There is hardly a more Italian way of celebrating the holidays than a slice of panettone and a flute of prosecco, a December ritual in homes, cafes, and restaurants throughout Italy. This sweet toque-shaped yeast bread stuffed with raisins and candied orange and lemon peel originated in Milan. It’s often served with a sauce of zabaglione, a custardy sauce made with egg yolks, sugar, and Marsala wine, or crema di mascarpone, and accompanied with a glass of sweet wine such as Moscato d’Asti. The name panettone comes from the Italian word “panetto,” a small loaf cake. The addition of the suffix “-one” makes it a large cake.

The origins of the cake date back to a type of leavened cake sweetened with honey and enjoyed by nobility during the Roman Empire. The cake makes cameo appearances in Italian paintings in the 16th century and is associated with Christmas in the 18th-century writings of Pietro Verri, who wrote an epic history of Milan.

But Panettone didn’t become a household item until 1925 when Angelo Motta, a Milanese baker, began commercial production of the bread. He’s credited with modifying the shape from a low, dense loaf to the tall, airy bread we know today. He introduced a natural leavening process, more like that used in sourdough, and allowed the bread to rise three times over 18 hours before baking. This produces the bread’s lightness and soft texture.

Motta’s bread was an enormous success and soon a competitor arose. Giacchino Alemagna created a similar bread, pricing his higher. The competition proved good for both brands, with Motta seen as the panettone of the middle-class, while Alemagna targeted those willing and able to pay premium prices. Today, the brands Motta and Alemagna dominate the market. Over 100 million panettone are produced by Italian bakeries each holiday season. Italy only has 60 million people! Even with about 10% of production bound for export that is a lot of panettone per person.

While commercial production of panettone dominates in Italy and abroad, many small bakeries (or le pasticcerie in Italy) make their traditional versions of the famous bread. Macrina’s version was inspired by a recipe in Carol Field’s wonderful book The Italian Baker. Our loaf is studded with candied citrus and dried fruits and enriched with eggs and butter. Nowadays it’s easy to find decorative paper baking molds, but I prefer to bake these loaves in clay flowerpots, which look beautiful and make great holiday gifts. The dough takes time and cannot be rushed, but it’s more than worth the wait. If you’re looking for an alternative to the version shipped over from Italy you can pick one up at any of our cafes this month, or find my recipe in the Macrina Bakery and Cafe Cookbook. Then grab a bottle of prosecco and invite some friends over for a very Italian holiday celebration.

Happy Holidays, Leslie

In the kind of cosmic connection that makes us all smile, Gary Snyder, co-owner of Geraldine’s Counter and now co-owner of Heyday, shares a random point of intersection with that other Gary Snyder, the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, Zen Buddhist, and protagonist of Jack Kerouac’s Dharma Bums. The publisher of Gary Snyder, the poet, is also named Heyday. Gary Snyder, the restauranteur, had no idea. He and his business partner, Dang Nguyen, chose the playful name because the space is located on Day Street in Seattle’s quiet Mount Baker neighborhood. “Names are really hard to come by,” Snyder said. “My partner came up with Heyday and it just stuck. It works.”Heyday is no ordinary burger joint. Starting with the interior. The space was designed by Graham Baba, the architect behind many treasured eating spots such as Melrose Market, Chophouse Row, and La Spiga. Floor-to-ceiling windows, sleek lighting, concrete floors, slotted wood on the walls and ceiling, and the use of lots of blue in the tile work that surrounds the bar and an inspired geometric mural that adorns a back wall give the space a warm, modern look.And the burgers aren’t the usual assortment. The menu was created by Melissa Nyffeler, the former chef/owner of the beloved Capitol Hill restaurant Dinette, which closed in 2013. The Saigon patty has equal portions beef, pork, and shrimp and is topped with Napa cabbage, fresh mint, cilantro, pickled daikon, carrots, and Sriracha aioli. Other offerings are made with lamb, bison, falafel, jerk chicken, and cod. All are served on Macrina Bakery’s potato buns and served with a side of the house-made pickles. Creative starters such as blackened cauliflower are excellent, and so are the hand-cut french fries that are deep-fried twice for the perfect crunch. The thick, crispy onion rings shouldn’t be overlooked. Another standout is the house-made pickled vegetables served with every burger and available as an appetizer.Snyder and crew went through a lengthy process to choose the right bun for their burgers, looking for one that would hold all the ingredients without getting soggy or being so firm that the filling squeezes out. “Originally I thought we should have a different bun that works for each burger,” Snyder said. “We sampled multiple buns from different bakeries. Macrina’s potato bun just worked, and it worked on every burger. Such a good bun. It toasts really well. We decided we didn’t need different varieties.”Heyday is family-friendly, with the space split about evenly between seating in the adults-only bar and the all-ages restaurant side. “We get a lot of families. I almost wish I had more room than I do. That’s the part that fills the quickest,” Snyder said.While the neighborhood is quiet, Heyday is open late. Regular hours are Tuesday through Sunday, 4 p.m. to 11 p.m, with the kitchen serving until 10 p.m. At some point next year weekend brunch may become a reality. Keep your ears open. Geraldine’s brunch is so highly-regarded that the to-be-determined offerings will surely be worth investigating.  

