Dear recipients of the Camilla Wynne Missive:
I’m delighted to announce today that I’ve written a new book, along with my good friend and long time collaborator Michelle Marek, and it’s available for pre-order today! It will hit shelves on November 4th, but pre-orders are treated to 20% off.
For years and years I’ve wanted to pitch a package on baking with breadcrumbs to a magazine, to be able to more thoroughly explore incredible textural possibilities and yeasty flavors born of thrift. I’m not entirely surprised no publication ever bit—on the surface breadcrumbs don’t seem particularly sexy. Fortunately, I have a dear friend who finds them just as compelling as I do. Michelle Marek went to pastry school in Montreal like me, and we worked there together in fine dining. But she’s one of those people who excels at everything she tries, so she ended up becoming a chef at the incredible SAT Foodlab, then pivoted to recipe development and food styling. In fact, we co-styled my books Jam Bake and Nature’s Candy, to which she also contributed amazing recipes. We’ve been working together for over 20 years now!
Sometime this past January we were idly texting each other (it’s the classic month of underemployment for freelancers). We started chatting about how great a breadcrumb book would be—and then just started writing it. It was a Google doc that quickly grew, as we added recipes from our shared Czech heritage, like Michelle’s smaženka, an incredible breadcrumb-bolstered omelette served open-faced on rye bread with mustard, pickles, raw onion and parsley, as well as new inspirations, like my breadcrumb pancake mix, which is super easy to make and tastes like yeasted pikelets. You’ll find plenty of desserts (we are originally pastry chefs, of course), as well as pantry essentials, sauces, sides, hors d’oeuvres, roasts and even pasta made from breadcrumb flour. Expect a treatise on making breadcrumbs as well.
As they say, however, it takes a village. We wanted the book to hit the shelves quickly but were slightly daunted by the idea of self-publishing. Happily Mika Baraket of Good Egg swooped in and agreed to put it out. Good Egg is Toronto’s fantastic cookbook shop and also has an imprint, most recently releasing Dawn Woodward’s Flour is Flavour.
To supplement our recipes, we wanted to add some superlative crumb recipes from some of our favorite cooks, and we are lucky enough to include contributions from Nicola Lamb, Jeremy Lee, Canal House, Andrew Janjigian, Anna Higham and Chi Nguyen.
It’s a slim volume—50 recipes with illustrations—but mighty (and we’ll be sharing photos of all the dishes online for all you visual learners). We intend to celebrate our first book together mightily as well! Save the following dates, please (details to follow):
November 14th - LONDON —> Quince
November 15th - LONDON —> Saltine
December 4th - Montreal, QC —> Lawrence
December 5th - Montreal, QC —> TBD, in conversation with Jonah Campbell
December 7th - NYC —> Archestratus in conversation with Natasha Pickowicz
TBD - Toronto, ON —> TBD
Before I share a teaser recipe from the book with you— a few things:
My friend Natasha Pickowicz, author of More Than Cake, just announced pre-orders for her new book, Everything Hot Pot, which will be released in January!!! Pastry chefs contain multitudes, and I’m so grateful for that. I’ve been looking for an excuse to buy a hot pot for awhile now, and this is definitively it.
I’ve sadly had to cancel my upcoming candied fruit workshop but am hoping to reschedule it ASAP. The good news is that I’m swamped for a very exciting reason. More on that soon.
Caesar Eggs
makes 16
I’ve been into the concept of snack eggs ever since seeing them on the menu at a lovely little restaurant called Milk Glass Mrkt in Portland, Oregon— jammy boiled eggs, peeled, halved and heaped with delicious toppings. When you’re doing something nuts like catering your own wedding, they’re much easier to put together than devilled eggs, and people go wild for them. I came up with this Caesar salad-inspired version at our last holiday party and they disappeared instantly. But you don’t have to wait until you throw a party. A half recipe would make a nice little lunch for two. If you are having a bash, though, these scale up easily and you should probably make more than you think.
8 eggs
1⁄4 cup mayonnaise
1 Tbsp lemon juice
1⁄2 tsp anchovy paste (or finely minced anchovies) 1 garlic clove, grated
Salt and pepper, to taste
1 Tbsp olive oil
1⁄2 cup medium sourdough breadcrumbs
16 little gem lettuce leaves
8 anchovy filets, halved
1⁄4 cup grated Parmesan
Bring a medium pot of water to a boil over high heat. Carefully add the eggs and boil for 7 minutes, then drain and cover with cold water to cool.
To make the dressing, in a jar, combine mayonnaise, lemon juice, anchovy paste and garlic. Season with pepper, then seal and shake vigorously to combine.
Heat a medium pan over medium heat. Add olive oil, then breadcrumbs. Fry until golden and crisp, 3 to 5 minutes. Remove from heat and season with salt.
Arrange little gem leaves on a platter. Peel and halve eggs, nestling each half in a lettuce leaf. Top each egg with about 1 tsp dressing then 1⁄2 anchovy filet. Sprinkle with fried breadcrumbs followed by Parmesan. Serve immediately.
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Speak soon!
xo Camilla Wynne
How exciting! I love that you made a book about this and cannot wait to check it out!
Good morning! Is this book available in the US?
Thanks--