Allison Stewart: This is All Of It on WNYC. I'm Allison Stewart. Vermont has given us two presidents, Coolidge and Garfield, the founder of an iconic tractor brand, Mr. John Deere. Now a new cookbook that celebrates the culinary culture of the Green Mountain State. If you're thinking Maple, yes, there's plenty of that in the book, but it also takes on the author's family recipes, reaching back to her German mother Helga's roots with dishes like goulash ish and a potato salad her mom only served on Christmas Eve. I need to know more about that. Then there's two sections based on Vermont's unique trade of having six seasons, spring, summer, fall, stick, winter, and mud/sugaring. Gesine Bullock-Prado is the cook behind the book. She's also the host of the Food Network show Baked in Vermont, and a guest judge on some of the network's competitions. The book is called My Vermont Table: Recipes for All Six Seasons. It was released yesterday. Gesine joins us in studio.

Nice to see you.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Nice to see you.

Allison Stewart: Some culinary cultures are described by region. Southwest and New England seafood or southern soul food. Why did you want to take a look at food through just the identity of the state, just through Vermont as opposed to a region?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: It's one of those touchstone states that when you just say the name, it reads comfort. It's like a code word in TV shows that scandal, the president was going to retire to Vermont. [laughter] Friends, we're going to go for a romantic weekend to Vermont. We just have to say Vermont, and it's the code word for comfort and solitude and loveliness, and I think of the food that way as well. Because we have those six unique seasons, or at least we recognize them, there is a flow to our year that is so quintessentially Vermont and what we look forward to, what we talk about, what we're craving, what we're all thinking about for the next month that it is quintessentially Vermont. The ephemerals in the spring, the gardening in that tiny, tiny season of summer [laughter], and then mud season of course where we're all tapping or thinking about tapping or smelling that lovely scent that comes from the sugar houses. It is so uniquely Vermont, but it is something that I think every American shares that knowledge of when you say Vermont, when you think Vermont, when you eat as a Vermoner, no T, you think of comfort and loveliness and joyfulness.

Allison Stewart: Tapping [unintelligible 00:02:38] sugar, by the way, and Vermoner?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Vermoner. There's no T. Like mitten is mien.

Allison Stewart: Got you. Hey, Vermoners out there, [chuckles] or anybody with ties to Vermont, we want to hear your take on Vermont's food culture. Maybe you have a favorite dish that just screams Vermont. Give us a call. 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC, or you can DM us on Instagram at AllOfItWNYC. We're talking to folks with ties to Vermont. My guest is Gesine Bullock-Prado. The name of the book is My Vermont Table.

Intro in the book, you say up front I grew up in DC in the Arlington area, and you spent a lot of time there. Obviously, you spent a lot of time in Germany and Austria with your grandmother, Helga, great name. LA, you had a previous career as a lawyer and in the entertainment business. Then almost 20 years ago, you find Vermont, or at least you decide to put down roots in Vermont. What was it about Vermont that called to you?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Well, when I was in Virginia, I was always a German girl. When I was in Germany, I was always the American girl. I don't think that's an unusual thing for many Americans to feel is slightly displaced, and never knowing where you belong. When my husband took me, we were at [unintelligible 00:03:54], and he took me to Vermont, first New Hampshire, and then we rode across the bridge into Vermont, across the Connecticut River. My heart just opened up and sang. I'm like, this is home. Because Vermontes often look at most people who live in Vermont as outsiders. I'm among very good company. [chuckle] I'm not alone. My people are there. I found home in that place because it spoke to Bavaria about the sweet little villages in Bavaria. It spoke to the Appalachian Mountains, which I adore because I love those gentle rolling hills. It just spoke to comfort, and it became home.

Allison Stewart: Could you describe the two extra seasons that Vermont has?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Mud season, which they're so practical, it's like, "Oh yes, of course. That's what it's called." Mud season, because when the big thaw happens, the majority of our roads are dirt. When the big thaw happens, there's lots of water, and that dirt becomes mud. Driving in the winter, no problem, but driving through mud, it's like when I was a kid, I was promised quicksand would be something that I would have to avoid in my adulthood.