I’m always surprised how much goes into making one of our short videos. Patrick Kehoe, a local director and photographer, has worked with me to produce eight videos so far. We have our rhythm down. Cooking in front of a camera doesn’t intimidate me—especially with recipes I’ve made hundreds of times before—but it’s still a lot of work. I want everything to look just right and to convey the tranquility I feel living out on Vashon Island and to share my love for cooking, especially with vegetables and fruits and edible flowers I’ve grown myself.For our fall video I chose pumpkin pie, for the obvious reasons, but also inspired by a beautiful pumpkin in my garden. It still impresses me that this beautiful large squash grew out of one of the dry little seeds I planted in April.On the day of filming, I woke early—baker’s hours—to get the house ready. The day was overcast, but thankfully not raining, something you can’t count on in October around here. Patrick prefers to film in natural light, so I set up my dining room table near the windows as a work table. I made two recipes of the Flaky Pie Dough from my first cookbook. Since each recipe makes enough for two crusts I’d have plenty extra, just in case. When filming you always need to be sure there is extra. You never know when you might need to reshoot something. Then I set about making one pumpkin pie in advance. Having one finished already makes the shoot go faster. When I put the one I made on camera into the oven, we were able to move right into filming the finished pie.With my food prep finished I made sure there were eggs in the chicken coop and that nothing had happened to the garden pumpkins. Next I arranged my work table, putting all the tools and ingredients out that I would need. I take great pride in displaying ingredients in colorful bowls and using family dishes collected over the years. The final detail was to instruct my dad, who’d agreed to help, when to get the pizza for lunch. In the past, we’d worked twelve hours without eating. A terrible idea, especially when working with food all day.Patrick and his assistant Casey arrived punctually at ten with their bags and boxes of cameras. While Casey set up, Patrick and I went over the script I’d prepared. We broke it into nine scenes: fetch eggs from the chicken coop; get pumpkin from the garden; cut, clean, roast pumpkin; roll out the pie dough; bake the crust; make the decorative leaves for the pie with the extra dough; make the filling; bake the pie; cut and serve a slice. With only one dish—the pie—this video was easier than others we’d done.Before starting each shot we choreograph the action. I explain to Patrick what I’m going to do. We do a dry run to see what it looks like. With our rehearsal done, Patrick sets up the cameras for the shots he wants. As we get going there are lots of pauses, lots of “stand by’s” and “go for it’s.” Often I must repeat actions slowly. Patrick stops to change lenses or cameras, working to get the best shot. He has a remarkable eye, lots of patience, and a great way of talking me through the process.We progressed from the chicken coop to the garden, getting the shots we needed, all with my dog Louis barking. This is life on the farm. Louis doesn’t tolerate visitors as gracefully as my other dog Jasper.  But the extra noise doesn’t matter since we record the sound last. Patrick mixes the audio with the video back in his studio.By about noon we had the squash cut and roasting in the oven as well as the pie crust when my dad showed up with the pizza—lunch time. After a short break we resumed filming the finished pie, using the one I had baked earlier in the morning. I always fuss with the final presentation and this time was no different. I added some grapes to the plate for color, added the sweetened whipped cream, and sprinkled the plate with a mix of powdered sugar and cinnamon. Then I added one of the leaves I’d cut from the leftover dough and baked. It didn’t look right. Fortunately I had seven more slices. I nailed it on the next one—without the leaf.Later in the afternoon we finished filming the filling and had baked the second pie. Only the talking parts remained. Maybe because I’m tired by this point, or because I’m not as practiced at narrating all the details of what I do when I’m cooking, this is always the harder part. I create an outline. This helps me talk more authentically. Patrick is really helpful at pulling out key phrases. While we can do take after take, the more retakes we do the more difficult it feels to me. Sometimes I get too lavish in my descriptions, over-explaining the process, and Patrick has to rein me in. “This is going to be a short video,” he reminds me.After what feels like too long, my liveliness waning, we had what we needed. Patrick and Casey packed up their gear and I worked on cleaning up the many dishes I’d created, amazed again that it had taken twelve hours to film a four-minute video. But the results were worth it. They always are.LeslieClick here to see the video.

Thanksgiving is such a special time of year, a time for family and friends to come together to celebrate food. Not surprisingly, the Thanksgiving holiday is the busiest time of year for us at Macrina. Demand for our offerings has grown every year. So many customers have told me how helpful it is to get items from us—our pumpkin pie, for instance—that allows them to spend more time with family and friends, offerings they know will shine.

And isn’t it really the sides and the pie that make the Thanksgiving holiday? I enjoy a slice or two of turkey, but what I go for is the stuffing, the vegetables, the cranberries, the rolls, and at my table anyway, various crostini with interesting spreads. To this end, we make a stuffing mix that has gotten very popular. We used to sell the stuffing mix only in the cafes, making it with leftover bread. Now we bake loaves just for the stuffing mix. You can find them at many places that carry Macrina’s breads. Our crostini and spreads have also taken off, as have our dinner rolls, our Winter Pear Crown and, of course, our pies.

We start our planning in early September when I sit down with our lead bakers, our savory department, and our retail managers. We talk about past favorites and new ideas. We test recipes. When we finally have our season’s list of offerings, we talk about logistics. This is no small challenge. Even with our fabulous space in Sodo, which once seemed so big, we are bursting at the seams. The spatial challenges and work-flow planning fall on the capable shoulders of Production Manager Jane Cho. The mixers run around the clock now, with three shifts managing dough production. On Thanksgiving eve last year they mixed nearly 20,000 pounds of dough. A seasonal crew is brought in to help with the production and packaging of the stuffing mix. Given the limited floor space, Jane maps out the production floor on charts that resemble architectural renderings.

I work with Head Baker Phong Bui on all the items, such as this year's Porcini Roll Tray, or the Winter Pear Crown, a sweet bread spiked with black pepper. Mi Kim, our head pastry chef, stays busy prepping lots of pie shells, pies, and ingredients to be ready for the big Thanksgiving rush. She says, “Every day is a busy day for our bakers once the holiday season is here! Long days are logged from everyone when needed, and we have fun doing it!”

In our savory department, Savory General Manager Marilyn Mercer and her team, in addition to preparing items for the cafes, are busy making the spreads, including a new one, a smoked trout spread. Savory Assistant Manager Elizabeth Hall says, “It’s Scandinavian-inspired, with smoked white trout from Gerard & Dominique, a premium purveyor of smoked fish, located right here in Washington state. We blend the smoked trout with a hint of horseradish, cream cheese, scallions, parsley, chervil, and lemon.”

The cafes must also do lots of extra planning, upping their pars to ensure they have enough on the shelves for their customers. Crystal Kitchin, general manager of cafes, starts the month off with a two-night Thanksgiving tasting. Each member of the retail staff tastes the products and learns how different items pair so they can help guide customers. On Thanksgiving Eve the management team comes in early in the morning to put together the long list of special orders that have been placed throughout the month. Elizabeth Krhounek, general manager of the McGraw Cafe, says, “Being here at 2:30 in the morning in my pajamas to get all the orders ready is really fun, also putting on music we usually can’t listen to in the store. Last year my lead came in wearing his red onesie pajamas.”

