Welcome to Between the Layers! I’m glad you’re here for the weekly recipe and conversation!

Between the Layers & the very best Strawberry Shortcake - No. 1

A Tuesday recipe and conversation

Anne Byrn

Apr 27

Welcome to my newsletter!

Many of you have been with me since the Cake Mix Doctor days, and I’m looking forward to reconnecting! Between the Layers is so-named because cakes have been my life, and obviously they are more interesting with fillings and frostings, sometimes dark and bold like ganache, other times subtle and surprising like a thin veneer of apricot jam spread between almond cake or an unexpected red ribbon of raspberry between coconut. I see this newsletter in the same way - stories and thoughts between lines of print that I don’t always get to say in books.

One of the struggles I’ve had is being boxed in - yes! - as the “Cake Mix Doctor,” and as much as I love cake and am crazy about shortcuts, I’m interested in all aspects of cooking.

I cook daily for my husband and myself, pulling out my favorite cast iron skillet or sheet pan. I enjoy having my extended family over for a meal whether I cook it all or give everyone assignments. I relish cooking my children’s favorites when they return home - my mother always did the same for me. When the weather warms up, I plan casual porch suppers for friends. Oh, and I love a good project, from pickles to sourdough to gardening, to making my own ricotta for lasagna night.

During the pandemic I was reminded of how much time we spend in the kitchen and also grateful that unable to frequent my favorite restaurants, I already knew the joy of cooking at home. Seeing everyone’s social media posts on banana bread and offering a Zoom challah-making class for my daughters made me feel like this affection we have for cooking and baking is also a means of survival. Cooking sustained us in more ways than one. I worked on a new book and baked hundreds of cakes. Grocery shopping was challenging, and tasting the cakes with my assistant took place outdoors in the summer heat, but other than that, no complaints. I was glad to be baking.

I know you have a gazillion places to find a recipe, so what I will share in this space week to week are my favorites. I feel like we should build on the momentum of this past year where the focus shifted from restaurant to home and talk honestly about cooking. I’d love to hear what you want to read in this space, what you don’t get from food mags or TV or social media. I’d like this to be a conversation instead of a lecture, so, here goes:

What do you wish you could cook better?

I wish I was better at roasting the big impressive holiday cuts - knowing when I place it in the oven that it’s going to come out perfectly medium-rare. I wish I could make better pie crust. It’s never been that important to me, but my husband weeps when I bake an apple pie. (Poor Mr. Pie Guy married the Cake Doctor.) And I’m buying an air fryer - what should I cook first? Have you ever made a blender hollandaise? And chocolate chip cookies - mine are never chewy enough. Should I remove an egg? And pizza crust, I’m getting better at it, but it’s not there yet. Do I need a Baking Steel?

In return, I’ll share the lessons - and mistakes, too - I’ve learned along the way like simple salad making from Julia Child in her Cambridge kitchen.

I’ll write about the 1-2-3-4 cake since my Instagram post generated so much interest. It’s a sad connection, really, of illiteracy and baking. Also, I’ll dish on the Chiffon Cake and its bizarre birth, which involves a runaway husband and a secret. I’ll write about foods that are peacemakers, why you never, ever refrigerate tomatoes, and why cast iron makes food taste better. Cooking does make life more enjoyable, doesn’t it? At the very least, it helps us stay sane!

My cooking muse, my mother Bebe.

The joyful ease with which she stirred fudge icing and how she carefully cut out sweet biscuit dough for strawberry shortcakes every April 27th for my sister’s birthday - I was in awe. When it was your birthday, you got to choose your cake for family dinners at home. Mine was invariably chocolate on top of chocolate, but my sister Ginger picked Strawberry Shortcake. And we were all the beneficiaries of her wise decision.

This was not the pre-made spongecake sort of shortcake with frozen berries and Redi-Whip, mind you. It was the Southern version, based on a biscuit-like dough, delicious and really not hard to make from scratch. That one recipe still connects me to the past, to the hands who made it, and through the years I’ve customized my mother’s recipe to make it more like the way I cook today.

How much can you really mess with a family recipe? Next week, I revisit Chicken Tetrazzini. Goodbye cream of mushroom soup.