Allison Stewart: That's what they told us. Wasn't it Gilligan's Island in the Brady Bunch?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Yes. I was like, "I'm expecting it quick." That never materialized. However, the mud is as close to quicksand as I was promised. You're not going anywhere, but the good thing is, is that when you're stuck in the mud, you're going to smell the beautiful wafts of maple coming your way because it's also sugaring season.

Then stick season is when the leaves have fallen, and it gets quiet because all the tourists have gone, and the snow has not yet come, and you look up at the trees and all you see is sticks. It's also near Halloween, so that eeriness is perfect. It's a little foggy. It's a little creepy. It's a lot of perfect because it's Halloweeny time.

Allison Stewart: Let's talk about some parts of the book that are really particularly interesting. You have ingredients and tools that you might not be familiar with, but should be. One is, I'm going to let you say it, M-A-G-G-I.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Maggi.

Allison Stewart: Maggi.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Maggi. It is an umami bomb. It is, I call it the wheat soy. It is a wheat-based seasoning sauce that is very much like soy in that it's umami-rich. It brings saltiness and just giant flavor. It was invented in Switzerland, but it is a staple of German households. You can find it in the states at many supermarkets, but Latino markets and Asian markets carry it as well. It's an alternative to soy if you're allergic to soy.

Allison Stewart: When's an example of when you would deploy Maggi?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Well, and just about everything, that's me. [laughter] In things like gravy, even a potato salad, things that need a roundness of flavor and maybe a little saltiness and you're not quite sure what it is, like goulash, things that need this added bump of je ne sais quoi, you add Maggi and it'll do you right. It's that perfect little punch.

Allison Stewart: Sounds like a little bit of depth, maybe.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Totally depth. It's how umami is that deep savory, that's what Maggi is.

Allison Stewart: The other sentence that caught my eye was, use maple syrup as seasoning.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Yes.

Allison Stewart: All right. What's an example of using maple syrup as seasoning?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Well, oftentimes in recipes, it calls for granulated sugar. I'm talking about savory recipes. The most typical would be grandma's gravy, a tomato sauce where the tomatoes are never quite as sweet as they should be. Granulated sugar is usually added, but I say add the maple because it incorporates instantaneously because it is liquid. It also has that backbone of that butteriness to it. It is three times as sweet but has fewer calories than sugar. Not that when you're making something super yummy that that's what you're thinking about. It's a superfood, and it's maple. It's such an American thing. Only we in the Americas make maple syrup. It is such a beautiful addition to things that need just that little, little hint of sweetness.

Allison Stewart: I like it in coffee.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Oh, coffee and tea. The best, right?

Allison Stewart: I have to say. You have a little tagline here called Brave little recipes. What should I be thinking about if I'm attempting a brave little recipe? [chuckles]

Gesine Bullock-Prado: A little more time or a little more effort. For instance, my inverse puff, which is a puff pastry where you do the butter block on the outside, and that just that alone makes people think that's very brave. [laughter] Why would you do that? I've taught 12-year-olds to do this, so it is an infinitely doable thing, but when you're approaching a recipe or it has a lot of steps, it's just a forewarning that just take a deep breath, it's not a big deal, but it might take a little more time, or a little more time for you to get your head to wrap around the concept or the number of steps. They're only a handful of them, but I wanted to call them out to say this is our brave little state, you might need a little more gumption to jump in, but it is not hard. Totally doable, and you will be so thrilled once you've done it and have succeeded.

Allison Stewart: Let's talk to Mary, calling in for Mount Kisco. Hi, Mary, thanks for calling All Of It.

Mary: Hi. No, thank you. I just wanted to give a shout-out to a fabulous community farm in Manchester, Vermont. It's called Earth Sky Time, and they have fresh baked breads and spreads and dips and produce, and the food is crazy good. They have community concerts all the time, and they just add a lot to the community, and it's a family wonderful, delicious place.

Allison Stewart: Thank you for calling in. Let's talk to Todd from Northport Long Island. Hi, Todd?

Todd: Hello. How are you?

Allison Stewart: Doing great.

