Erin McKenna - Bread & Butter: Gluten-Free Vegan Recipes to Fill Your Bread Basket

My first visit to BabyCakes was a rendezvous with a friend who lived in New York City and raved about the place. Always up for trying a new sweet spot, I headed to the Lower East Side. Unfortunately I got hopelessly lost in that part of Manhattan, where the streets are no longer numbered but named. After exiting the subway and wandering around until I ended up at the base of the Williamsburg Bridge, I started to give up hope.

But when theres a bakery involved, I am compelled to persevere. When I finally entered the homey BabyCakes shop, I felt like Id stepped into a little time warp. There I found counter girls in suggestively snug 50s diner garb pouring dark mugs of coffee, trays of cupcakes swirled high with frosting filling the showcases, and baked doughnuts so good they give their deep-fried counterparts a run for the money. (Now I knew how those women squeezed into those tight uniforms!) And Erin McKenna was in the kitchen, making her trademark swirl across racks and racks of bite-size cakes and confections.

As I sat at the counter with my friend, we fought over the last of the crumbs and bits of frosting left on our plates. Since that day, BabyCakes is one of my must stop places when I visit the city. Even though Im not gluten-free, I love that convivial feeling I experience every time I enter the shopincluding that very first time, when I instantly felt comfortable. And my badge of honor is that Ive gone there so much that Ive almost memorized the route. Its always a pleasure to walk in that now-familiar door and see Erin smiling away in the bakery, presiding over her glass cases overloaded with treats.

But no mannor womancan live on cake alone (although Ive considered trying). Its bread that is the stuff of life, and Im thrilled that Erin has created this collection of baked goods not just for the wheat-free crowd, but for everyone who enjoys good, fresh, honest food as much as I do. Looking through the recipes, I landed on the one for homemade and immediately began racing around my kitchen (and making a quick trip to the nearby natural foods store), gathering up the ingredients. Because, well, what kind of person can pass up the opportunity for a warm, freshly baked English muffin with a slathering of jam? (Certainly no one I know.)

I measured and mixed, let the batter rise, and then panfried them up on the stovetop, leaning over the pan to catch that impossible-to-replicate yeasty aroma. And for once, I was actually happy to be lostlost in the smell of frying dough. To be honest, I couldnt wait for them all to be done. As soon as the first of the English muffins were finished off in the oven, I split one open, smeared it with some homemade apricot jam, and a happy glow came over me. They were perfect.

One doesnt need to be gluten-free to appreciate breads made from the galaxy of grains that exists outside of the world of wheat. As I live a few thousand miles from Erins bakery, Im thrilled to be able to bake her recipes from Bread & Butter in my home kitchen. Which means I can take a quick trip to BabyCakes whenever I want... with easy-to-follow directions, too.