Brownies are a diabolical(ly) good cross between cake and cookie. They taste sinfully rich and decadent, but they’re an angel in the kitchen (one bow recipe alertl!) and they make your house smell like heaven. Plus, we hear Deb and Kenji’s recommendations for the best snacks for gossiping or watching reality TV.

Recipes:

Sharing another podcast we can’t get enough of: Your Mama’s Kitchen. It’s a show about cuisine and culture, ingredients and identities, and the meals and memories that make us who we are. Host Michele Norris talks to Michelle Obama, Glennon Doyle, José Andrés and so many other guests about the complexities of family life and how their earliest culinary experiences helped shape their personal and professional lives. And of course, each guest shares a recipe for a favorite dish from their youth so you can taste a bit of their story. In this episode, Late Show host Stephen Colbert and his wife Evie reminisce on their romcom-worthy meet cute, they share the food they ate growing up in Charleston, North Carolina (hint: lots of seafood), and some of the cooking hiccups they faced as a new couple in their first kitchen. Plus, Stephen teaches us how to make his version of his mama’s fudge – a recipe none of his siblings can agree on.

You can find more Your Mama’s Kitchen at https://lnk.to/yourmamaskitchenTR

Nachos were invented in a Mexican border town for a group of American ladies who lunch, and now they are considered food for the beer-drinking, football-cheering everyman. They can come piled high with twenty ingredients; a plate of nothing more than chips with melted Velveeta are also considered nachos. Whatever floats your tortilla, Kenji and Deb discuss ways to optimize every bite. Also, our Executive Producer Audrey Mardavich gets advice on how to slay the Super Bowl potluck.

Recipes mentioned:

If humanity’s gotten you down lately, just keep in mind that our species can’t be that bad… we did invent the meatball after all. This ingenious invention stretches an expensive ingredient by mixing it with pantry staples into a dish that can feed many more people than on its own, while being truly delicious in its own right. Think about it: when meatballs are what’s for dinner, or you see meatballs on the menu at a restaurant, don’t you automatically think, ooh meatballs? It’s practically a reflex by this point of human evolution, someone really ought to study this. 

Quiet luxury has been all the rage the past few years, but our girl Onion Soup has been out here epitomizing that s**t for literally hundreds of years. A bag of onions, some butter to sauté it in, beef broth are really all you need; throw in some stale bread and grated cheese, and you’ve got a million-dollar taste for ten dollars and change. (AND it doesn’t take as long as you think. Ask Kenji and Deb.)

We are taking a break this week. Please enjoy this classic interview from our friends at Milk Street Radio.

For more information, visit Milk Street Radio's homepage, and follow Milk Street Radio on Apple Podcasts.

There comes a point in every New Yorker’s life when they venture outside city limits and learn, to their horror, 24-hour access to breakfast sandwiches via bodegas spaced two blocks apart is not the norm in the rest of the world. When Deb and Kenji start breaking down each component, you will realize that it takes a lot of skill and discernment to a) choose the right ingredients b) prepare them all to perfection at the exact same time. You will never take the humble BEC for granted again.

Radiotopia’s fall fundraiser is here! Donate today to support The Recipe. Thank you! 

Chicken soup is the universal comfort food, but there are as many versions of chicken soup as there are planets in the universe. Depending on where and how you grew up, versions as varied as “Jewish penicillin”, phở gà, stracciatella, Campbell’s condensed all mean home to someone.

Radiotopia’s fall fundraiser is here! Donate today to help us reach our goal of 2,024 donors. Thank you!

Congratulations are in order for Deb, who released the audiobook of Smitten Kitchen Keepers earlier this month. We are proud to share with you a little excerpt.

Back in 2006, when she was just starting her food journey, she encountered a lot of dud recipes on the internet. (Haven’t we all?) This book is a collection of the ones you’ll want to return to over and over again, aka the keepers.

You can purchase a hardcover version at our page on bookshop.org, and a portion of the sale will go towards supporting our network.

The Radiotopia fundraiser is happening now! Donate today.

Things we learn in this episode: Kenji has a not-so-secret secret ingredient for can’t-miss pie crust, Deb is not allowed at Thanksgiving without her pie, the birthplace of Kenji’s love of junk food, the ideal baking apple, why American apple pie reigns supreme.

Radiotopia's fall fundraiser is happening now! Visit radiotopia.fm/donate.