Todd: I just so happened to be picking up my lunch and heard this on the radio, and I've never called in, but I thought now would be the time. [laughter] I've been going to Vermont since I was 12 years old. I'm in my 40s. We have a family home up there. I find that whatever it is, it just seems to taste better in Vermont as opposed to New York.

Alison Stewart: You are correct, Todd.

Todd: It's simple and silly stuff, like milk and cheese and meat from the butcher. Even when I go up there, I don't go out to eat that much. I end up cooking a lot. It is just something so enjoyable about getting local ingredients, slowing down, going to the farmer's market, going to the general store to get stuff. Of course, the maple syrup, and the apples, and all that stuff is good. The amount of craft beer, I'm always astonished every time I go up--

Alison Stewart: And delighted, I hope. [laughs] I think Todd has transported himself mid-conversation.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: I know. He describes everything that I love about Vermont, that it just tastes better. That's why I wrote the book. I want people to have, "This is the book that I needed when I lived in LA." Because when you need to be transported, you think of those ingredients and that comfort, and just relax and you slow down, no matter the season, and you can bring that beauty that Todd is describing into your life no matter where you are.

Alison Stewart: Something that piqued my interest in the book, and hearing both of our callers talk about the local produce and going to the farmer's market, you actually have a recipe in here that uses Japanese knotweed.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Yes, that stinky, stinky bugger, is just cropping up. Usually, you yell at it because it makes you so angry because it's so invasive, but it is actually a lovely ingredient. It has beautiful taste. It's actually very nutritious. I use it in lieu of rhubarb in this recipe, and that it has that same kind of quality of rapaciousness, a little bit of tang. It has a lovely texture to it as well, despite the fact that it is such an evil, evil, evil, evil weed, that it actually is tasty. It is very tasty. You have to get it when it's very tender, though. That's usually when you want to start hacking it down anyway.

Alison Stewart: These are for your lemony Japanese not weed streusel muffins.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Yes.

Alison Stewart: Made me think of foraging in a different way.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Absolutely. The invasives can often be edible, so it's worth getting rid of them with all your rage, and also eat them. There's something cathartic about going, "I shall eat you."

[laughter]

Alison Stewart: We are talking about My Vermont Table with Gesine Bullock-Prado. Our phone number is 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC. For listeners with ties to the Green Mountain State, maybe you want to shout out your favorite dish that screams Vermont. After the break, we'll hear about a couple of recipes that Gesine has kindly given to us to put on our website. We'll talk to you about that. I'll also get the lowdown on this Christmas Eve potato salad. That's next.

[music]

You're listening to All Of It. My guest is Gesine Bullock-Prado. The name of the book is My Vermont Table: Recipes for All (Six) Seasons. You are so kind, Gesine, to give us two recipes to put on our page on the WNYC website. One of them is Dog Team Tavern sticky buns. What makes this different from other sticky buns?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Well, they are a legend in Vermont. There was The Dog Team Tavern, and it sadly burnt down, but it was a historic tavern, and they were famous for their sticky buns, among other things. The best part was they served them as an appetizer, which as a child I would have been like, "This is my home." It uses potato, both in that it uses the actual potato and the water in which the potatoes are cooked. What it does is ends up making a very soft, spongy, glorious, sticky, sticky, sticky bun. You can make them monstrous, dinner-plate size, or you can make them smaller, but the bottom line is that you need that potato to make them tender, tender, tender.

Alison Stewart: Also, potato dumplings. That was the other recipe. You're insistent in the book that they must be "baseball-sized, period."

Gesine Bullock-Prado: I say, "If they don't look like a starchy whale breaching the soup or whatever it is that you've got them in, it's done wrong," because they need to be big. They need to be big.

Alison Stewart: How do you make them big without making them too much of a good thing?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: I don't know these words you say "too much." What are these words? Baseball-size is the perfect size. The other thing that we do with them, if you don't eat all of them, is you slice them up and you fry them as a leftover. If they aren't big enough, then you're not going to get a good fry. I think ahead. I think ahead of all the things that you can do with these things.

Alison Stewart: Here is Helga's potato salad. This is the blurb you write for, little paragraph, "My mother's potato salad is a staple on our holiday table, but the holiday was always an only Christmas Eve. We never had her potato salad any other day because we limit our Christmas Eve celebrations to immediate family. Only a few select few had ever tasted the stuff." All right. Tell us, one, about your decision to include this dish, because you're saying, "Go for it, rest of the world."

