[2] Just a taste, from Tsunami Sushi in Lafayette, Louisiana (photo © Tsunami Sushi).

[3] A quart of oysters from our favorite oyster grower, Willapa Oysters. They’re grown in the cleanest waters in the USA (photo courtesy Willapa Oysters).

We like to serve fried oysters as a first course, on a bed of greens with remoulade sauce, which also dresses the salad.

There are different approaches to fried oysters. Some people dredge them in flour, then an egg wash, then bread crumbs.

If the oysters are good, they should release their flavor as close to your palate as possible. No extra layer of breading is required…or desired.

That’s also why we won’t turn the oysters into a po’ boy: The bread gets in the way of tasting the gems of the sea.

The remoulade recipe is a spicier variation of the French classic: a version you’d find served with fried oysters in New Orleans.
 
 
RECIPE: FRIED OYSTERS

Ingredients Per Quart Of Oysters (32 Meats*)

For The Oysters

For The Louisiana Remoulade Sauce

You can make the remoulade 1 to 2 days in advance to let the flavors meld.

 
For Serving

You can use a pot or a deep skillet to fry.

1. MAKE the remoulade sauce: Combine the ingredients and refrigerate until ready to serve.

2. DRAIN the shucked oysters. Season the milk with garlic powder, paprika and hot sauce, and soak the oysters for 30 minutes before frying.

3. PREHEAT the canola oil to 350°F. While the oil is heating…

4. WHISK together the flour, cornmeal, salt and pepper together in a separate casserole dish. When ready to fry, drain the oysters and dredge through the flour mixture, coating completely. Tap off the excess flour.

5. FRY in batches of 4 or 5 (the oysters need space between them), using tongs to place the oysters in the hot oil. Cook until golden brown, about 2 minutes (“rare” is better for juicy, succulent oysters).

6. DRAIN for a minute on a paper towel-lined plate. Serve hot atop the greens with a lemon wedge and ramekin of remoulade sauce.

________________

*There are approximately 32 medium-large shucked oysters per quart (4″ across in the shell before shucking).

†Creole seasoning is a mix of paprika, cayenne pepper, oregano, dried sweet basil and other spices, depending on the producer. Cajun seasoning is a mix of garlic powder, paprika, black pepper, onion powder, cayenne pepper, oregano, thyme, and red pepper flakes. If you don’t want a spicy remoulade you can leave it out; or mix some of the ingredients you have to get the 1-2 teaspoons for the recipe.
 
  

We had never heard of naked cake when, in our first apartment, we began to bake Easter cakes. For years, we had a Nordicware lamb-shape cake mold. We baked a chocolate cake (a black sheep, as it were), frosted it in vanilla, and covered it with white flaked coconut.

One year, we outgrew the lamb, gave the mold away, and moved on to a layer cake. The sides were covered in white coconut and the top was green-tinted coconut, the “grass” upon which we placed our favorite malted-milk speckled candy Easter eggs.

After years of dying coconut, and with complaints from those who didn’t like coconut cake (you know who you are!), last year we made this Speckled Easter Malted Milk Cake.

Alas, lacking a good hand for smooth icing, ours didn’t look quite this pretty. We haven’t met anyone who can show us the trick.

So this year, we’re minimizing the need for icing by going with a naked cake (see photos).

A naked cake can have a light, uneven swath of frosting on the outside with naked cake showing through (see the nakedness here).

Or, it can have no side frosting at all. That solves my particular challenge!

> The history of cake and the different types of cake.
 
 
NAKED CAKE VS. STACK CAKE: THE DIFFERENCE

Is a naked cake the same as a stack cake? No.

Both of these layer cakes are so newly trendy that the terms are often used interchangeably. But they are different:

 
 
EASTER CAKE IDEAS

We like the concept of stack cake as a modern party idea—a pot-luck cake, as it were. Here’s how to throw a stack cake party.