While all the extra work provides new challenges, it’s exciting to see all the teamwork. “In production you see everyone moving fast, working their hardest, but we have fun,” Jane Cho says. “It’s exciting. And then after months of planning it’s just suddenly over and we get to enjoy the holiday with family and friends.” It really is a rush, in every sense. I love it all.

Our Thanksgiving menu is now available for the whole month of November. We will be taking advanced orders for the holiday through noon, November 23rd.

Leslie

Last year was the first year I grew my own squash for our Thanksgiving pumpkin pie. We did a taste test between canned and fresh, and surprise, fresh squash won. My favorite pumpkin variety is the New England Pie Pumpkin. You can find the seeds in many local garden stores. It’s fun planting a garden in April, nurturing it through the summer and waiting for the squash to ripen in the fall. It’s even more fun cutting that pumpkin up and turning it into pie!The pie crust recipe I use is Flaky Pie Dough from More From Macrina cookbook. We sell this pie as well as many other Thanksgiving treats at our cafes. Do come visit and see what we’ve got cooking. Watch the video to learn how I prepare my special pumpkin pie and follow the recipe links below.Garden Pumpkin Pie RecipeFlaky Pie Dough Recipe

I love the breads made by Jim Lahey at Sullivan Street Breads in New York City. He’s one of America’s great artisan bakers. He bakes most of his crusty European-style breads until they're quite dark. They come out of the oven burnished, with an amazing crackle when you bite into them. But he also makes a few loaves with thin, light brown crusts. My partner, Matt Galvin, sampled an airy bread of his on a trip to New York - not quite baguette, not quite breadstick and not quite focaccia.  Matt suggested something like this would make a nice addition to our line of breads. I set out to create something similar but uniquely Macrina.Stecca, a soft “sweet” (meaning not sour) baguette, is made with our yeast-risen ciabatta dough. The loaves are baked closely together, “kissing” we call it, which results in soft sides. This makes it an ideal bread for sandwiches of all kinds. It has a light, golden crust and a well-aerated irregular crumb structure. Stecca is now available in all of our cafes.Beginning in 2016, we will begin offering a Green-Olive Stecca exclusively in our cafes. Studded with green olives, brushed with extra-virgin olive oil, and garnished with fresh herbs this bread is hard to resist.

In Mexico, Pan de Muerto, or bread of the dead, is a flavorful sweet bread traditionally baked during the weeks leading up to the Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, which is celebrated on November 1st and 2nd. All month leading up to the official celebration people enjoy this bread. On Dia de los Muertos, the bread is taken to the gravesite, often along with the favorite food of the deceased, and eaten there. Food is very important to the celebration, for it is thought the dead are driven back to the living by the scent of their favorite foods.Our Pan de Muerto is made in honor of this wonderful tradition. A soft round of sweet, yeast-risen bread with a crunchy cinnamon sugar glaze, ours is studded with fresh orange zest and spiced with orange flower water, cinnamon, cardamon, and cloves. We lay two crossed links of dough over the top to symbolize crossbones. They represent those no longer among the living. This bread, sliced and toasted for breakfast or dipped in Mexican hot chocolate as an afternoon snack is a decadent treat.Pan de Muerto is in our cafes up through the Day of the Dead. You can also find it at Metropolitan Markets and Town and Country Markets.Leslie 

“These are the guys that turned down Guy Fieri,” Ornella Lorenzo blurted out.“Not because we didn’t want the exposure,” her husband, Lucas Lorenzo protested. “We’re just not the best at publicity, actually we’re pretty bad. I mean, look at us. We suck on paper. We didn’t attend a fancy culinary institute, we’ve never traveled the world sourcing the best international flavors. We just grew up working with my dad, day in and day out, learning the recipes and cuisine he brought with him from Cuba.”Welcome to Un Bien, the child of Paseo, or more accurately, a restaurant by the children of Lorenzo Lorenzo (his real name), the founder and former owner of Paseo, arguably Seattle’s most celebrated sandwich shop. For over 20 years, until it’s abrupt closing last November, Paseo was a favorite of locals and travelers alike. Lorenzo's two children, Julian and Lucas Lorenzo, worked weekends at Paseo while in high school and full-time for the last five years. When their father, amidst some legal trouble, abruptly closed both stores, Julian and Lucas were left without jobs.Four months ago they opened Un Bien at 7302 15th Ave NW in Ballard, at the former site of Burger Hero (and Lunchbox Laboratory before that). They've painted the building a Caribbean-pink and are serving many of the same sandwiches that made Paseo famous—such as the nationally-renowned Caribbean Roast. They use the same bread Paseo did for 20 years, the Giuseppe Roll made by Macrina, the perfect roll for a robust sandwich like the Caribbean Roast—not so soft that it collapses under the weight and juices of the marinated pork, aioli, onions, lettuce, and jalapeños, and not so firm that the sandwich’s ingredients spill out into your lap (or at least most of them) when you take a bite.They opened with a staff comprised entirely of former Paseo employees. Business has been brisk, largely fueled by word of mouth. To keep up, they’ve recently had to hire two new employees. Lucas works the kitchen in the mornings, Julian in the evenings. They are busy at lunch and then again later at dinner. As their father was, they are very protective of the secret ingredients in the marinades. But they’ve tweaked things a bit, finding ways to speed up the line by making the kitchen more efficient, adding a helpful new POS system, and accepting credit cards, a big difference from the cash-only days of their father’s Paseo.On a recent weekday afternoon, Un Bien’s long outdoor communal table was full, a steady line at the order window, the kitchen a bustle of activity. Lucas, his wife Ornella, and Julian stood in front, tired from the days work, but grateful to be open and doing their own thing. “We feel very fortunate for the reception we’ve gotten,” Julian said. When asked about the future Lucas said, “We still have to get through our first winter. We work to make the food we know the best we can. We’re proud to make our father’s recipes, to carry that on, and also to be doing our own thing. One day at a time. We’re restaurant people, that’s what we do.”Un Bien:  7302 15th Ave NW; Open Wednesday-Saturday 11 am - 9 pm and Sunday 11 am - 8 pm; Closed Monday and Tuesday

