If you haven’t heard of the dynamic kitchen duo of Marilynn and Sheila Brass, now’s the perfect time to make their acquaintance. Not only have the Massachusetts sisters and best-selling cookbook authors recently launched a PBS cooking show called Food Flirts, but also their kitchen savvy shines especially bright when it comes to terrific holiday baking recipes.
Marilynn and Sheila Brass at their Cambridge, Massachusetts, home. Photo Credit : Mark Fleming
Senior food editor Amy Traverso catches up with the two sisters in Yankee’s November/December issue (“Baking with the Brass Sisters”) and gets the scoop on everything from Food Flirts to their childhood in in Winthrop, Massachusetts, to their abiding love of family recipes with a history. “We keep reminding people,” Marilynn says, “it’s so important to do a gentle interrogation of [older family members] to get the stories and the recipes.”
For the full story, including some memorable holiday baking recipes from the Brass sisters — including Cranberry-Raisin Pie, Big Mama’s Lemon-Lime Tassies, and Grandma Goldberg’s Honey Cake — see “Holiday Baking with the Brass Sisters” in the November/December 2017 issue.
Below are two bonus recipes from the sisters’ deep archives, along with their own descriptions. Enjoy!
BONUS HOLIDAY BAKING RECIPES
Chocolate Bûche de Noël | Holiday Baking Recipes Photo Credit : Mark Fleming
CHOCOLATE BÛCHE DE NOËL
“For this cake, we started with our mother’s chocolate jelly roll recipe and added the chocolate filling and buttercream frosting. French patisseries turn out elaborate bûches, but we keep ours fairly simple, using a fork to make ‘wood grain’ lines in the frosting. Then we chop up some pistachios in a food processor. We put the chopped nuts in a strainer and dust the ridges of the log with pistachio flakes, which look almost like powdered gold.”
“This recipe reminds us of both Hanukah and Christmas. Our mother would bake dozens of these cakes to give as gifts, wrapping them in a blue ribbon for Hanukkah and a red ribbon for our Christian friends. Our Auntie Dot decided we couldn’t call this a fruitcake because it’s really more of a spiced sour cream cake with some candied fruit in it. You can pour a little brandy over it when it’s still warm, if you like — it’s also delicious when taken with a little glass of sherry. It wouldn’t be the holidays without it.”