This Easter, we’re not going to ask everyone to bring a layer (maybe next year, guys). So we’re making a naked cake.

We’re currently thinking orange pound cake layers topped with a great ganache. (It’s great when you make it from the best chocolate, like Callebaut or Valrhona). Make any cake and frosting recipes you like, 2 or 3 layers. You can add fruit to the frosting layers (raspberries, sliced strawberries).

Thanks to the video below, we’re topping our cake a chocolate nest, filled with our [still favorite after all these years] speckled malted milk eggs. It is a really easy technique.

You can find other nest recipes made with everything from shredded wheat and pretzel sticks to Chinese fried noodles and uncooked rice vermicelli. Trust us: The chocolate nests are easier—and taste better.

You have plenty of time to practice: All you need is sugar water, melted chocolate, two pans, a bowl, and a squeeze bag.
 
 
VIDEO: HOW TO MAKE CHOCOLATE NESTS

[2] Carrot cake is a great choice for Easter. You can see how easy it is to turn any cake into an Easter cake with jelly beans and sprinkles. What’s up, doc? (cake from Black Jet Baking Co. | Good Eggs).

[3] We prefer this type of side icing on our naked cakes (photo © King Arthur Flour).

Note that this recipe makes individual nests. For a cake of 8-9 inches diameter, use a bowl as your mold instead of the foil.

We did not make the leaves or feathers shown in the recipe, but instead filled our basket with malted milk eggs.
 
 

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[2] Chocolate chile halva.

[3] Lavender halva.

[4] From the front: chocolate orange, date, lemongrass and marble.

[5] Caffeinated, with ground coffee beans.

[6] Vanilla topped with Pop Rocks.

[7] A halva dessert plate: mixed flavors and fruits.

[8] Dessert plate of halva with dried fruit.

[9] For a special occasion cake, just add a candle.

The sweet confection’s name derives from the Arabic word halwa, which means…sweet confection.

The best halva we can imagine comes from a relatively new company, Seed + Mill, founded by three friends in New York City, one of whom grew up in Israel.

The company was born when the latter friend couldn’t find quality tahini in the U.S., and decided to grind her own. Fresh tahini is ground on-site at their store in Chelsea Market, New York City, and sold along with other sesame-based products.

The company says that theirs is the only store in the U.S. that solely purveys sesame seed products (although we noted a frozen yogurt machine with goat’s milk yogurt).

While all products are excellent, our food-life-changing experience was engendered by the sesame-based confection, halva(h). Seed + Mill makes the most ethereal, exquisite halva we can imagine—and we have been halva-deprived, for reasons we’ll explain in a bit.
 
ARTISAN HALVA

Seed + Mill distinguishes its products using white sesame seeds from Ethiopia, considered the world’s best. Known for their richness of flavor, they are grown in the area of Humera, a city in the northwest corner of Ethiopia, at the borders of Sudan and Eritrea.

Most of the sesame used for halva and tahini sold in the U.S. is made from seeds from India and Mexico, and are not as flavorful. Hence, our disappointment with the halva available to us.

Seed + Mill’s sesame seeds are shipped from Humera to Israel, where they are roasted. Some stay in for a bit in Israel, to be ground in small batches and turned into halva. Whole roasted seeds are shipped to New York, to be ground into tahini.

The halva is made by small Israeli producers to the company’s specifications. The producers use ancient artisan techniques—no machines, but caldrons, paddles, and troughs. The sugar is boiled and whipped into a foam that produces the melting lightness of the confection. Vigorous hand-kneading produces the finest, fluffiest halvah.

Although halva is approximately half sesame paste and half sugar, you can assuage some of the guilt with sesame’s enviable nutrition† and heart-healthy fats.

The confection is only mildly sweet, the opposite of fudge and American candy bars.

And let us add: Seed + Mill has as much in common with halva brands like Joyva as McDonald’s has with Per Se.