Gesine Bullock-Prado: I realized far too late, I think I was in my 40s, I'm like, "Wait, I'm a grown woman. I'm allowed to make this potato salad any time of year." [chuckles] Helga, she had a very strong presence in my life, and the rule was, "Only Christmas Eve," when I realized, "Oh, I'm allowed to do this anytime I like." It is so delicious. We all know potato salad is very innocuous. There's nothing that you can do to it really to jeuje it to the point that it's the gem of the table.

However, when you put this in your mouth, you will be transcendent. You will realize that potato salad should be and could be a meal of its own. The fact that she never shared it beyond that one day and with a handful of people, is extraordinary, because my mother was a diva.

Alison Stewart: Literally.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Literally, a diva. You would think the diva would want to share this with the world, but she kept it contained. Now, mom, in heaven, I am sharing your potato salad with everyone because you and the potato salad are so fabulous.

Alison Stewart: We mean it, your mom was an opera singer.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Yes, she was an opera singer. Yes. [laughs]

Alison Stewart: Let's talk to Chris from Andy's New York. Hi, Chris.

Chris: Oh, hi. How are you?

Alison Stewart: Great.

Chris: Some time ago, I saw Jack Pepper make tarte tatin on the TV, which was a recipe that was created by the Tatin sisters, and it was kept secret, and restaurants from Paris had to send spies out to find out what she was doing. Anyway, I immediately forgot his technique and made my own, just forgot about the white sugar, just poured maple syrup in and cooked the apples in that. Then when it's time to put the puff pastry, I weave it into a basket, because you're not going to get the crust from the maple syrup. I don't flip it out. I just slice it with the top, which looks like a basket. Nobody's ever rejected it.

[laughter]

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Yes. I mean, happy accidents, right?

Alison Stewart: You have an apple tatin recipe right here on 147. What do you account for the success of your tatin?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Making a great puff and great apples, so the two together. It's such a simple recipe, with beautiful ingredients. I think in most cases, in food, beautiful ingredients will elevate anything, and you needn't doctor it too much. Then also, as Chris noted, maple will not go wrong with most things.

Alison Stewart: Amy is calling in from Ryegate, Vermont. Amy, thanks for calling in.

Amy: Hi.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Hi, Amy.

Amy: Hi. I hope my reception is good. We don't have great cell reception here. We are recent transplants. We moved from Brooklyn a couple years ago.

Alison Stewart: Welcome.

Amy: Thank you. The only thing that gave us a little pause was that, well, first of all, there's really no place to eat out around here, but we do like to cook. One of the things we were concerned about was that we wouldn't be able to find the ingredients that we usually cook with. I have to say, we've been happily surprised that even things that you wouldn't necessarily expect to find up here, like pancetta and guanciale, things that we would use to make-- we do a lot of Italian cooking-- they're here. Small producers are making pasta, are making these Italian specialty items. Of course, we expected great cheese. We live not too far from Jasper Hill, and we live down the street from a dairy farm. We've just been so impressed. We're eating better than ever, growing our own vegetables. Of course, all the maple and the maple creemees.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: [laughs]. Beautifully done.

Alison Stewart: Whenever we have a cookbook thereon, someone usually tries to make something from the book. Our resident cookie monster, Zach, who came in and fixed your microphone, they tried to make the oat crisp cookies, which were delicious, I've have had four in the past two days, but they couldn't get them to come out with that thin, lacy look you describe in the book. Zach wants to give it another go. Any suggestion to get that laciness?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Make sure your oven is hot enough. That is number one. Because what it is essentially doing, because it's so butter-forward, you need for that to spread and spread quickly. With the right temperature of oven, it will do that. You also want to make sure that it is preheated so that that cavity is radiating heat.  

It's not just the temperature of the oven, it is the fact that it has been pre-heated, and because ovens are liars.

Alison Stewart: You should get maybe an oven thermometer.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: An oven thermometer. I always tell people to get oven thermometers because ovens are big fat liars. We can't live without them, but they lie to us all the time. Bumping up that temperature and just making sure that you've got it well pre-heated and then try again, and just don't put too much down. Put a small amount down so that there isn't so much that needs to spread.

