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Anna Markow

Pastry Chef

Pastry chef hailing from Maine. Married and working in Brooklyn. Took a little break behind a bar and recently back in action! Writing about original recipes and the kitchen counter-culture. Been creating crazy edibles since 2008 at VerySmallAnna.

Location: Brooklyn
Favorite foods: Seaweed salad, crispy salmon skin, quince, dates, curried goat, soba, whisky, wild blueberries, pomegranate, scallops, molasses, duck, kumquats
Last bite on earth: Duck. Delicious ducky duck. And a big chewy spicy molasses cookie.

Comments

What's Better Than Cheddar on Apple Pie? Cheddar Ice Cream

I like cheddar with apple pie if it's done properly. (Not a cold slice on top of a wedge, popular Brooklyn place with "Pies" in their NAME!) I made smoked cheddar gelato recently at work to top an apple and doughnut bread pudding special. Weird on its own but perfect when melting into the sticky sweet stuff below.

Duckfat Chef Rob Evans Picks Portland, Maine's Best Bites

I'm a die hard Gelato Fiasco fan but I'll try Gorgeous Gelato next time I visit. Anything and everything Miyake has been on my list for a couple years but I keep missing them, and I'm definitely going to Piccolo next year!

New York Essentials: 10 Must-Eat Desserts in NYC

Dairy Queen? :( I hope you're trolling.

The only things I've specifically had on this list were the pretzel croissant (awesome), olive oil coppetta (it was winter and kumquats were involved!) and Levain cookies...which are fine, but are so much better sprinkled with some Maldon salt. And I need to visit Chikalicious more often...and eventually get myself to Dominique Ansel.

Polish Summer Soba Salad From 'Salad Samurai'

Giving me more excuses to eat soba is perhaps not wise because I'd eat them every day if my husband would let me. This sounds fantastic.

Why It's Time to Start Making Your Own Sherbet

Uhhh beer sherbet sounds great. I'm a big fan of the buttermilk sherbets myself, especially raspberry, mulberry or peach. I have a hard time selling sherbets a la carte, though. It was fine to call it peach buttermilk sherbet when it was being served with a dessert (doughnut bread pudding!) but when it went on the a la carte list the next day I had to call it peach buttermilk gelato (it sold out immediately).

15 Lesser-Known Berries You Should Try

Ha, along the lines of local pride in regards to berries...I'm from Maine and I'll take a huckleberry over a big, bland Jersey blueberry any day. Seriously, those overgrown things are hideous in pies. But huckleberries are lovely and make insane ice cream, almost as good as the roadside blueberry kind back home ;)

How to Make Posset, the Egg-Free, Gelatin-Free, Starch-Free Pudding

Posset is amazing! I was doing one with kaffir limes (the actual fruit) last winter and am going to play with other flavors this year. People didn't know what a posset was (I told servers to explain it as a precursor to panna cotta) but it sold like crazy, mostly because I topped it with graham shards and gin and tonic sorbet.

Taste Test: 1 Day, 23 Pop-Tart Flavors

I'm so bummed that they apparently don't do apple cinnamon anymore. But yeah, toasted unfrosted blueberry is where it's at for me.

Requiem for an Egg Cream: In Search of a New York Classic

So here's something I didn't mention...when I was briefly bartending in the East Village (just a block or two away from Gem Spa and Veselka, coincidentally) I came in one day with a random craving for an egg cream. Since I had to open shortly and we didn't stock milk or chocolate syrup, I ended up combining creme de cacao, vanilla vodka and Bailey's in a pint glass and adding seltzer from the soda gun. It hit the spot...and I put it on my specials board as kind of a joke. I actually sold some and people LOVED them. It was usually middle aged dudes who ordered it, too.

How to Make Light and Tender Cream Biscuits

I did cream biscuits at my first pastry chef gig. In general I prefer recipes with butter for the flavor but they ARE crazy fast to make. I always brushed the tops with more cream for a softer outer texture, too.

Meet the Italian Ice Cream Sandwich: Brioche Con Gelato

I had a brioche and corn gelato sandwich when Meredith Kurtzman did a demo while I was in school. Really good. Not toasted, though.

I once put my jamon gelato inside a mini leftover brioche bun. SO good.

What are NYC's Most Overrated Restaurants?

I'm glad people agree about how overrated Milk Bar is. Her cakes were what started it for me - why do people want something sickly sweet and leaking butter that looks like someone puked in a ring mold??? I worked with a server who had done some production there. They freeze cookies post-baking and there is no quality control, which is very apparent if you ever buy the same thing twice.

