Posted by Lia Bulaong, March 13, 2007 at 11:06 AM
Jenn Garbee, in the LA Times:
Technically, it's just pudding. But mention the word budino to an Italian chef and eyes light up, chattering hands dance through the air and unabashed creativity is unfurled.
"Budino is BUDINO! Its big flavor hits your palate at once, so pure it dissolves right on your tongue," says Nicola Mastronardi, chef at Vincenti. "Nothing else is in the way — just custard and concentrated flavor."
Garbee includes three budino recipes, including one for the much-heralded butterscotch budino (in photo at right) by pastry chef Dahlia Narvaez at Nancy Silverton and Mario Batali's Pizzeria Mozza, that our head honcho Ed Levine says "will bring tears to your eyes because it is so rich and creamy and delicious."
Posted by Lia Bulaong, March 8, 2007 at 9:51 AM
Candy Sagon in the Washington Post, on how we've neglected butterscotch in recent years:
[Shuna Fish] Lydon says butterscotch has fallen out of favor because most people today associate it with "those awful chips" or the artificial flavor of instant pudding. "Even really famous San Francisco pastry chefs aren't making homemade butterscotch" when they do serve butterscotch-flavored desserts, [s]he wrote in an e-mail. "They're using the chips and/or adding Scotch, both of which are very, very wrong."
Cookbook author Diana Dalsass thinks it has to do with the fact that the name includes the word "butter." "It's still such a taboo because of our obsession with dieting," says Dalsass, who bucked the trend in 2001 with "The Butterscotch Lover's Cookbook" (Buttercup Press), a slim volume of dessert recipes plus a list of places where you can order butterscotch treats.
The article includes three butterscotch recipes: butterscotch cookies, easy butterscotch sauce, and fudgy butterscotch icing; if it's pudding you want, Shuna posted a recipe for butterscotch pudding in December.
