Barbra Austin

I’ve been wanting to attempt this dessert since having it at Le Bal Café a few weeks ago, and Friday’s nuptials seemed like a good occasion to try a little bit of British dessert cookery.

I accidentally made two of these cakes a few weeks ago.

This turned out to be a happy accident.

Life is not a bowl of cherries. It’s not like a box of chocolates, either, unless some of those chocolates happen to have bad timing, sinus infections and heartbreak at their centers. Do I sound bitter?

I thought I might feel better if I did a little baking (speaking of clichés). It usually works.

I got an email recently from my friend Bonnie, wondering what would happen if she substituted butter for the Crisco called for in her mom’s “crazy delicious” rhubarb coffee cake recipe.

I replied to her query by saying, “The cake will be more delicious, that’s what will happen.” And I asked for the recipe.

Parfait is perfect for those who like creamy frozen desserts but don’t have an ice cream machine.

In other words, me.

When I first made this cake years ago with my friend Heather we used pecans, but pecans are not so easy to find here in Paris.

We also wrote a song about it, which I’m sure is funny only to us. I will not share it with you.

Though I generally prefer dark chocolate, there’s no denying that milk chocolate pairs very well with certain flavors. Peanut butter and bananas, for example.

Though irrefutably Bordelais, the little cakes known as cannelés have conflicting origin stories. One attributes their development to a group of nuns. A more sentimental spin credits resourceful Bordeaux residents, who scooped up flour spilled from sacks during unloading at the port and used it to make the cakes for impoverished children.

If you hide a dried bean in this pastry and eat it on or around the 6th of January, it’s called a Galette des Rois. The rest of the year it’s a Pithiviers.

Thanksgiving is here, and that means one thing: Pie. Lots and lots of pie.