Sunset Magazine is featuring my kitchen in the October issue. Truth be told, the article is sweet to include me, but the true focus is my all-time favorite cabinets. Kerf Design, located in the Interbay neighborhood of Seattle, built them. The owner and designer, Nathan Hartman, is a sweet, quiet man with a remarkable, creative aesthetic. He designed the cabinets for my kitchen with function in mind, aiming for a sleek, modern look. The cabinets are constructed of one-inch maple laminate plywood. To brighten them up and add a sense of playfulness we added colorful laminate inserts. The farm-style open shelves work well for me. I appreciate being able to see where everything is and it forces me to be clean, like working in an open kitchen. I don’t think the cabinets could be more beautiful. Surprisingly they are far from the most expensive in their league. Initially, I worried about how they would hold up. I’ve seen plenty of home kitchens that look spectacular but don’t look like they were designed to get a lot of use. I knew mine would, and it has. The cabinets have held up beautifully. The magazine is on newsstands now, or you can check out the article here.Leslie 

You know what they say about the best-laid plans. When I got involved in the planning stages of Les Dames D’escoffier’s Green Tables Summer Supper, an annual fundraiser for an organization I’m part of, no one could have predicted the historic windstorm we would have to deal with. August in the Pacific Northwest is about as reliably sunny and beautiful as anywhere on the globe. We get our wind and our rain alright, just not in August.This year’s Summer Supper was an elegant outdoor tour of Washington’s Skagit Valley, a place with some of the best soil in the country and one of the state’s premier growing regions. We wanted to show off a variety of the great foods that grow in the region. Guests were invited to tour the Taylor Shellfish Farm at 12:30 in the afternoon. The next stop was Hedlin Farms, a 100-year old farm comprised of 300 acres of seed crops that ship around the world, 40 acres of organically grown produce, and 2 acres of hothouses lined with beautiful heirloom tomatoes and peppers. From there everyone moved to La Conner Flats, a scenic farm with 11 acres of breathtaking European display gardens. The capstone to the day was a dinner al fresco featuring Skagit Valley ingredients at Cathy Conner’s 1890’s home on Fir Island, prepared by several Les Dames d’Escoffier’s chefs, including myself.Four days before the event we were very nervous about rain. Just rain, not the unbelievable winds that the tropical storm heading our way from Hawaii would bring. Cathy Conner borrowed six tents to provide cover for the dining guests. Set for rain, should it happen, we procured the best local foods and wines, we chopped, marinated, and baked. The sold-out event had to go well. It’s a really important fundraiser for Green Tables and provides grants to support teaching and training students to cook seasonally healthy foods and garden-to-table concepts.As guests began to show up at Taylor Shellfish, the fierce wind howled off the hills, gusts reaching over 50 miles per hour. (I would learn later that we experienced record high winds for the month of August.) The tide was out and guests walked right out to the oyster fields to look at geoducks and baby oysters in various stages of development. With seriously wind-blown hair, guests finished their visit with a delicious tasting of Shigoku oysters paired with a crisp white wine from La Conner’s Hellam’s Wine Cellar. So far so good, but I sure worried about those tents.On our drive over to Hedlin Farms, the second stop, we saw many trees and branches down. Dave Hedlin and Serena Campbell have been farming the family land since 1974, the fourth generation to do so. Serena gave a gracious tour, explaining why the soil is so good for growing organic seed crops. The farm produces the bulk of the cabbage seeds for the kimchi market in Korea. Plump large heirloom tomatoes filled their hoop houses. Cherry tomatoes tasted like candy picked right off the vine. During high season, they pick half a ton of tomatoes every day.In between snacking on the tomatoes and enjoying the scenery of the farm, I learned the power had gone out. I conferred with the kitchen crew. We’d prepped really well, but we still had a lot of cooking to do, heating up sauces, sautéing spinach and gnocchi, roasting the potato gratin, and so forth. With all the trees down we couldn’t count on the power coming back anytime soon. We’d all planned on going to each stop but leaving the last stop before dinner a little early. Scratch that. We needed more time to deal with the unknown. A bunch of us made a beeline for Cathy’s house to see what we were up against. Stressful as it was, I never doubted we’d figure it out, somehow. One thing you learn working in a busy kitchen is to expect the unexpected. You hone your improvisational skills and make the best of what you’ve got.The group moved on to La Conner Flats, a smaller family-run farm, with beautiful gardens that, I hear, got a little roughed up by the winds. The farm would be a perfect venue for a wedding, with its beautiful broad lawn filled with different varieties of pear and apple trees, and at the back a gazebo surrounded by circled rows of different colored roses. Amongst many other crops, they grow delicate teeny-tiny cucumbers, all of which are reserved for Canlis restaurant. It was at this farm that the Seattle Culinary Academy created the farmer/student partnership that Les Dames d’Escoffier made possible. The guests enjoyed wine from Hellam’s Wine Cellar in La Conner and local cheese while touring the gardens.Meanwhile, back at Cathy Conner’s house, we surveyed the damage. The wind had blown the tents many feet from where we’d set them up. And there was no power. Fortunately, we had several grills, and the stove top was gas. A team worked on fixing the tents and readying candles while the rest of us tackled the food. As we were lighting the grills, the winds began to die down, thankfully. Between the grills and the gas burners in the house, we were able to do most things. The challenge was the potato gratin that needed to bake for 45 minutes. We improvised. Grilled gratin it would be. After starting it, we moved it to the grill's warming rack. While we couldn’t caramelize the top, it cooked beautifully.The candles cast a beautiful light on the tables. It would be a lovely setting. But without any electricity we would have to be sure we got everyone back to their cars before the daylight vanished. Out in the country it gets very dark. We would have to stay on a tight schedule. Everyone worked together and we stayed on pace.The guests arrived on time and in good spirits, despite the wild weather. Cathy’s home, barn, and gardens are absolutely stunning. The guests were led on tours by the women of Les Dames while enjoying a summer berry vodka spritzer and passed appetizers. Mother nature had whipped up quite a storm, but it wasn’t going to stop us. We seated everyone for a starter of homemade gnocchi and grilled spot prawns, followed by an entree of sockeye salmon and a chimichurri spiced lamb chop, and finally an apple crostata with my quince caramel and Cathy’s soft cream. Exhausted, but exhilarated, I gave my best heartfelt thanks to everyone, while holding a candle that kept blowing out. It had been a fantastic day. Everyone had a great time. The rain even held off until just after the last guest made it to their car.LeslieLeslie Mackie opened Macrina Bakery in Seattle's Belltown neighborhood in 1993.  Leslie has been an active and devoted member of the Seattle chapter of Les Dames d'Escoffier since 1992.  She finds her work with the Dames to be a wonderful source of mentorship, camaraderie and resource sharing.To find out more information about the Les Dames d'Escoffier Green Tables programs, click here.