Even the large halva cakes sold at Zabar’s and shops on the Lower East Side have become so mediocre through the use of cheaper ingredients, that we gave up eating halvah several years ago.
 
 
THE HISTORY OF HALVA

 
Here’s more halvah history.
 
 
SEED & MILL’S MOST HEAVENLY HALVA

Halva is made when tahini (ground sesame paste) is blended with sugar at a high temperature, and then hand-stirred.

The company boasts 27 flavors, including two sugar-free varieties. They’re all available online, and the retail shop in Chelsea carries about ten them at a time. Some are seasonal; for example, expect cranberry in the fall and lavender in the summer.

Wile many Seed + Mill flavors are vegan, about half of the flavors do include a bit of butter, which makes the halvah even lighter and melt-in-your-mouth. These are noted on the website.

The non-butter flavors meet dietary preferences including dairy-free, gluten-free, paleo, and vegan.

If this seems like a lot of flavors, note that Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-1566), the Ottoman Empire’s longest-reigning sultan, had a special kitchen built next to his palace that was dubbed the helvahane, house of halva. It produced some 30 varieties of the confection.

At Seed + Mill, you’ll find traditional and modern flavors:

 
Sugar-Free Flavors

While you’re at it, treat yourself to a jar of the company’s rich, silky tahini in herb, organic and organic whole seed; and two sesame spices, mixes of sesame with salt or za’atar.

RECIPE: HALVA ICED COFFEE

Seed + Mill adapted this recipe from Ben of Havoc In The Kitchen. He found it in a Russian food magazine, where it was originally made with peanut halva.

The shake-like drink does nicely as a snack, a dessert or, with the whiskey, an after-dinner drink.

Ingredients For 2-3 Servings

 
Preparation

1. COMBINE the coffee, halva, ice cubes, and ice cream in a blender. Process for 5 minutes or until smooth and foamy.

2. STRAIN and discard the tiny pieces of halva and the coffee will be silky and smooth.

[105] Serve halva iced coffee with alone or with halva dessert plate.

*The word is transliterated from Arabic, so either halva or halvah is correct.

†Sesame seeds are one of the world’s healthiest foods. Here’s a nutrition profile.
 
 

[1] Melba toast and olive tapenade. Here’s the recipe from Sprinkles & Sprouts (photo © Sprinkles & Sprouts).

[2] Chicken liver paté and Melba toast, with a dab of marmalade. recipeHere’s the recipe from Drizzle And Drip (photo © Drizzle And Dip).

[3] Salmon tartare and melba toast. Here’s the recipe from Olive Magazine. Crackers or crisps like these are thin and crunchy, but were baked that way. They are not toasted from bread, so are not toasts (photo © Olive Magazine).

[4] These are Raincoast Crisps, a NIBBLE favorite (photo Elvira Kalviste | © THE NIBBLE)).

[5] This is a copycat recipe for Raincoast Crisps from The Wandering Fig (photo © The Wandering Fig).

March 23rd is National Melba Toast Day, celebrating dry, crisp, and thinly sliced toasts.

First, and with all due respect, today’s packaged Melba toast has as much to do with homemade Melba toast as the Keebler Elves have with the best homemade cookies.

Melba toast, which became a diet staple in the U.S. thanks to manufacturers such as Devonsheer and Old London, dates to the end of the 19th century.

But as previously noted, packaged toasts are so dry and unappealing! A recipe to make your own yummy melba toast is below.
 
 
THE HISTORY OF MELBA TOAST

Melba toast was born in 1897 at the Savoy Hotel in London, where the legendary French Chef Auguste Escoffier ruled the kitchen, and César Ritz ran the hotel. Dame Nellie Melba, the great Australian soprano, was a guest.

There is an unsubstantiated tale that Melba toast was a mistake in the hotel kitchen; that the dieting diva asked for some dry toast which arrived as over-toasted, thin, and crunchy slices. However, as with the story of the history of potato chips, the guest enjoyed the result.