I worked at Hearth for a while, I do think they're overpriced but hey, they have a formula that works, and legions of dedicated fans. And they're not pushing themselves all over the place. They don't have to. They have a model that works and you don't have to eat there if it's not your thing.

Behind the Scenes: Making Edible Blown Glass at Aureole, NYC

That is amazing. I hear their pastry department is huge - you need a lot of space to devote to stuff like sugar work, plus some climate control. Well guess I know where I'm eating dessert next...

16 Great Ways to Eat Squid and Octopus in NYC

Call me biased but the octopus at Amali is pretty great, and I don't usually like the stuff.

Brunch at Five Leaves is Worth the Wait

I'm amazed you had the elbow room to photograph anything! The food there IS insane. I worked there briefly, wasn't the right fit, but holy wow that's a high volume, high quality operation.

@jedd63 They open at 8, but the place is literally a narrow hallway and is PACKED from 9 am to whenever they close for the night. PACKED. With a waiting list. If you can get in, it's always worth it.

Park Slope's Best Ice Cream Shop Makes Great Cake, Too

I just recently went there for the first time. As someone who is admittedly a total dick abut ice cream/gelato, theirs is AMAZING. The licorice flavor has to be one of my favorites of all time. They're all so invested in what they're doing, as well. Hoping to get back soon.

Ask a Bartender: How Do You Prevent a Hangover?

I always constantly sipped on a pint glass of seltzer with bitters. Tastes good, keeps your belly happy, keeps you hydrated. I also don't drink sugary drinks or really anything that isn't on the whisky shelf...

Pie for Breakfast at Two Fat Cats in Portland, ME

I grew up in Maine and my mom is from Connecticut and she always considered (homemade) pie to be acceptable breakfast. I actually had to teach that to both my ex boyfriend (a lots-of-generations Mainer) and my husband (a Brooklyn boy). My husband took to eating blueberry pie and even almond flour cake for breakfast pretty easily when I brought him home.

How to Top a Torte?

@Traveller Any middle eastern grocery should have date molasses and I imagine that Whole Foods probably carries it, too. Regular molasses also works great.

I did a chocolate date torte that I made a simple glaze for, it was just chocolate, butter, vanilla, salt and a little date molasses, spread thinly on top of the torte and then sprinkled with toasted sesame. It wasn't much but it helped the dessert immensely.

And Now, a Frozen Yogurt Made With Liquid Nitrogen

Gosh you guys are never happy. This looks great and I'm so stopping by some day after work.

Chocoholic: Flourless Coconut Lime Cake with White Chocolate Whipped Cream

This is awesome! I recently had a blood orange and toasted almond flour cake on my menu at work that used this method and have been thinking about using other citrus and flours to achieve different results. I'll wait on this until limes no longer cost half my paycheck though ;)

Also loving the white chocolate in the chocoholic column, more love for the (un)dark horse of the chocolate family!!!

Ask a Bartender: Cocktail Experiment Failures

Oh hi Jason! :D

Cookie Monster: Earl Grey Tea Cookies

Heh, I have that same cutter and did matcha cookies almost as soon as I got it home. The flecks of tea are so pretty!

Real Talk: Stop Bashing Ice Cream Stabilizers

Lol at calling commercial stabilizers "non-natural." Guar, carrageenan, etc. are all plant-derived substances, not spooky chemistry experiments. That said, I hate the texture that most of them give things, and some are awful for long term storage. Guar in particular.

Since I make gelato at work, I've been playing with different ways to strike the balance between stable recipes that don't get creepy textures if we don't sell them right away but also don't freeze too hard or come out so fatty they leave a film in your mouth (which is an issue with things churned in a gelato machine, as it incorporates very little air compared to ice cream machines). My favorite gelato base so far, at least for infused flavors, relies on whole eggs and a little cornstarch and is like loose pudding before churning. Flavors are strong and true, the product is stable and not too fatty (I use more milk than cream, which is common in gelato recipes). For sorbets, if I'm using something that doesn't provide enough pulp or pectin naturally to stabilize itself, my go to is an Eddy Van Damme base using powdered pectin. Best pomegranate sorbet I've ever had and it works with citrus, too. Pectin feels more natural in a sorbet since it's fruit-derived and it holds well. Occasionally I'll use an Italian meringue to stabilize, like when I did a gin and tonic sorbet, but it isn't perfect for long term storage and is best for things I churn regularly.