Hallie: Savoring soup dumplings and lost jelly donuts

HALLIE EPHRON: Happy Holidays, everyone!! This last week of the 2014, we're regifting! Each reprising a favorite blog from the days of yore. Lest auld should be forgot.

Here's mine... on food, of course.

HALLIE: Sharing my favorite foods is one of the guilty pleasures of writing. In THERE WAS AN OLD WOMAN, Evie Ferrante has my passion for Chinese soup dumplings. Evie's boyfriend (aka Mr. Wrong) is all about steak. Which, by the way, I also love, but given a choice between soup dumplings and steak? No contest.

When I eat at the aptly named Gourmet Chinese Dumpling House in Boston's Chinatown, I order rack of those succulent babies just for me. Anyone who encroaches on my share gets stabbed with a chopstick.

Often I find myself writing about fondly remembered foods -- the ones I can no longer get. In THERE WAS AN OLD WOMAN, it's jelly donuts. When Evie returns to the little the grocery store near the house in the Bronx where she grew up, she discovers that the kind of jelly donuts she remembers are still there...along with a man who could easily learn to love soup dumplings.

Sadly, my favorite jelly donuts have gone the way of the dodo. They came from a Van de Kamps next to the Thriftimart in Beverly Hills -- back when Van de Kamps was just a bakery and Beverly Hills was just an upscale neighborhood. 

In my memory, those jelly donuts were light, puffy, powdered sugar-coated cakes. Literally jam-packed, front to back, every bite risked spurting some of the filling out the other end. The filling was in a league of its own, thick and tangy and intensely raspberry -- not that pallid, sugary-sweet, gelatinous stuff that finds its way into jelly donuts these days. And there was none of that palate-coating greasy finish that today's donuts deliver.

Though I love to cook, I'd never attempt to make my own jelly donuts. I'm not good with yeast or deep fat. And forget soup dumplings.

Fortunately, I've discovered a great recipe for another gone-but-not-forgotten treat -- chewy, caramel-colored hazelnut biscotti that were once but are sadly no longer available at my local Italian bakery. This recipe is a close approximation.

Hazelnut Biscotti

3 c. whole hazelnuts (or almonds) (skin on)
1 c. white sugar
1 c. brown sugar
2 c. flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp cinnamon
3 T soft unsalted butter
2 beaten eggs
2 T vanilla
1 beaten egg mixed with 1T water for egg wash
Preheat oven 350
1. Roast nuts
-In a single layer on a cookie tray in the oven - check after about 8 minutes but keep roasting until lightly browned and (if you are using hazelnuts) the skins are coming loose.
- Dump them onto a dish towel and roll them around to rub off most of the skins (if using almonds, leave the skins on).
2. Prepare dough
- Cream the butter with the white sugar in large mixing bowl.
- Add brown sugar, flour, cinnamon, baking powder and blend.
- Add beaten eggs and vanilla and BEAT with mixer on low speed until dough holds together.
- This makes a VERY STICKY DOUGH.  Fold in the nuts.
3. Make 2 logs of the dough
- Put dough on floured surface. Cut in half. Roll each piece into a log.
- Place on parchment-lined cookie sheet and flatten slightly.
- Brush each log lightly with egg wash.
4. Bake 30 minutes OR until ***firm*** to the touch. (Go by touch, not time)
5. Remove from oven. Cut diagonally into biscotti. Turn each piece sideways (cut side up) and return to 300 degree oven to dry out and crisp--about five minutes.
 
My question: What are your "lost" food favorites, and have you been able to recreate them?

THERE WAS AN OLD WOMAN is the story of a young woman, Evie Ferrante, who reluctantly returns the house where she grew up on the waterfront in the Bronx in order to deal with the chaos left behind by her gravely ill, alcoholic mother. She renews a friendship with Mina Yetner, the 91-year-old woman who lives next door. Mina helps Evie figure out the meaning of her mother's last message: Don't let him in until I'm gone. And Evie helps Mina figure out whether she's losing her mind.

Craving a lost jelly donut...

HALLIE EPHRON: Evie Ferrante in my new book THERE WAS AN OLD WOMAN shares my passion for old fashioned jelly donuts. The ones you can't get.

Evie remembers jelly donuts...