Macrina’s head pastry chef, Mi Kim, has a visible presence in our cafes—in the cakes, the croissants, brioche, cookies, and much more—but you rarely see her in person since she’s usually busy in the kitchen turning croissant dough by hand, making Pate a Choux, or putting her artistic touch on a wedding cake. But with Seattle’s Sweet Week approaching, and a recent feature article in bake, a leading trade magazine for members of the baking industry, she’s in the spotlight.Sweet Week, in its second year, is a little like restaurant week, but a lot sweeter. For a full week, beginning this coming Monday, September 14th, through Sunday, September 20th, at participating restaurants and bakeries, you’ll find special $5 items and samplers not ordinary on the menus. Mi Kim created this years’ Macrina offering, the Mini Banana Cake. It features layers of banana cake and chocolate cake filled with roasted bananas, whipped cream, and glazed with ganache. Mi Kim says, “This cake has it all. Delicious layers of chocolate and banana cake, bananas roasted with rum and sugar that turns into a bit of a caramel, and whipped cream to lighten it all up!” The new cake is so good that once Sweet Week is over, Macrina will continue to offer it throughout the fall.Mi Kim also has an entertaining and instructive blog, A Piece of Mi, filled with sweet and savory recipes, baking insights, and bits of her life.We have all enjoyed taste testing Mi Kim's new cake around here, I hope you get to enjoy our new Mini Banana Cake soon.Leslie Mackie 

Throughout time people have gathered to break bread, brought together by warm loaves made from simple ingredients: flour, water, salt. Some special loaves bring people together with religious significance. Challah is just such a loaf. A traditional egg bread in the European Jewish tradition, the rich, golden loaf is similar to brioche or the Russian babka. It is typically eaten at the meal marking the beginning of the Sabbath, the day of rest. Traditionally the loaf is braided to symbolize unity. Some loaves are sprinkled with poppy seeds to symbolize manna from heaven.At Macrina we make Challah every Friday, offering it in both plain and poppy seed. Our recipe came from our friend Andy Meltzer, a former baker at Macrina, who is currently a baking instructor at the Culinary Institute of America. He got the recipe from friends in upstate New York. Our Challah is such a favorite, I included it in the first Macrina Bakery and Cafe Cookbook. We form ours into three braids. It bakes into quite a beautiful loaf. Our challah is a deep golden mahogany color and has a firm crust. Its soft, tight crumb pulls apart easily. Gently sweet, the bread is great toasted, turned into delicate french toast, or passed around the table with a meal.On Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, challah takes on extra significance when it is formed in a circle to recall the cycle of the year. For this occasion the bread is often dipped in honey to represent hopes for a sweet new year. We refer to the circular Challah we make for Rosh Hashanah as a crown. Whether challah is part of your religious tradition, or you just love sharing great food with others, come try this beautiful, symbolic loaf for yourself.This year Rosh Hashanah starts Sunday, September 13th and ends Tuesday, September 15th.  Our three cafes will be well-stocked with challah for the duration of the holidays.Leslie

King County’s first ever CHOMP! festival celebrates local food and green living. The event takes place on September 12th and 13th at Marymoor Park. On Saturday the 12th, King County Executive Dow Constantine and I are hosting a farm to table kickoff dinner. The ticketed event will be held at the Clise Mansion Garden at Marymoor Park’s Willowmoor Farm. I’ll be cooking with several other of Seattle’s top chefs. Come join me for a great meal made from foods grown and produced right here in King County, local beer and wine, and live music. Proceeds from the dinner benefit the Snoqualmie Valley Preservation Alliance, a nonprofit organization committed to protecting the rural character and the viability of farms, residents, and businesses of the Snoqualmie River Valley. Tickets for the dinner are limited. Order your tickets here.On Sunday, September 13th, Chomp! takes over Marymoor Park with a full day of free programming. Two stages will feature some of the best indie music and ethnic folk performances. There will also be cooking demonstrations, local craft beer and wine, food from local, sustainable businesses, plenty of hands-on activities, and interactive demonstrations from King County farmers and businesses. Kids will enjoy a “Pea Patch” that will include family-friendly musical performances, pizza dough tossing lessons for youngsters, and many other fun activities.Chomp! will be fun and informative. It benefits our local food economy by celebrating local farmers, chefs and restaurants that use locally-sourced foods, and local organizations that specialize in healthy food, sustainability, and social justice. Come dance, eat, drink, learn, and grow. All while supporting something really important. What's not to like? Click here to learn more about the event.I hope to see you there.Leslie

https://youtu.be/W213YS1R34oThe best meals always seem to be the spontaneous ones. During summer harvest season, I let the garden inspire my meals. For this lunch, I picked what was ripe, and pulled together a quick and delicious meal for my neighbors. With vegetables this fresh, they don’t need a lot of fuss so I leaned towards simple preparations that allow the natural flavors to shine.Our meal consisted of a sugar snap pea guacamole, oven-roasted sliced beets, simple marinated grilled chicken with herbs and garlic (served with a pistol sauce that was not covered in the video, but in the recipe below), and a just-picked garden salad with a fresh raspberry vinaigrette. Enjoying the gift of a warm, sunny day we dined by the garden. I think food tastes better outside, especially while sharing stories with friends and a nice bottle of chilled rosé.Watch the video above to learn more about how I prepared the meal.You can find the recipes here.Crostini with Snap Pea GuacamoleRoasted BeetsGrilled Chicken with Pistou SauceGarden Salad with Raspberry Vinaigrette

