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12/22/2004 Archived Entry: "Happy New Year: Off to Italy"

In less than an hour, I am off to Italy for the holidays and until January 10. I will be quite busy. First I will be celebrating Christmas with Cecilia and her family. Then we have a Cook at Seliano group coming. Then I am taking several days to prowl around Calabria, finding new places of gastronomic and cultural interest to visit with future groups.

I wish you all a Merry Christmas and a happy and healthy New Year to you and yours. This is my last diary entry for 2004.

Meanwhile, the big news for me in 2005 is that I am going back on the radio Tuesday, January 18. If you haven’t already heard or read, I will be broadcasting on WWRL, which is 1600 AM, every Tuesday from 11 to noon. I believe the show will be rebroadcast every evening at 11, too. And you can also listen on the internet, either by going to the WWRL webstie, or the website of Invite Health, which is sponsoring the show. Starting at 10 a.m., Invite Health, formerly known as Hickey Chemists, has an hour-long program every day on WWRL, with Jerry Hickey himself, and host Rob Martin, but on Tuesdays they have a second hour during which my program will air.

The program, “Arthur Schwartz, the Food Maven,” will be mostly a call-in show. I will be doing the show from my kitchen table (literally) and, I have been joking, “Working in my underwear, on the theory that anything you can do at home in your underwear can’t be bad.”

But seriously, I’ll have my dear friend and neighbor Rozanne Gold with me on the first day – Jan. 18, I repeat – just in case no one calls – but the show is mostly about you. So call! (By the way, for you low-carb people, Rozanne’s latest book is Low-Carb 1-2-3, three ingredient recipes that will fit your diet, and it is being published in January.)

What else is happening? My walking tour with Addie Tomei on January 29th filled up immediately. (Very gratifying!) We are working on a second Saturday date now: March 5. You can read about the tour on my Maven’s Appearances page on the website. We already have several people signed up for the second date – the limit is 12 people – so if you are considering doing this, you should make your decision soon.

Did you know I am hosting another cruise? I’ve posted the info in the Maven’s Diary. For now, what you need to know is that it is on the Crystal Serenity, a very luxurious ship, starting May 16, and that we are going from Venice to Athens, Greek island hopping along the way, with one stop in Turkey – Kushadasi. We get to use the ship as our hotel for nearly two days in Venice, and before the boarding, as an option, there will be a three-day gastronomic tour of the western Veneto, where we will be based in Verona. For details, go to the item in the Maven’s Diary and it will link you to the ship’s website, and to the site of Alice Travel, who is handling the arrangements.

A missing recipe:
If you came to any of the book-signing events I’ve been doing, you’d know I am disappointed that certain recipes had to be cut from my new book. (I mean, you get only so much space.) On November 30, in the Maven’s Diary on my website, I posted the recipe for Chinese Almond Cookies. Here, exclusively for subscribers to this so-called “newsletter,” is a cake recipe that I treasure.

Wonder Loaf used to be made in most Jewish bakeries, but it has almost disappeared, as have those neighborhood bakeries themselves. It is a yellow cake, light in texture and in color, with streaks of chocolate that seem unincorporated into the batter, like candy. It is sold as a loaf cake or a sheet cake. If a sheet cake, it is sold by weight, and the bakery clerk cuts off as much as you like. You can either show her how big a piece you want, having her move her knife a little this way or a little that, or tell her how much you want your piece to weigh. You can depend on her to make it somewhat heavier than you asked for.

According to George Greenstein, my friend the old-time New York Jewish baker whose recipe I have adapted here, there are two possible reasons it is called Wonder Loaf. The first is that it is a particularly light cake, lighter than the standard marble cake because egg whites are folded into the batter. But the real “wonder” is the chocolate that marbleizes the loaf. A coating chocolate, and not a very fine one – for instance, the chocolate bits we use for chocolate chip cookies -- is melted, allowed to cool, but not to harden. Then the chocolate is drizzled over the top of the batter in the mixing bowl and quickly and lightly swirled down into the batter. The point is to have only a small amount of the chocolate blending with the batter, as in a regular marble cake, while the rest of the chocolate remains unabsorbed. It requires a delicate touch and you made need to bake the cake a couple of times before you get it perfect. When done right, the cake has veins of pure chocolate. When it is eaten one wonders how the baker did it.

Wonder Loaf
(A Marble Cake)
Makes two 8-inch loaves

1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon (1 stick plus 1 tablespoon) unsalted butter or margarine, softened
1 3/4 cups bleached all-purpose flour (measured by the scoop and swipe method)
2 eggs plus 2 egg yolks
1 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup milk or water
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup egg whites
1/4 cup sugar
Pinch cream of tartar (optional, to further stabilize the egg whites)
8 ounces semisweet chocolate bits
Shortening, for greasing pans (optional)
Flour, for dusting pans (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
In the bowl of a standup mixer, using the paddle attachment on medium speed, lightly cream together the sugar, butter, and 1/2 cup of the flour.
Beat in the eggs and egg yolks one at a time, beating each until just incorporated.
Mix in the remaining 1 1/4 cups flour, the baking powder, and salt.
Slowly add the milk and vanilla, then beat thoroughly.
In a clean bowl, using the whisk attachment on medium-high speed, beat the egg whites into soft peaks. Slowly add the remaining 1/4 cup sugar and the cream of tartar (if using). Beat until stiff peaks form and the egg whites are shiny.
Gently fold the beaten whites into the cake batter, first partially folding in about a third of the whites to lighten the batter, then the remaining whites.
Melt the chocolate in a double boiler, in a microwave oven, or over a flame tamer. Let cool, then drizzle most, but not all of the melted chocolate in spirals over the top of the finished batter in the mixing bowl. With a spatula, quickly swirl the chocolate down through the batter to marbleize. Do not over-mix.
Grease and flour two 8- by 4- inch loaf pans.
Carefully pour the batter into the prepared pans, filling them two-thirds full.
Drizzle the remaining melted chocolate over the tops of the cakes and run a few lines into the cake with a knife, leaving a chocolate design on top.)
Bake on the middle shelf of the preheated oven for 35 to 40 minutes, or until the cake is lightly browned, pulling away from the sides of the pan, and the center feels firm when gently pressed with a fingertip. (Be careful not to burn your finger on any hot melted chocolate that may be on top.)
Let cool for 5 to 10 minutes in the pans, then remove and let cool completely on wire racks.