Baking Ingredients, recipes and more

For us here in the Northwest, where we have warm days in the 60’s and cool nights in the high 40’s, it feels a lot like fall. Realistically, it is fall!

For those of you in Austin, where it's in the 80’s during the day and touches the 60’s by dawn, it might not feel that way at all. Universally, though, it seems like it's time to start baking.

Being prepared for the baking season has never been my skillset. I do have a really big pantry that has almost everything...it's just that it's a drive away. And in my mind, nothing's worse than not having the correct flour on hand when you've already started measuring!

Or, not having candied fruit at the ready for when the urge to make fruitcake washes over you. If candied fruit is on your list, be sure to get your order in early. We expect to have most on hand by mid-October. Keep in mind that candied fruit is swallowed up by those who prepare and is often not available until the following year.

Though we make cookies and the like throughout the year, the tendency is to make more cookies in the last quarter of the year.

I have learned this year, from all my cookie making, that there is a lot of sugar in cookies. And there are a lot of cookies I want to make with lots of different sugars.

While the fall harvest fruits are in the markets, we think about pies and fruit-sweetened dishes. Breads of apple, pears, figs, and yellow peaches. My goal, like every year is to make more pies.

Time to start baking! Or, at least getting the ingredients for the pantry.

Instead of pecan pie, walnut pie is a nice twist for the holidays. We put the ChefShop spin on the original recipe, incorporating red walnuts from California, known for their balanced flavor and rich antioxidants and Omega-3s. We also love to use Steen’s Pure Cane Syrup, a sweet staple of Cajun and Creole pantries and produced in Louisiana since 1910!

I love these nuts! And though I eat them out of hand every day, I am really enjoying them the most in baked goods.

Just lightly baked and they make the perfect bite and crunch, and the flavor is just that much more than raw.

Probably the most beautiful walnuts you've ever seen--with a buttery taste to match. All the health benefits of walnuts (Omega 3 fatty acids) with the addition of red polyphenols to match. The California organic red walnuts are a perfect upgrade to our recipes.

Perfect for baking and especially pecan pie!

Steen’s Cane Syrup has been a Southern staple since 1910, when Charley Steen began producing pure cane syrup in Abbeville, Louisiana after salvaging a frozen sugar cane crop and boiling it down into syrup. That humble beginning grew into a recognizable brand whose bright yellow can became synonymous with Louisiana cane sweetness in households across the region.

Pecan pie’s association with Thanksgiving and holiday tables took hold throughout the 20th century as its simple ingredients and Southern roots matched the seasonal harvest. Pecans ripen in the fall, aligning perfectly with Thanksgiving timing, which helped cement both pecans and their signature pie as part of autumn celebrations across the United States.

Today, pecan pie sits alongside pumpkin and apple as one of Thanksgiving’s classic desserts, where it symbolizes hospitality, abundance, and shared family meals.

Unlike highly refined sweeteners like corn syrup, Steen’s Pure Cane Syrup is directly tied to sugar cane agriculture — a crop with deep roots in the American South. Growing cane domestically supports U.S. agricultural diversity, local economies in Louisiana and Florida, and culinary traditions built around products that can’t easily be replicated by imported or industrial sweeteners.

Moreover, cane syrup maintains a distinct flavor profile — richer and more complex than corn syrup — that gives pecan pies made with it a unique character.

In regions like Louisiana, using traditional cane syrup connects the dessert not just to holiday tables but to a broader food heritage that includes cane-dripping biscuits, molasses-glazed vegetables, and cane-sweetened sauces.

Long before the discovery of refined sugar, ancient peoples satisfied their craving for sweetness with what nature provided directly.

Honey was humanity’s first concentrated sweetener, used by Stone Age hunter-gatherers at least 8,000 years ago, as evidenced by cave paintings in Spain showing honey collection. Ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans used honey not only in food but also in medicine and offerings to the gods.

At the same time, early civilizations discovered that certain plants — like dates, figs, and fruits — could be dried or boiled down into natural syrups, offering both sweetness and energy.

The sugarcane plant (Saccharum officinarum), native to New Guinea, began its global journey more than 10,000 years ago. Early peoples chewed the raw cane for its sweet juice, and by around 500 BCE, the technique of extracting and crystallizing sugar from cane juice had developed in India.