Marilyn is new to Macrina but not to Seattle’s food scene. Over the last 18 years, she’s acquired a wealth of experience while cooking at some of Seattle’s most acclaimed restaurants. After graduating from college with a BA in Art History and Archeology, Marilyn decided to follow her greatest passion: food. She enrolled at the Seattle Culinary Academy at Seattle Central Community College and began cooking at The Ruins. Over the years, she has worked at The Herbfarm, with Tom Douglas, at Ponti Seafood, and Crow, amongst others. Most recently she was the Kitchen Manager for Metropolitan Market.At Macrina Bakery she manages the Savory Department. A typical day starts at 5 or 6 in the morning. She balances her time planning the daily production schedule, cooking with the crew, ordering supplies, and developing new specials. On the weekends she is busy supplying the cafes for their busy brunches, running over to provide support to especially busy cafes, or helping deal with crises such as the occasional equipment breakdown.Marilyn grew up in Seattle’s Magnolia neighborhood, and two of her sisters still live in the Seattle area. In her free time she loves to take long walks with her two dogs, Chloe and Julia Child. She enjoys hiking in the Cascades and Olympics and can often be found cycling on her days off. In the summer, she loves to cook on her large Brinkmann charcoal barbecue in the backyard where she just reaches into her garden for fresh herbs.Her favorite thing about Macrina is the people she works with and the company itself. She says it’s clear the company really cares about each employee and the quality of the breads and pastry and savory is so high and so consistent that the company is growing fast. While that keeps her busy, she’s happy for all the opportunities it provides for her and her crew.

Happy Birthday Julia Child!One of the bakers here at Macrina noticed that Julia Child’s birthday was coming up on August 15th and suggested I write about my experience filming Baking with Julia in 1996. It just so happens I’m currently in Boston visiting my dear friend Susan Regis, a super host as well as a James Beard Award-winning chef so the walk down memory lane is timely in many ways.Susan accompanied me to Julia Child’s house for the filming of my episode that memorable summer day in 1996. Susan, who has presided over some of the most storied Boston kitchens, knew Julia Child through the Cambridge food network. I was glad my supportive friend was with me because I was going to cook in Julia Child’s kitchen. The Julia Child's kitchen! It still gives me goose bumps to think about it. I’d done cooking classes before, but not on television and not standing next to Julia Child’s famous pegboard. It was a dream come true, and yet I was absolutely terrified.I’d met Julia Child briefly back in the 80’s when I cooked at Jasper’s, a great restaurant on the Boston waterfront in its day. I was very surprised and honored when I got a call and heard that Julia Child was interested in featuring me in an episode of Baking with Julia, the show that would go on to win an Emmy Award and a James Beard Award. Macrina had only been open for three years. She traveled to Seattle, visited the bakery, and loved it. I wanted to do bread, my true love, but they had already lined up several very prominent bakers to be on the show. Julia loved our pastries and convinced me to make tarts.When the time came, I flew to Boston and with Susan in tow made my way to Julia Child’s imposing Cambridge clapboard house. The house was bustling with activity. There was a prep kitchen set up in the basement and her kitchen was transformed into a studio, full of lights, people, and cameras. There was a make-up artist, the cookbook writer Dorie Greenspan, who was writing the companion cookbook to the show, the producer Geoffrey Drummond, and several others bustling about.It turned out that the night before we were to film there were some electrical problems and the air-conditioning had gone out. They’d had to bring in a generator and had hooked up an ad hoc cooling system. Silver accordion ducts poked through windows and out of hallways blowing cold air. Those cameras put out a lot of heat. Even with all their efforts it was still mid-eighties in that kitchen. It didn’t feel like a good omen.I planned to make two crusts, our classic pie crust, and our crostata crust. With the pie crust I would make three tarts, a French Apple Tart, a Baked Yogurt Tart with Blackberries and Almonds, and a Blueberry Nectarine Tart. With the crostata crust I would make a Raspberry Fig Crostata. As filming started, we found the dough had to be kept in a cooler between takes. It was too hot and tart dough can be a prickly creature in warm weather. My nerves might have overwhelmed me in this less than ideal scenario if Julia Child wasn’t so graceful. She asked me instinctive questions, leading me along, smoothly adding details to help the home cook. I relaxed in a few minutes.The rest of the day was a blast, even with the hot kitchen. The tarts came out perfectly! I even got to the crostata. Evidently I was fast, and we managed to film more than enough for one show. So I got a bonus half-show that just focused on the crostata. All of the humor and wit and personal connection that you see from Julia Child on the show came across even more between takes. It was unbelievably stimulating and thrilling to be there.As I packed up my stuff, tired, hot, and exhilarated, little did I know that the best part of the day was yet to come. Susan invited Julia Child over to her house for a barbecue on the roof. Susan lived in a North End brownstone, four flights of stairs to the roof. Julia Child was 84 years old then, her husband Paul had passed away two years earlier. To my great surprise, Julia accepted the invitation. Geoffrey Drummond and Dorie Greenspan accompanied her. She scaled the four flights just fine, took a seat in an Adirondack chair and held court with a roof deck of people, most half her age. She talked of meals and wines, recalling nuances of flavor and special dishes fondly. What a memory she had. I think we grilled pizzas and I know there was lots of great food. I barely remember all that now. What I remember is Julia Child, sitting on the roof sharing her passions, not at all pretentious, incredibly approachable, humble, and full of grace.That experience is one of the great memories of my life. The cookbook turned out beautifully. I was so pleased that in addition to my tarts and crostata they included my potato bread as well. It’s so much fun to be back at Susan’s recalling that day.Happy Birthday, Julia Child. You will never be forgotten.Leslie MackieWatch Baking with Julia featuring Leslie Mackie  http://video.pbs.org/video/2250839787/