Here’s how it works on Substack. You are on my newsletter list, but if you have no interest whatsoever in anything I’ve said to this point, you may unsubscribe, absolutely. No worries!

But if you decide to stay with me on this journey and be a part of this newsletter as it takes shape and grows - I might just get a fancy logo if this thing takes off! - you will receive it each Tuesday. And if you choose at some point to pay to subscribe, you’ll get more in the way of recipes, content, links, new voices, even book giveaways. Yay!

Welcome to my new baby. I look forward to reconnecting with you in the kitchen!

And now, that Strawberry Shortcake recipe… If you make it, I’d love to hear how it turned out!

Absolutely the very best Strawberry Shortcake

Back when I was a girl, our mother didn’t make this dessert until local berries came into season - mid-April to June. She said it was a waste of good whipped cream to use anything else. The local berries’ sharp acidity, forward flavor, and fragrance was like no other! But I have made it in July using ripe, sweetened peaches, and that’s pretty amazing, too, but obviously, then it’s Peach Shortcake… The word "shortcake" implies some solid fat has been incorporated to make it "short" or flaky. Mother used Crisco, but I use butter because it’s got more flavor.

I start with a soft flour, like White Lily, but you can use the all-purpose flour you normally buy. You'll need a bowl and two sharp paring knives to cut the butter into the dry ingredients until it looks like peas - or you can use a food processor to pulse and speed things along. This is an important step to make sure the shortcakes are short, or flaky. Then you stir in the wet ingredients and turn the dough out onto a floured countertop or board and GENTLY pat it out with your hands to about one-inch thickness. NO ROLLING PIN! The less you work the dough, the more flaky your shortcakes will be. Save the heavy hands for bread!

You can even freeze the cut-out rounds you don’t need and save those for another night. (I let them nearly thaw before baking.) Or, don’t cut out rounds - cut them into squares. It takes half the time and there are no scraps for re-rolling! Split the hot biscuits with a fork if you like, and tuck a little butter inside to melt. Spoon the sweetened berries onto the shortcakes, and on top, pile on the whipped cream. I never said strawberry shortcake was low in calories! Enjoy this recipe from my cookbook, American Cake. (Photo credit to Mitch Mandel).

Makes 8 to 12 servings

Prep: 25 to 30 minutes

Bake: 12 to 15 minutes

6 cups ripe fresh local strawberries

1/3 cup granulated sugar, or more to taste

3 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra flour for dusting the countertop

1/3 cup granulated sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, a little soft

1 large egg

1 cup heavy cream

2 tablespoons butter, for buttering the shortcakes, if desired

1 1/2 cups whipped cream, sweetened with 1 to 2 tablespoons powdered sugar

1. An hour before you are serving this dessert, hull the berries and slice all but 8, and save those for garnish, if desired. Toss the halved berries with 1/3 cup sugar and set aside at room temperature.

2. Place a rack in the center of the oven, and preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

3. Place the flour, 1/3 cup sugar, baking powder and salt in a large mixing bowl and stir to combine well. Cut the 3/4 cup butter into tablespoons and distribute over the top of the dry ingredients. With two sharp paring knives or a pastry blender, cut the butter into the dry ingredients until it looks like uniformly sized peas. Crack the egg into a measuring cup with the cream and stir with a fork to break up the yolk. Pour this into the dough mixture and stir together with a wooden spoon or spatula until the liquid is just combined.

4. Scatter flour on a work surface, and turn the dough out onto the flour and with floured hands, pat it to a generous 1-inch thick. Flour round 2- to 3-inch cutters and cut the dough into 8 to 12 rounds. Place these on a baking sheet, and place the pan in the oven.

5. Bake the shortcakes until they are golden brown around the edges, 12 to 15 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven, and let the shortcakes cool a few minutes, then split open with a fork and butter lightly with the 2 tablespoons butter, if desired.

6. To serve, place the bottom half of the shortcake into a serving bowl. Spoon sweetened berries and juice on top, then place the top half over the berries, and spoon more berries and juice on top. Spoon whipped cream over the berries and garnish with 1 fresh strawberry, if desired. Repeat with the remaining shortcakes. Drizzle any remaining juice in the bowl over the shortcakes before serving.

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