Fresh on the heels of a look back at 2013 it’s time to look ahead to 2014!  Perhaps you have resolved to learn a language, or run a marathon, or volunteer once a week.  Or, perhaps you would like to start baking your own bread!  Over the past few months I’ve talked with several friends about […]

It’s the time of year when mailboxes are stuffed with letters detailing the year’s adventures, so why not get in on the action?  56 posts and 7,900 visitors later, 2013 is in the books.  Here’s your Bakers & Best 2013 Year in Review! You knew 2013 would be good when it started with apple cinnamon […]

The first bread book I purchased was Peter Reinhart’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice.  In the introductory pages he outlines the twelve steps of making bread, from mixing and fermentation to cooling and storing.  Before all of those, however, is the critical mise en place, French for putting in place.  Essentially it means that before you start […]

A well stocked spice rack never ceases to open up a world of opportunity when cooking.  My fiancée is particularly good at mixing together the many complex Indian spices, and we often cook out of Julie Sahni’s Classic Indian Cooking, which we inherited from her parents.  I’ve made naan before but otherwise had not ventured out […]

Last weekend I journeyed west on I-94 to Chicago to go to the Michigan-Northwestern football game.  I was pretty excited to see two close friends who live there and had planned the trip several months ago. Unbeknownst to me, but known to seemingly everyone else on this planet, almost a dozen other friends had planned for […]

Last Thursday was a very exciting day for me, as Bakers & Best passed 10,000 all time page views!  While about 70% of those have been from within the US, the other 30% come from 94 other countries!  The UK, Canada, Australia, and Germany round out the top 5.   I’ve had visitors from Brunei, […]

Baguettes are, in theory, very simple.  There is no reason for them to have anything more than flour, water, yeast, and salt.  Yet online you can find an infinite number of recipes and techniques to make them.  For a few years I’ve been making Peter Reinhart’s pain a l’ancienne baguettes with great success.  However that bread, […]

This week the pumpkin recipe train keeps rolling along!  A few weeks ago we got one of those Trader Joe’s inserts in the mail advertising all things pumpkin that they were currently selling.  Well, it worked, and two weeks ago we made a very successful trip to Trader Joe’s and came back with pumpkin ale […]

Word on the street is that Jeremy Gallon eats pumpkin bagels before a game; he had a Big 10 record 369 receiving yards in Saturday’s 63-47 victory over Indiana.  Now in my mind the real MVP was the kid in the front row of the student section dressed as one of these.  I am yet […]

Despite starting the season 4-0, the Michigan football team has had its fair share of struggles against lesser opponents.  I’ve studied the film, poured over the stat sheets, and concluded what they’re desperately missing: bread bowls.  Well, bread bowls and an offensive line that can hold against a 4 man pass rush.  But soup in […]