The Sanskrit word śarkarā (“gravel” or “sand”) gave us the word sugar. From India, sugar-making spread to Persia, and through Arab trade and expansion, it reached the Mediterranean and Europe by the Middle Ages. By the 15th–16th centuries, sugarcane cultivation became a major global industry — first in the Arab world, then in colonial plantations in the Caribbean and Americas.

In its purest, natural form, sugarcane is an extraordinarily vibrant and healthy plant. It’s a tall, tropical grass, rich in chlorophyll and natural plant compounds. Fresh cane juice — the sweet sap squeezed directly from the stalk — contains vitamins (like B-complex), minerals (iron, calcium, magnesium, potassium), and antioxidants such as polyphenols. In many tropical cultures today (including India, the Caribbean, and Southeast Asia), fresh sugarcane juice is still consumed as a refreshing, nourishing drink that supports hydration and energy without the loss of nutrients caused by industrial refining.

When sugar is refined, however, nearly all of those natural minerals and beneficial plant compounds are stripped away, leaving pure sucrose crystals — high in calories but devoid of nutrients. Thus, while raw sugarcane is a wholesome, living source of sweetness, super-refined sugar represents its most concentrated and least nutritious form.

This recipe was adapted from Marian Burros fabulous cook book, Cooking for Comfort

I really love this cookbook, filled with down to earth recipes, that taste like you expect them too.

Flour has been part of the human diet for tens of thousands of years.

Archaeological findings show that Paleolithic hunter-gatherers were grinding wild seeds, grasses, and roots into a primitive form of flour as early as 30,000 BCE—long before agriculture began.

A grinding stone from Grotta Paglicci in southern Italy, for example, still contains starch residues from wild oats, evidence that early humans used flour-like substances to make primitive breads or porridges.

Around 10,000 BCE, with the rise of agriculture in the Fertile Crescent, humans began cultivating wheat, barley, and other cereals, which quickly became the main sources of flour.

Over the millennia, milling evolved—from stone hand tools to water and wind mills, and eventually to the industrial roller mills of the 19th century that made fine, white flour widely available.

Today, flour is made from an amazing range of plants: wheat, rye, barley, oats, rice, corn, millet, sorghum, teff, chickpeas, lentils, nuts, cassava, and more. Counting all regional and specialty flours, there are well over 100 types globally. Each culture not only favors certain grains but also classifies its flours differently—by chemical content, grind, or use—reflecting unique culinary traditions and milling practices.

🇫🇷🇮🇹🇺🇸 How Different Countries Classify Flour

France
Ash content (mineral residue after burning 100 g flour)
T45, T55, T65, T80, T110, T150
Lower number = whiter, finer flour. T45 used for pastries; T55 for baguettes; T80–T150 for rustic and wholegrain breads.

Italy
Grind fineness & protein content
00, 0, 1, 2, Integrale (wholemeal)
00 = most refined and softest (pasta, pastries); 0 = bread; 1 & 2 = coarser, more bran; Integrale = wholegrain.

United States
Intended use / gluten content
All-purpose, Bread, Cake, Pastry, Self-rising, Whole-wheat
All-purpose = general baking; Bread = high-gluten; Cake/Pastry = low-protein; Self-rising = with baking powder; Whole-wheat = wholegrain.

What's Happening in the Store Next

Saturday, November 7 – Holiday Baking Event

Get ready for holiday baking at ChefShop Seattle. Taste Felchlin and Valrhona baking chocolates, compare specialty sugars and sweeteners, explore cocoa, spices, extracts, flours, and more, and find the right ingredients for your holiday desserts and homemade gifts. Free! 12:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.

See the Event list HERE for 2026
Monday - Saturday 10am-5pm
ChefShop Retail Shop, 1425 Elliott Ave West, Seattle

This has to be one the most versatile vinegars to always have in the pantry!

You can use it in everything (almost) and it is so, so good! Not like all the other ones out there! Has flavor, you can smell the gravenstien and taste it too.

Yes it has acid but not like the commercial stuff you get for cleaning!