Early this June I visited Seattle Tilth’s farm incubator in Auburn with Marilyn Mercer, Elizabeth Hall, Mandela Turner, and Crystal Kitchin, Macrina’s brunch team. We were especially excited to visit the farm - Macrina is one of the lucky few establishments that buys freshly grown vegetables from Seattle Tilth for our weekly rotating brunch menus.Seattle Tilth started in 1978 with its Urban Agriculture Center in Wallingford. The Tilth Association began as an alternative agriculture movement with the aim of supporting and promoting biologically sound and socially equitable agriculture in the Pacific Northwest. While the parent association disbanded in 1984, Seattle Tilth has continued to grow and thrive with a stated mission today to inspire and educate people to safeguard our natural resources while building an equitable and sustainable local food system. They teach people to grow food organically while taking care of the environment through a wide variety of classes, programs, and community events. There are classes for both kids and adults, many of them located in Seattle’s most diverse and densely populated urban neighborhoods. They’re an amazing resource for organic gardening education in the region.One of their newer programs is the farm incubator.  Matthew McDermott, the director of Seattle Tilth Farm Works, and Chris Iberle, the Food Hub Manager, led us on our tour of their forty-acre site in Auburn. They call it “The Red Barn Farm.”  While we walked through the fields of young starts, Matthew filled us in on the history of the land. Originally owned by former Seattle Supersonics Greg Ballard, who bought the land for a kid’s basketball camp, it was later donated to Seattle Parks and Recreation. They make it available to Seattle Tilth Farm Works as part of their Parks Urban Food Systems program.The program provides farm business training and support to immigrants, refugees and people with limited resources in South King County. Each year they add ten new farmers to their training program that runs from February to June, reserving ten spots for returning farmers. Their aim is to help new farmers get into small farming, teaching them not just the elements of organic farming through hands-on experience, but also business planning, operations, and marketing. Matthew explains that the average age of an American small farmer is 60 years old. They hope to lower that through their program.Each of the twenty farmers tends a quarter-acre parcel, growing vegetables for Seattle Tilth’s CSA subscription program that provides subscribers with a weekly box full of fresh, delicious produce from June through October. The farm also supplies the fresh produce for their Good Food Bag program, which helps supply healthy organic vegetables to qualifying limited-resource families. We saw peas, radishes, onions, garlic, corn, squash, and pole-beans. In addition to the open fields they have 13 100-foot hoop houses, most of them planted with tomatoes. Due to the low snow pack this year and the possibility of a drought they mandated a water irrigation system. To supplement their water supply, they have a large cistern that collects rainwater. At the end of our tour, we stopped by the cleaning station where the farmers wash and trim their veggies, weighing their daily harvest and logging it onto the weekly production board.It feels good to be a part of a program that is training young farmers in the best practices for sustainable and environmentally sensitive farming. Moreover, their produce is simply delicious. Visit one of our Macrina cafe locations over the weekend and try something off of our rotating brunch menu to see for yourself.Leslie Mackie

For our fourth annual Feast of Macrina celebration honoring our staff, their families, and our community at Macrina we encouraged everyone to wear wigs. Why not have a little fun? So on July 14th we closed our cafes at 2, just like a bakery in Italy does to honor a patron saint, often the whole town for that matter. We gathered at a beach in Lincoln Park to celebrate St. Macrina’s Feast Day (For you sticklers, her actual feast day is July 19th). St. Macrina was known for working to improve the quality of life for people in her community, my kind of gal, and why I found her so inspiring when naming my bakery. But it takes more than a patron saint to run a bakery and Macrina wouldn’t be what it is today without the talented, hard-working team we have. With silly wigs on our heads, we feasted on amazing food and laughed a lot. There were scavenger hunts, a balloon toss (a great way to cool off in the hot sun, as many discovered), and a prize for the best wig. When I opened Macrina in 1993, we had a staff of six and could celebrate in a backyard. Now we need many tables and acreage at a park. It’s been so much fun watching the bakery grow, and I am honored to be able to celebrate and feast in honor of St. Macrina with so many great people.

Last month I took a little work trip with my partners Matt Galvin and Scott France to the Bay Area - if you call eating at some of the country’s finest restaurants and bakeries work. Our first stop was the San Francisco Baking Institute. Michel Suas, a mentor of mine for over 20 years, founded this internationally recognized baking school in 1996. Michel has consulted for many of the nation’s top bakeries, including Acme Bread and Thomas Keller’s restaurants. The Institute hosts bread and pastry classes for both professional and amateur bakers, and many at Macrina have taken classes from him in classic breads of France and Viennoiserie pastry. I consider him the best in his field and continue to consult with him as Macrina grows.

1. Tartine

For a late lunch, we made our way to the Mission District to Tartine, a French-style bakery run by Elizabeth Pruitt and Chad Robertson. There is no sign above the door, just a street address, but finding it is easy. Just look for the long line of people snaking out the door, waiting for one of Tartine’s gorgeous pastries or a loaf of bread often still warm from the oven. When we finally made it to the front of the line, I had to peek through a baker’s rack behind the cash register to catch a glimpse of the breads. Fortunately, they are also listed on a chalkboard. I bought a half-loaf of sprouted rye bread, still piping hot. We tore into the fragrant, crusty loaf right at the counter. We also indulged in their rye cookies, a savory scone with Niman Ranch bacon, a classic croissant, and lemon pound cake, all of which I recommend. As we were finishing up a little red pull-wagon stacked with over a dozen fragrant loaves wheeled right by our table bound for their restaurant Bar Tartine, which is located right around the corner.

2.  STATE BIRD PROVISIONS

We had a dinner reservation at State Bird Provisions on Fillmore Street.  In 2012, the recently opened State Bird Provisions was named the best new restaurant in America by Bon Appétit magazine. While waiting for our table we had appetizers and a drink at Progress, their sister restaurant next door. A couple standouts were their Malaysian Beef Jerky with Crushed Peanuts and Wood-Roasted Blonde Morels with Smoked Hollandaise. With our table ready we moved over to State Bird Provisions. The food there is served dim-sum style, with over half the food delivered on gleaming carts that are wheeled by filled with many creative concoctions. For two hours we indulged. My favorites were Garlic Bread with Burrata, Smoked Trout-Avocado ‘Chip and Dip’, Green Garlic Steak Tartare Caesar Toast, and Don Watson’s Lamb with Cumin, Squid, Shishitos, and Dates. The chef Stuart Brioza visited our table, filled us in on the history of the two restaurants, and I enjoyed learning of the many mutual friends we have in the industry. 

