School of Cooking in Culver City. You can read about it elsewhere on my blog. Here's a recipe for Vanilla Bean Brown Butter Ice Cream that Weston shared with us but hasn't yet posted on her popular Baking Bites blog. It will be in her new ice cream cookbook, due out next year. Meanwhile, here's an advance look, with additional notes on making brown butter from the recipe for Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies in her 2009 cookbook, The Baking Bites. Brown butter seems to be one of Weston's favorite ingredients. From the rich and sensuous taste of this ice cream, I can see why!

Vanilla Bean Brown Butter Ice Cream

1/3 cup butter

2/3 cup sugar

1 cup milk

Seeds scraped from split vanilla bean

2 cups heavy cream

Melt the butter in a saucepan over low-medium heat until butter has turned an amber color and smells toasty but not burnt. (The butter turns brown after 4 or 5 minutes, Weston said.) Add sugar and milk and stir for a minute or two until the sugar dissolves.

Remove the pan from the heat. Split the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape seeds out using the back of a knife. Add the beans to the milk, sugar and butter mixture. Stir to incorporate. Then stir in the cream.

Put the mixture into the refrigerator to chill completely--for about 6 hours or so. Remove it from the refrigerator and stir. Pour into an ice cream maker and churn according to the manufacturer's directions.

We enjoyed the ice cream with Weston's Sticky Toffee Pudding, a recipe you can find at her Baking Bites website. For those of us without an ice cream maker, Weston said it's definitely worth the investment for ice cream lovers. She has an excellent discussion on how to choose one at her blog.

Pickling Party with Mr. Pickles and Kristyne

After an enjoyable pie primer and feast a few days earlier, I couldn't resist returning to the New School of Cooking in Culver City this weekend for a hands-on pickling extravaganza. With expert instruction from Kristyne Starling and Mr. Pickles (aka David Jarrett, proud partner in a new vegan restaurant on Pico, Maddy's Sweet & Savory, 14 excited students of all ages and backgrounds moved smartly around multiple work stations, chopping jalapeños, blanching green beans, pricking baby tomatoes, slicing red grapes, shucking corn, and piling pre-cut cucumbers  and beets into the canning jars. We learned the difference between quick pickling (also called refrigerator or vinegar pickling), which doesn't require immersing the jars in water to sterilize and seal them, and water-bath canning, which does.

Each recipe called for a different brine composed primarily of vinegar of various types, water, salt and sugar--plus a variety of spices and flavoring. 

The range of pickles you can make is as large as the harvest and as broad as your imagination, it seems. A teaspoon and a half of coffee beans were the secret ingredient in the Pickled Coffee Beets. Pickled Chai Grapes called for chai tea bags.

Bourbon Pickled Jalapenos required, well, booze! Only one of the seven jars of picked produce we took home with us--Chow Chow, a mix of corn, onion and red bell peppers--was canned using the water-bath method, and it could have been done without.

Most of the quick pickles can be stored for about a month in the refrigerator, while the water-bath-canned ones keep for much longer and don't require refrigeration until they're opened.

It's not as hard as it sounds, said Mr. Pickles, and, as for everybody's number one worry, botulism, it's not a concern with quick pickles, as they're under refrigeration. Having the proper acidity of pH level is particularly important with water-bath canning, he said, which is a good reason to follow the recipe, at least when it comes to the type and quantity of vinegar you use.

Probably the biggest misconception about pickling is that you have to water-bath can, Chef Starling observed as the class came to a close (with an Irish whiskey and pickle-juice chaser!). "Pickling is fun and easy to do," she said. "Feel free to play around."

As for me, my next adventure will undoubtedly be trying to figure out recipes for foods that use up or go well with seven cans of pickles! Any ideas?

Two Pickle Recipes

Following are recipes for refrigerator Bread and Butter Pickles and Pickled Chai Grapes, which were among my favorites of those we sampled. The recipes we received don't specify quantities or container types. In the class, we filled to the line just below where the lids screw down on the Ball canning jars. Glass or hard-plastic containers with lids would work at home for refrigerator pickles.

Bread and Butter Pickles

5 pounds pickling cucumbers in quarter-inch slices
1 pound onions, thinly sliced (preferably a sweet onion, like Vidalia or Walla Walla)
1/2 cup kosher salt

Brine Ingredients:

4 cups white vinegar

2 cups water
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon black mustard seeds
1 tablespoon yellow mustard seeds
1 tablespoon black peppercorns
1 tablespoon celery seed
1 tablespoon turmeric
1 tablespoon kosher salt


Toss the cucumbers and onions with the 1/2 cup kosher salt. Cover with ice and let sit for 2 hours. Rinse and drain. Set aside.

Combine the ingredients for the brine and bring to a boil. Pour over the cucumbers and onions. Ladle into jars or store in other sturdy covered containers in the refrigerator. The pickles will keep for up to one month.

Pickled Chai Grapes*

3 pounds red seedless grapes, sliced in half
Cinnamon sticks (we used one per jar)
3 chai tea bags (we used one per jar)

Brine ingredients:

2 cups champagne vinegar

Pickled grapes, tomatoes and cukes

1 cup water
2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon kosher salt

Put halved grapes into a container with a cinnamon stick, packing with a enough space for liquid to surround the fruit.

Combine the brine ingredients and bring to a boil. Pour over the grapes and add the tea bags in jars or other covered containers. Let sit in the refrigerator for 2 days, then remove the tea bags. Grapes will be ready in 4 days and will hold for three weeks in the refrigerator, but don't forget to remove the tea bags!

*Mr. Pickles said the recipe would also work well with another fruit, such as cherries, perhaps using a different spice and tea flavor.


