Chef Bruno Feldeisen Has A New Cookbook

The popular judge on The Great Canadian Baking Show pays homage to the contribution of immigrants

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Unique Recipes From A French-Trained Canadian Chef

Since 2017, French-born chef Bruno Feldeisen has been a judge on The Great Canadian Baking Show, produced by the same company as the Great British Bake Off.

As Red Beans readers know, I’m a big fan of CBC Baking, as the show is known, and I consider it to be kinder and more innovative than the British original. People who live outside Canada are able to catch episodes on YouTube, which has widened Bruno’s fanbase.

Two years ago, he published his first cookbook, Baking With Bruno: A Baker’s North American Love Story. It included pastry recipes and was especially aimed at newcomers who might be trying to emulate what they saw on television.

Now, Bruno is back with his second cookbook, The Bacon, Butter, Bourbon and Chocolate Cookbook: Chef Bruno’s Favorite Ingredients. Just the cover alone is enough to entice anyone to open it. But the book is more than simply good things to eat.

In his preface, Bruno pays homage to the role that immigrants like himself play in the world of cuisine. In addition to working in Canada, he spent time in New York at the Four Seasons Hotel.

“More than ever, it is important to recognize the contributions of immigrants from all corners of the globe, without whose influence the food we enjoy on our table wouldn’t be possible,” he writes.

They include “farmers, pickers, packers, drivers, cooks, bussers, waiters, and story tellers; home cooks and bakers from boundless horizons that enrich our daily lives. Traditions from every part of the world enrich our daily meals.”

Bruno approaches recipes as stories. “They are tales that travel through time - gifts shared with us by witnesses of bygone eras, preserving memories of times spent with family and friends. They might be the only link to a past love, a scribbled piece of paper with only a few words and some numbers, holding so many powerful emotions.”

His favorite ingredients

In choosing the four ingredients for his cookbook, Bruno writes, “Each one (is) remarkable on its own, and together they produce a range of tastes and experiences that we humans are greedy for: salty, sweet, silky, chewy. These ingredients — from the old world to the new world — merge my past, present and future.”

Butter: Of course, the culinary world is enthralled by French butter, but Bruno says that a lot of local dairy farms offer butters that are as good or even better than the international kind.

Bacon: He believes North America produces the world’s best bacon, French lardons and British or Irish bacon aside. He counsels cooks to seek out an ethical food supply since animals handled ethically simply taste better.

Bourbon: Bruno says it is one of the best liquors to use in cooking, from classic cocktails to fruit stews and baked cakes. “It adds a unique flavor that evokes an older time’s sensibility and invites you to sit back and relax after a long day.”

Chocolate: Bruno’s culinary career began as an apprentice at a chocolatier in France. At 16, he was often elbow deep in melted chocolate. “Chocolate is a small taste of heaven on earth,” he writes. “I’ve heard there are some who don’t adore chocolate, but if so, I believe them to be a mere few.”

A long list of luscious recipes

In reading the book, I came upon a number of recipes that I’m looking forward to making. One of them brought to mind a dish that my mother often served: wilted lettuce, which is torn leaf or Boston lettuce dressed with a bacon vinaigrette.

Bruno’s version is grilled asparagus with apple cider bacon viniagrette. His recipe includes Dijon mustard, honey, olive oil, apple juice, apple cider vinegar, and crispy bacon. Essentially, you grill the asparagus, and top it with the delectable dressing.

A number of his recipes combine savory and sweet. One is for peanut butter, coffee and bacon cookies, topped with icing sugar. On the next page, you’ll find bacon coffee marshmallows, dotted with tiny bits of bacon.

The butter section includes a tutorial on making brown butter as well as recipes for compound butters, such as tarragon and roasted garlic butter, and dried fig and cranberry butter.

There are gooey brown-butter lemon cookies, Louisville butter cake and of course, that Canadian specialty, butter tarts, with raisins and bourbon. (I am a skeptic when it comes to raisins in butter tarts.)

The chocolate recipes do indeed sound like heaven, starting with double chocolate whoopie pies and interestingly, lemon ricotta chocolate cheesecake. Its crust has ground hazelnuts as well as graham crackers, and it is topped with chocolate curls.

There are “Everything” brownies, which have walnuts, hazelnuts, almonds, pumpkin seeds and dried cranberries. And, there is another butter tart recipe, for chocolate butter tarts with pecans, while a recipe for chocolate meringue kisses wraps up the cookbook.

As with the Great Canadian Bake Off, Bruno’s recipes put delicious twists on recipes we may already be making, and offers some combinations we might not have considered. I’ve bookmarked a number of things to try.