Alison Stewart: For people who can't make it to Vermont, but they can make it to the green markets of New York, which are excellent, can you share some advice on picking a maple syrup?

Gesine Bullock-Prado: It depends on what you're using it for. There are four grades. There's golden, amber, dark, and very dark. They look as they are described, but their relative maple punch is different. If you go for golden, it's very light. Amber, a little more maple-flavored. Dark, very maple-y. Very dark, very maple-y. If you're baking with it, go for very dark. If you just like a hint of maple, go for maybe the amber, which would be the more traditional to most people's maple syrup.

It depends on what you're using it for. If you're putting it in your coffee, go with whatever. It's all delicious. A Vermoner will go for a syrup that is darker because we want that flavor.

Alison Stewart: Vermont has a law passed in 1999 that raises follow. When serving apple pie in Vermont "a good faith effort" shall be made to meet one of the more following conditions with a glass of milk, with a slice of cheddar cheese weighing a minimum of half an ounce.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: That's my favorite part.

Alison Stewart: With a large scoop of vanilla ice cream. All right, we have the pie police standing by. You don't necessarily mention this anywhere in your book.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: No, the apple pie that I do have in there is one that is so-- It predates 1999.

Alison Stewart: Oh, okay.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: It's called a Marlborough apple pie. I wanted to go-- [crosstalk]

Alison Stewart: Oh, I'm on technicality.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Yes. I wanted to go full historic, and the Marlborough apple pie is one that uses sherry. You puree the apples. It's like what bananas are to bread, apples are to this pie. You want to get an apple that is a little over ripened and super sweet, almost like alcoholic.

[laughter]

It used to be the staple on Vermont Thanksgiving tables, and it's kind of been lost through the years. It's like a custody thing, so there is a dairy element too, so it squeaks into-- It is not a violation of that law. I think that is the best thing ever. My favorite part of it, it has to be no less than half an ounce.

Alison Stewart: No less than.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: It has to be cheddar cheese. The fact that I didn't say Vermont cheddar cheese is kind of mystifying to me, and that the vanilla ice cream isn't Ben and Jerry's. These are things that I thought they could have put in there as well.

Alison Stewart: Or maybe you should just assume that it would be Vermont cheddar cheese. [laughter]

Gesine Bullock-Prado: One would assume, correct.

Alison Stewart: One of the things I really like about-- This isn't a question, but one thing I really like about the cookbook is that there's not a ton of ingredients. It's very straightforward. I always get a little suspicious when we get up to 13, 14 ingredients for one thing. It's just very straightforward, and I just appreciated that as a cookbook.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: Oh, good. Thanks.

Alison Stewart: My guest has been Gesine Bullock-Prado. The name of the book is My Vermont Table. I don't know if you didn't know this, but we happened to have had Noah Kahan in our studio. People know Noah Kahan. He has performed the song Stick Season, which went viral. He joined us back in December for a listening party and did it for us live. We thought since we were talking about your book, we just go out on the live performance.

Gesine Bullock-Prado: That's fabulous.

Alison Stewart: Here's Noah Kahan's Stick Season. The cookbook is called My Vermont Table.

[music]

Noah Kahan: As you promised me that I was more than all the miles combined,

You must have had yourself a change of heart,

Like halfway through the drive,

Because your voice trailed off exactly as you passed my exit sign,

Kept on driving straight and left our future to the right,

Now I am stuck between my anger,

And the blame that I can't face,

And memories are something,

Even smoking weed does not replace,

And I am terrified of weather 'cause I see you when it rains,

Doc told me to travel, but there's COVID on the planes,

And I love Vermont, but it's the season of the sticks and I,

Saw your mom she forgot that I existed and,

It's half my fault, but I just like to play the victim,

I'll drink alcohol 'til my friends come home for Christmas,

And I'll dream each night of some version of you,

That I might not have, but I did not lose,

Now you're tire tracks and one pair of shoes,

And I'm split in half, but that'll have to do, ooh, ooh,

So I thought that if I piled something good on all.

 

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