It is a delight and there is so many recipes that call for vinegar, and if you don't have the perfect one this is the one you can use to fill in.

This is one of the products that I will drive to the warehouse to get if I have run out. There is no substitue when you run out!

For those that don't like that dense, heavy dark cakes, the blonde fruitcake is a great alternative. Although the color depends on the fruit and nuts you choose.

Vanilla is primarily grown in tropical regions, thriving between latitudes of approximately 20°N and 20°S of the equator.

The main producers are Madagascar (around 13°S), Mexico (around 19°N), and Southeast Asian countries like Indonesia and Tahiti (around 17°S). These regions offer the hot, humid climate and nutrient-rich, well-drained soil necessary for vanilla cultivation.

The vanilla plant, Vanilla planifolia, is an orchid that requires specific conditions, such as temperatures between 75°F to 95°F (24°C to 35°C), to grow successfully. Due to the delicate nature of the plant, it must be hand-pollinated, as the natural pollinators are rare.

The complex process of pollination, followed by harvesting and curing, makes vanilla one of the most labor-intensive crops to produce. This, combined with the vulnerability of vanilla crops to weather events like cyclones, makes vanilla relatively rare and expensive compared to other flavorings.

I like these better than the ones made with AP flour. Or you can make it with AP too

4.5 oz tube - Italy The history of Tomato Paste in a Tube di Pomodoro dates back to the early 20th century in Italy. Tomato paste itself has been used in cooking for centuries, but the innovation of packaging it in tubes was a more recent development.

Tomatoes are native to the Americas and were introduced to Europe in the 16th century. Initially, they were regarded with suspicion and were grown primarily for ornamental purposes. However, as their culinary uses became more apparent, tomatoes gained popularity in Italian cuisine.

Packaging tomato paste in tubes offered convenience and practicality. Tubes were easier to handle and store compared to cans and glass jars. They also allowed for precise measurement and because the tube could be closed with a thimble sized cap it reduced the tomato concentrates exposure to the air allowing a longer life.

The introduction of tomato paste in tubes revolutionized the way people used and stored tomato paste, making it more convenient, economical, and accessible to home cooks and professional chefs alike.

Couscous is a staple in the North African kitchen, where there are as many ways to serve it as there are chefs. Although it is usually classified as a grain, these little granules are actually tiny pasta made by coating coarse-ground semolina with flour.

Serving Suggestions:


A little chicken stock and almost any minced or diced ingredients - from sautéed onion to pine nuts and from chopped olive to currants - some spices, chopped parsley, and seasoning, and you will have a quick and delicious side dish that is just as appropriate for a piece of grilled salmon as an authentic Moroccan tagine.

Cooking Couscous:
Directions:
Pour 3 cups of dry couscous into a lasagne pan. Bring 4 1/2 cups water to a boil, season water with 1 teaspoon salt and 1 tablespoon olive oil, and pour over the couscous. Stir well with a fork to moisten every piece. Cover with plastic wrap and let rest for 10-15 minutes, or even longer if the water is not all absorbed. (She assures us that it WILL absorb, eventually!) Rake with a fork to break up lumps, and serve right away.

Shared by a Louise

Savory Dill Pancakes with Smoked Salmon Recipe

— Louise, ChefShop Reader & Friend

Professional pastry chefs are using ChefShop Grande Brut because it does several things well at once: deep flavor, smooth texture, rich color, easy blending, low acidity, and real versatility across applications. It is a many-trick cocoa powder.

We stock it now because after working with it ourselves, we found it spectacular! It makes a giant difference!

ChefShop Grande Brut contains 22% to 24% cocoa butter. That is significantly higher than most cocoa powders on the market, and it is one of the main reasons we chose it. That extra cocoa butter is not a minor detail. It changes how the cocoa tastes, how it blends, and what your finished desserts actually feel like.

Most people focus on cocoa percentage (and with cocoa powder it is always 100% as it has no sugar) and overlook fat content entirely. It is the balance between cocoa mass and cocoa butter that matters. Cocoa butter is the natural fat in the cacao bean, and it shapes everything about how cocoa performs in a recipe.
Shop now for ChefShop Grande Brut Cocoa Powder here!

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