"... coated with velvety powdered sugar, the light cakey donut left not a trace of the usual greasy film that said 'store-bought.' [... L]iterally jam-packed, front to back so every bite risked spurting some of the filling out the other end -- filling that was in a league of its own, too, thick and tangy and intensely raspberry. Not that pallid, sugary-sweet, gelatinous stuff that donuts were filled with these days."

The jelly donut I covet came from a Van de Kamps (before it turned into a mega-brand) "Dutch" bakery in the corner of the Thriftimart on Roxbury and Little Santa Monica near where I grew up in Beverly Hills. 

Just for the record, I also miss rootbeer Popsicles but I have no soft spot for Twinkies which I gather are about to reappear on store shelves with twice the longevity. Why are they coming back and not my beloved jelly donuts?

So today, sharing food memories. Any treats from your childhood you'd love to find today ... or perhaps are happy to never see again?
DEBORAH CROMBIE: I wasn't lamenting the demise of Twinkies, either. And longer shelf life--ugh! As for childhood favorites, I loved Fletcher's Corn Dogs from the Texas State Fair, but you can still get them at the fair and they're just as good. I liked Dreamsicles but have no idea if you can still get them!

One childhood treat I've resurrected in the last couple of years is root beer floats, but with Whole Foods Market's 365 Root Beer (the best of the naturals) and organic vanilla ice cream.

Ice cream--oh, my, we did make homemade ice cream when I was a kid, but I think that may be another post!

RHYS BOWEN: I yearn for the old fashioned candy shop, with the big glass bottles of hard candies. My favorite real treat there, because it was expensive, was called buttered Brazils. It was a Brazil nut in a little crisp bed of toffee. (I've never been fond of anything too sweet, apart from cotton candy which I adored and then felt sick afterward)

ROSEMARY HARRIS: I never "got" cotton candy. Probably a good thing for my teeth. No..I had other sweet treats. None of which I actually miss.

In my first book, Pushing Up Daisies, I had the body found with an empty box of candy (that was actually the case with the body that was the inspiration for the book.) I found a website called oldtimecandy.com - purely for research mind you - and what fun that is! All the candies you loved as a kid - and many are still available. Faves - Broadway rolls - ribbons of strawberry licorice. Loved 'em. And the insensitively named Chocolate Babies.

But Twinkies? Not interested. I was more of a Devil Dogs girl.

Hallie, you're the foodie, have you had a cronut yet? Some New Yorkers are going crazy for them. It's a cross between a croissant and a donut and people are lining up to get them. Insanity.

HALLIE: Cronut? Never heard of 'em. But I found a photo - they look delicious. Remember when Beard Papa Cream Puffs were hot?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Yeah, cronuts. I have to admit being weirdly curious. Like the bacon sundae at--Wendy's?

ANYWAY.  Old time candy? Teaberry Gum! And Black Jack gum. And Chuckles, which you had to eat by licking off the sugar first. And those candy bars that were in four parts, remember? I always tossed the mashmallow one.

One of my first summer jobs (c. 1965) was at the candy counter at the local dime store. I overdosed on peanut butter crunch things. I also never understood Pixy Stix, which were essentially straws full of colored sugar which you just poured into you mouth and onto your teeth.

Cotton candy? Weird, but fun to play with.  There's a chic restaurant in Boston that serves it for dessert!

ROSEMARY: Skybars! I threw away the marshmallow bit too!


HALLIE: Give me your marshmallow! If you worked and worked it with your fingers you blended the chocolate in and turned it into warm taffy.

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: It doesn't look like they sell Dreamsicles anymore, Debs, but you can make your own Dreamsicle cocktail! 

Childhood food I miss? Well, my Spencer grandmother used to make the most heavenly southern Sunday dinners. Fried chicken, fried okra, green beans cooked with bacon, biscuits slathered in honey, mounds of butter-soaked mashed potatoes... you can see why she converted to heart-healthy food as they got older. In this case, it's not like the food isn't still available - it's just that it would take about three meals to induce a heart attack if I ate it now.

HALLIE: I am SO HUNGRY!

So Reds, is there a favorite treat you wish you could find... or enjoy the way you did when you weren't worried about sugar and chemicals and calories and... ?