Speaking of pickles: To hear audio of what Mr. Pickles and Kristyne had to say about pickling and a future class on another kind of pickling, lacto-fermentation, click the links below.

Secrets of a 'Perfect' Pie Revealed

I've been a huge fan of KCRW-FM's weekly Good Food show with host Evan Kleiman for many years. When I heard that New School of Cooking in Culver City was doing a fundraiser for the radio station that included pie demonstrations by Kleiman and the famed pastry chef, Sherry Yard, I had to go!

The sold-out evening on Aug. 14 drew 50 to 60 excited fans to the New School's spotless demo/dining room. We sipped champagne and chatted a bit, but then listened raptly as these two pie pros spilled secrets about making perfect crust in a lively back-and-forth that was punctuated by questions, comments, and then an echo chamber of "ooh," "ahh" and "mmmmmm" as we dug into helpings of Kleiman's Chicken Pot Pie with a Duck Fat Pie Crust, followed by Yard's Plum and Blackberry Pie with Toasted Almond Crumble and Quintessential Apple Pie (recipes to come in a future post). It was probably the most lively, delicious and informative evening of food I can remember.

Following are a few tips and observations I picked up on pie-making. So much of interest was said that my trusty Pilot pen nearly died. In future I may tote an audio recorder and post choice bits on the blog.

Pie Mavens

"Were you a pie hog as a child?" Evan Kleiman asked her co-host.

"My first pie was Hostess," answered Yard to much laughter. "My family never baked pies. We just opened up cans."

Yard worked worked with Wolfgang Puck at Spago for 19 years, wrote two cookbooks, collected a James Beard Award, and is planning to reopen Helms Bakery in Culver City with another celebrity chef, Sang Yoon (Father's Office, Lukshon). A tiny pink and white whirlwind at the front of the room, she seemed like she might be your chummy neighbor, if that neighbor also happened to be the most accomplished pastry chef on the planet.

Kleiman, taller, sporting chef's whites and spectacles, curly hair tied back in a ponytail, fell easily into her role as interviewer, which she does with such aplomb and skill on "Good Food."

"It's difficult to believe it's me and Sherry up here," she said as she began to demo making the crust for the chicken pot pie. "I'm a cook who loves to bake," she said. She didn't mention that she was the chef/proprietor of the well-loved Angeli Caffe for 28 years before it closed in 2012.

Tips & Comments

- As Kleiman measured flour on a scale, she reminded the audience that weighing your ingredients is the best way to ensure accuracy. Yard added that the best way to check the accuracy of your scale is to put a pound of butter on it.

- Kleiman made her dough with a mixture of chilled high-fat butter (Plugra or Kerrygold, she suggests) and rendered duck fat, also chilled, while Yard's "3-2-1 Flaky Pie Dough" used only butter. Neither thought much of using the old standby, Crisco, in crust. Duck fat is particularly flavorful, but chicken fat can also be used, Kleiman said. Both she and Yard love using leaf lard.

Two apple pies: One with crimped crust, one without

- Both women used a little vinegar in their crust recipes. Kleiman also threw in a little sugar and a pinch of rosemary. But when I checked the recipe in the goody bag we received at the end, neither vinegar nor spices were mentioned. I guess you're on your own as to amounts, though Yard's written recipe calls for 1/2 a teaspoon of vinegar for a double-crust pie.

- Kleiman likes her dough to chill in the fridge overnight, while Yard removes it after only an hour, because "I like it wetter."

- Both are careful not to try to "pretty" the dough by breaking the butter down into uniform, pea-sized bits, as so many recipes suggest. "I prefer not pretty," Yard said, showing off dough with large and small pieces of butter plainly visible. Later we saw two very large brown pies in the reflecting mirror over the workspace--one with neatly crimped edges and the other showing a very layered, flaky looking edge, not prettied up at all.

- Yard precooks her bottom crusts almost completely so that once filled with fruit they don't turn soggy. To make sure they hold their shape, she uses two industrial-sized paper coffee filters, coated with a little nonstick spray. She fits them inside the unbaked pie shell and fills them with uncooked beans or rice to weight them down. She bakes her pies in pyrex pans so that the bottoms can be checked for browning. Once the browning begins and the crusts have settled into their final shape, she takes them out of the oven, removes the first filter with the beans or rice, returns the pan with or without the second filter in order to cook the crust until almost done. Then she adds the filling, which she has partially cooked first. Got that?

- Yard never uses white sugar alone in her baked goods, always adding brown sugar or some other variant. Her almond crumble topping, for example, includes confectioner's sugar and light brown sugar (not to mention espresso powder, almond meal and fleur de del!). And she baked it first before putting it on her blackberry-plum crumble confection. That way, the filling doesn't make the topping soggy.

Mini Chicken Pot Pie

- Noting how both she and Yard work with what's available and don't sweat the details, often adding a dash of this or that along the way, not always pulling out the measuring spoons, Kleiman commented toward the end of the evening: "Chefs don't think in terms of recipes. We think in terms of building blocks."

"I'm not big on measurements. I like to kind of go with the flow," added Yard. Take the idea of perfect and throw it out. Perfect is the enemy of the good."

Let Them Eat Pie

Apples a la Mode

Plums, Berries & Crumbles

But for those who sampled the results, the proof was in the pie--and it was perfect. The chicken pot pie was the ultimate in comfort food, with a meltingly delicious crust; the apple pie was chunky, with the apples spiced and cooked just right and the crust substantial but not heavy. The plum-berry crumble had a tongue-pleasing tang, with the crumble texture a mind- (and tastebud) blowing cross between candy and cookie.

As for me, my diet went to hell--and I simply didn't care, as I was in pie heaven. It would have been a sin to leave a crumb (or crumble) on the plate at the end of the evening. And I didn't.