3.  SIGHTGLASS COFFEE

The next morning started with a visit to Sightglass Coffee; an independent sibling-owned coffee company with a few locations.  They specialize in small batch production and source only the best green coffee. We visited their flagship store on Seventh Street, which already had a line at 7:30 on a Saturday morning, this in a city not known for waking early. It was immediately evident why Matt, a very discerning coffee drinker, suggested the visit. On one side of the high-ceilinged industrial space bags of green coffee surround a large stainless steel roaster. Behind a handsome bar the baristi serve up freshly roasted coffee on the other side.  We enjoyed unrivaled espresso, cappuccini, and americani, along with fantastic pastries from b. patisserie and Neighbor Bakehouse.

4.  B. PATISSERIE

That afternoon we set out to visit a few other standout bakeries. First up was b. patisserie, a collaboration between Belinda Leong and Michel Suas. This dynamic duo is a formidable combination, with her talent as a pastry chef and his bread knowledge and general expertise. After years of planning, they opened their doors in 2012 at the lower edge of Pacific Heights. The open pastry kitchen has a large butcher block prep table surrounded by a team of bakers in white chef’s coats. Marble-topped Parisian style cafe tables, with bentwood chairs and a few bench seats, surround the beating heart of the patisserie, a long temperature controlled marble display counter filled an overwhelming display of sweet and savory treats. The elegant, buttery croissants are delightful, and the Kouign Amman pastries (pronounced Queen Ah-mahn) have developed a cult following in the city. Originating from the Brittany region, this round crusty cake has layers of butter and sugar folded in, much like a croissant, although with fewer layers. We sampled one filled with warm chocolate ganache, one with local berries, and a perfectly caramelized sugar version. While I’d recommend anything they make, seek out their addictive house-made granola, fresh berry scones, and sandwiches served on freshly baked bread.

5.  SEMIFREDDI'S BREAD COMPANY

When you are in the bread business you often reach out to other bakers when taking on new projects or approaching big decisions. This is how I got to know the owners of Semifreddi’s Bread Company, Tom Frainier and Mike Rose, and vice president of bakery operations John Tredgold (who goes by JT). In business since 1987 they have grown into one of the largest artisan wholesale bread and pastry bakeries in the Bay Area. They have always been very generous with their time and knowledge. Tom says their company culture has evolved from ‘take care of the customer’ to ‘take care of our employees.’ Through their expansion they’ve managed to maintain the same high quality. They’ve also become industry leaders in their dedication to community giving. Primarily a wholesale business, they have two cafes, one in Berkeley and the other in Kensington. Their baguettes are especially worth picking up.

6.  ACME BREAD COMPANY

Another major artisan bakery in the Bay Area is The Acme Bread Company. Owner Steve Sullivan was the first baker I knew about who was making French artisan-inspired bread. Before opening Acme Bread Company in 1983, Steve was baking bread for Chez Panisse. He left the famous restaurant to visit France to learn more about bread. Now more than thirty years later he continues to bake some of the best bread I have ever had. Steve met with us and gave our crew a tour of his small but mighty bakery in Oakland. They also have two other baking facilities strategically located as close to delivery locations in San Francisco in order to keep the bread as fresh as possible. Primarily a wholesale bakery they have two retail locations, one in the ferry plaza, and their original bakery on San Pablo Avenue in Berkeley. I love the racks and racks of fragrant freshly baked breads in the cafes.As vibrant and booming as our own Seattle food scene is, it was great to visit San Francisco and taste what is happening down there.  I am already looking forward to my next trip there!Leslie MackiePlaces Visited:

1. Tartine, 600 Guerrero St, San Francisco, 415-487-2600; www.tartinebakery.com
2. State Bird Provisions, 1529 Fillmore St, San Francisco, 415-795-1272; www.statebirdsf.com
3. Sightglass Coffee, 270 7th St, San Francisco, 415-861-1313; www.sightglasscoffee.com
4. b.patisserie, 2821 California St, San Francisco, 415-440-1700; www.bpatisserie.com
5. Semifreddi’s, 3084 Claremont Ave, Berkeley, 510-596-9942; www.semifreddis.com
6. The Acme Bread Company, 1601 San Pablo Avenue, Berkeley, 510-524-1327; www.acmebread.com

I received an invitation from Bob's Red Mill to join seven other celebrated bakers and pastry chefs from around the country for an event in New York City on May 12th. We were each given a type of flour and asked to create a new recipe for the event. A large bag of Bob’s Red Mill Organic Unbleached All-Purpose Flour arrived, and I set to work. With rhubarb in season and my raspberry bushes just beginning to fruit I started playing around with a few ideas. Some organic flours I have used have been inconsistent. I found Bob’s to be very predictable, both in pastry and bread. It bakes nicely, is not too heavy, and has good texture. The recipe I settled on for the event was a Rhubarb and Raspberry Upside Down Cake, a sweet and buttery favorite that pairs the tang of raspberries with the tartness of rhubarb.I flew to New York with Jane Cho, Macrina’s head pastry chef, and together we prepared 250 tiny cakes, topping them with whipped cream. Astor Center, where the event was held, was beautifully decked out. Many food magazines, such as Food & Wine, Saveur, and Martha Stewart Living stopped by for a nibble, as well as a great number of food bloggers and tastemakers. And Bob Moore, the real Bob we know from the label, wearing his signature red vest and golf hat, made the rounds. He repeatedly thanked all of us “for making Bob’s Red Mill what it is.” Well into his eighties, Bob is a charming and very gracious man, and it is easy to see how he has built such a strong community around his product. The values of his now employee-owned company are first-rate, as you’d expect from a company dedicated to sourcing the finest grains and flours and milling them with old-world techniques.The next day we toured some of New York’s finest bakeries: Sullivan Street Bakery, Tom Cat Bakery, Balthazar Bakery, and Amy's Bread. We returned to Seattle exhausted, exhilarated, and honored to have been a part of Bob’s Red Mill’s celebration. To have shared the stage with so many other talented pastry chefs and bakers was special. Look for my Raspberry Rhubarb Upside-Down Cake at one of our cafes this summer.

 - Leslie Mackie