The more likely explanation is that Melba toast was created by Escoffier either as a lower-calorie food for the singer, or as simple fare during a bout of illness in 1897 when she was unable to tolerate richer foodstuffs.

See more foods he named for Nellie Melba at the end of this article.

It is said that César Ritz bestowed the name Melba toast, and put it on the menu.

Since then, manufacturers have marketed Melba toast as a reduced-calorie bread option.

But for those who want to enjoy a piece of Melba toast, modern crostini are a much closer match.
 
 
MELBA TOAST & CROSTINI VS. CRACKERS & CRISPS:
THE DIFFERENCE

Those thin toast points served with caviar, pâté and steak tartare…those crunchy toasts served with cheese…are they Melba toast?

And what do they have to do with biscotti and bruschetta?
 
Melba Toast Vs. Crostini

These two are very similar. Both are cut from a loaf of bread and toasted. However:

 
Melba Toast Vs. Crackers/Crisps/Toasts

In the U.S., makers of artisan crackers sometimes call them crisps, to sound more elegant. That works in the U.S., but in the U.K., crisps are potato chips.

 
Bruschetta Vs. Crostini

 
Melba Toast Vs. Biscotti/Rusks

What about savory biscotti?

 
 
WAYS TO SERVE MELBA TOAST

Whatever you call them, serve them:

 
Are you ready to toast your own?
 

RECIPE: MELBA TOAST

Melba toast is made by lightly toasting thin slices of bread in an oven or under a grill (no grill marks!), on both sides.

The thin slices are then returned to the heat with the untoasted sides towards the heat source.

 
Preparation

1. PREHEAT the oven to 250°F. Remove the crust from the loaf. You can save them and turn them into parmesan crisps, or let them dry out overnight and pulse (or use other technique) to make bread crumbs.

2. DECIDE on your toasting technique. (a) Cut the loaf into sections 3 inches thick. Cut each chunk into triangles, then cut each triangle into three or more thin slices. (b) Lightly toast thick slices of bread. While still hot, slice horizontally into two; then create triangles or rectangles as you prefer.

3. PLACE on a baking sheet and toast until golden brown. Toast bread in the oven, flipping slices halfway through, until dry, about 2 hours. Rotate the baking sheet for even browning.

4. COOL thoroughly. Then store in an airtight container.
 

MORE FOODS NAMED FOR NELLIE MELBA

Escoffier created four foods in total, in Melba’s honor. In addition to Melba toast, there are:

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Pipérade (French) or piperrada (Spanish) is a French Basque dish made from green bell pepper, garlic, onion and tomato, sautéd together and seasoned with red espelette pepper.

The word derives from piper, the Basque word for pepper. The colors—red, white and green—are those of the Basque flag (said to be a coincidence).

Basque Country straddles the border between France and Spain on the Atlantic coast, Pyrénées-Atlantiques north and south of the Pyrenees Mountains.

The area has a rich culinary heritage, including some 40 Michelin-starred restaurants and a sheep cheese, Ossau-Iraty, named best cheese in the world at the World Cheese Championships in 2011.

Pipérade is a dish from the Northern Basque Country (French Basque Country), which lies entirely within France and known as Pays Basque Français in French.

Pipérade is related to the Provençal ratatouille, which adds zucchini and eggplant to the mix. Both are colorful and versatile dishes that can be enjoyed any time of the day (and are a delicious way to add to your daily vegetable servings).

WAYS TO SERVE PIPERADE

While many of these applications may not be traditional Basque, they show the flexibility of piperade.
 
Pipérade At Breakfast

 
Pipérade At Lunch

 
Pipérade At Dinner

 
________________
*In French Basque cuisine, piment d’espelette with ham is often served over braised chicken.
________________

 
RECIPE: PIPERADE

When bell peppers are on sale, we load up and make a batch of pipérade (it can be frozen). We’re flexible on the color of the bell peppers (in fact, we prefer a mix of colors ).

