Welcome to Secret Breakfast / An exclusive newsletter, the best place to start your Easter, or Passover, with the Gochujang lobby and some unexpected guests

Hi there!

The Best Foods For Unexpected Guests was the catchiest headline of the week for me.

It’s incredible how, during the busiest days of the week, my fridge can’t afford even +2 people at the table. I don’t keep the meat in the freezer, I bet that makes me a bad survivalist.

When people come over at the last second, pasta, leftover vegetables, legume flour, eggs, and cheese are my go-to elements. Maybe I’d bake a pie crust of some kind too.

And you? Are your unexpected guests luckier than mine?

Piero

A volunteer prepares iftar food for Muslim devotees breaking their fast at the Data Darbar shrine on the first day of the holy month of Ramadan, in Lahore, Pakistan, on March 23, 2023. Arif Ali / AFP / Getty

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THE BEST QUOTE

✦ Harrison Ford, as Paul in the tv series Shrinking.

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THE MISSING INGREDIENT

NOTED, GOCHUJANG IS THE NEW CACIO & PEPE

I've been walking around in a kind of daze for two weeks, and everywhere I go... Planes, trains, restaurants, meetings... I find myself scribbling something down: Gochujang. Gochujang noodles. Gochujang Buttered Noodles (★recipe). Even Gochujang Cookies (★recipe) and gluten-free Gochujang Cookies (★recipe)

This mix of glutinous rice, fermented soybeans and red-pepper powder it’s not a sauce, but a jang, “a foundational ingredient in Korean cooking, meaning you usually need to add other ingredients to it”.

Picture: ohmonah@SAKURACON & ANIMEBOSTON

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THE BOOK

The Fruit of Your Labor

★★1/2

I don’t know if we needed a book to remind us that fruit can enhance any delicious main. You can test if Berens is the right chef for you by vetting her Food52 recipes, this Grape Custard Pie (★recipe) or the Chocolate Pudding with Coffee-Soaked Black Cherries (★recipe).

Pulp: A Practical Guide to Cooking With Fruit by Abra Berens
→ Shortplot: 🍑 🥬 🥥 🍉

❍ OnlyPans
This is where Secret Breakfast picks juicy content from food creators

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RANDOM ACTS OF HUNGER

This is the space where I share some food (un)related stuff of my week

🥚21 Passover Recipes From Jewish Communities Around the World (★recipes) ✝️Time to bake some Hot Cross Buns (★recipe) 🐰Rabbit Bolognese is the New Chocolate Bunny (★recipe) 🐕Dogs and Cats Linked to Reduced Child Food Allergies 🐶What Your Dog Wants? 🌭Who Said “Dog”? 14 Facts About The Chicago-Style Hot Dog 🍋When Life Gives You Lemons, Make a No-Bake Lemon Meringue Cake (★recipe) 🥒Start with Bread and Cucumber and You’ll Have a nice White Gazpacho (★recipe) 🌮Ixta’s Winner Taco Ice-Cream Looks Awesome ☕️Pedro Pascal's Starbucks Order Has an Alarming Amount of Caffeine: six shots of espresso with extra ice in a Venti cup 🥕Easter’s Perfect for a Carrot Cake Cheesecake (★recipe) 🔥ProPublica’s Report: What to Know About the Risks of Gas Stoves and Appliances 🍔A New Burger Seasoning recipe ©️And we have a New Pepsi Logo, Again

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FOOD FOR LATER

A Brief History of Pancakes
Grace Linden / Smithsonian Magazine

Flat cakes prepared from starch-based batter date back 30,000 years. And they did not have baking powder, then!

You’re Wrong About White Chocolate
Jordan Michelman / Taste

It’s not real chocolate, it’s cocoa butter. Yes, we know the refrain. But is it enough to forget this mighty and quite remarkable ingredient?

What Is N/A Wine, Anyway?
Megan Krigbaum / Punch

Can you call “wine” something with no alcohol?