From Brooklyn’s sizzling restaurant scene, with the hottest cookbook of the season…my first guests, Frank Castronovo and Frank Falcinelli join us to talk about the restaurants and their new book Frankies Spuntino – Kitchen Companion & Cooking Manuel.
From urban singles to families with kids, local residents to the Hollywood set, everyone flocks to Frankies Spuntino—a tin-ceilinged, brick-walled restaurant in Brooklyn’s Carroll Gardens—for food that is “completely satisfying” (wrote Frank Bruni in The New York Times). The two Franks, both veterans of gourmet kitchens, created a menu filled with new classics: Italian American comfort food re-imagined with great ingredients and greenmarket sides. This witty cookbook, with its gilded edges and embossed cover, may look old-fashioned, but the recipes are just what we want to eat now. www.frankiesspuntino.com
In the second half Lucy Baker joins us with fresh off of her appearance last week on the Today show with her new book, The Boozy Baker – 75 Recipes for Spirited Sweets.
The Boozy Baker is a fun collection of recipes for cakes, pies, tarts, cookies, and more, all of which contain a healthy dose of alcohol. Home bakers will recognize classic treats such as profiteroles, peach cobbler, and spiced Bundt cake, and be delighted by the ways they are reinvented with chocolate stout, almond liqueur, and even Jägermeister. Featuring more than 30 full-color photographs, the book also includes sidebars throughout with instructions for preparing funky cocktails that add a punchy compliment to many of the recipes. Whether you are a pastry perfectionist or a one-bowl beginner, a bonafide mixologist or just looking for a way to polish off a few dusty bottles, this cookbook is sure to become a favorite, its pages splattered with chocolate, sprinkled with sugar, and garnished with a twist. Learn more about Lucy at www.abookintheoven.comSomething cool for the last day of July!