While waiting for summer tomatoes (and after they’re gone), we use whole canned San Marzano† tomatoes instead of the bland plum tomatoes in the market. Drain them, but save the juice and drink it, plain or with a splash of gin.

We adapted this recipe from one by Chef Aida Mollenkamp. She peels the tomatoes. We’re lazy and often skip this step (and usually use use the peeled, canned San Marzano tomatoes, anyway).

[1] Pipérade crostini (here’s the recipe from The New York Times, and another recipe for piperade with Arctic char). [2] Eggs poached in pipérade, shakshouka-style (here’s the recipe from Au Petit Gout). [3] Chicken with pipérade, a basque classic (here’s the recipe Williams-Sonoma). [4] Sirloin with pipérade and arugula pesto (photo from Sun Basket meal delivery service).

[5] Fresh espelette peppers in the marketplace (photo courtesy Lurrak). [6] Ground espelette pepper, used in recipes (photo courtesy La Maison du Piment).

Ingredients

________________

†The San Marzano is an heirloom variety of plum tomato, originally planted in the town of the same name at the base of Mount Vesuvius, near Naples. The volcanic soil and sunny climate grow tomatoes that are among the most sought-after on earth, with remarkable, sweet, intense tomato flavor. The canned variety are also delicious.

‡Bayonne ham is a cured ham from the French Basque country. If you can’t find it, substitute prosciutto or other ham.
________________

Preparation

1. PEEL the fresh tomatoes. Bring a large saucepan of water to a boil over high heat. Prepare an ice water bath by filling a medium bowl halfway with ice and water. Using the tip of a knife, remove the stem and cut a shallow X-shape into the bottom of each tomato. Place the tomatoes in the boiling water and blanch until the skin just starts to pucker and loosen, about 10 seconds. Drain and immediately immerse the tomatoes in the ice water bath. Using a small knife, peel the loosened skin and cut each tomato in half. With a small spoon, scrape out any seeds, then core and coarsely chop the remaining flesh. Set aside.

3. RETURN the pan to the heat, add the remaining 2 teaspoons of oil, and, once heated, add the onion and garlic. Cook, stirring a few times, until soft and beginning to color, about 8 minutes. Stir in the herbs and bell pepper slices and season well with salt. Cover and cook, stirring a few times, until the peppers are slightly softened, about 10 minutes.

4. STIR in the diced tomatoes, browned ham, and piment d’Espelette, and season with salt to taste. Cook uncovered until the mixture melds and the juices have slightly thickened, about 10 minutes. Remove the bay leaf and serve.
 
THE ESPELETTE PEPPER
The espelette pepper, called piment d’espelette in French and ezpeletako biperra in Basque, is a variety of species Capsicum annuum that is cultivated in the French commune of Espelette in the Northern Basque Country (Pays Basque Français).

Chiles, which are native to Central and South America, were brought to France in the 16th century. It is believed that the chiles were introduced into the Basque Nive Valley in 1523 by Gonzalo Percaztegi, a navigator who voyaged with Christopher Columbus (who brought chiles to Spain in 1494). It became popular as a condiment and is now a staple of Basque cuisine, where it has gradually replaced black pepper.
This pepper has only a maximum of 4,000 SHUs on the Scoville Scale and is therefore considered only mildly hot—at the level of cayenne and Louisiana hot sauce.

Espelette pepper can be purchased as fresh or dried whole peppers (photo #5), as ground pepper (photo #6), as purée in jars or pickled in jars. For fresh espelette, look for non-AOC espelette peppers grown in California.

Growing in French soil, its unique qualities have earned it AOC and APO classifications. An annual pepper festival organized by Confrérie du Piment d’Espelette, held the last weekend in October since 1968, attracts some 20,000 tourists [source].

If you can’t find it, substitute hot paprika or cayenne.

See the different types of chiles in our Chile Glossary.