A Q&A with Christina Tosi

Christina Tosi, the chef, owner and CEO of Milk Bar, is coming to Blackberry Farm for a Blackberry-style house party event, Will, Christina and Friends! During the event, guests have the unique opportunity to learn from the best in a baking demo with Christina herself. Ahead of her visit to Blackberry, we chatted with Christina about ingredients she can’t live without, baking secrets and more!

What three ingredients can you not live without and why?
Christina Tosi: Use delicious ingredients, yield mind blowing results! 1. Any cookie/cake/pie or otherwise we bake up at Milk Bar starts with a delicious, European-style or cultured butter. Start with tasty butter, yield mind blowingly delicious baking results. 2. Nonfat milk powder (easy to find in the powdered beverage section or baking aisle of the grocery store), because it brings a depth and roundness of flavor to baked goods. It is also the secret ingredient to many Milk Bar classics. 3. Salt, more specifically kosher salt. Most people think pastry chefs are all about sugar, and yes, that’s a very important textural and flavor lever in most desserts. But salt is the ingredient that without, no sweet treat can shine. Salt rounds out the taste of any great baked good, amplifies the flavor story and is the very balancing act of every creation in the kitchen.

What are your baking secrets?
Read recipes. Bring one in to your kitchen, but once the oven is on and the mixer is going, ditch the rules and do YOU. If you think that chocolate chip cookie would be killer with some pretzels, add them in! If you sneak a bite of batter and think, "This isn't as dreamy as I want," stir in some more vanilla. What you bake is an extension of you, so you have to go for it, loud and proud. Worst case scenario, you learn from a mistake. But even more detrimental in my book – your baked good is just meh. There’s no perspective, no personality and you, by extension, aren’t excited and proud.

What do you love baking the most?
I love baking anything that allows space for creativity and flexibility. At home I make a lot of bar cookies because the format is so open ended. I can use whatever my pantry and creativity are pushing me towards in the moment. Ritz crackers, coconut, graham cracker, butterscotch bars – I'm in.

What books – cookbooks or otherwise – are you reading?
My mother recently sent me a care package – you're never too old for some snail mail love from mom, right? – that included a Milk Bar Catering recipe book from the '50s, full of old school soda shop moves. Some are a little dated, but I'm flipping through the pages to fill up my creativity tank.

What are your hobbies outside of baking?
Running, crafting, getting lost in the forest, reading the paper with a cup of coffee – anything that lets my mind wander or sets me in motion.

Do you have a favorite Milk Bar dessert and why?
That’s like choosing your favorite family member. I love them all, but my “favorite” does vary by time of day/how much dessert I've already crushed. A Coffee Cake Truffle Crumb Cake with my morning cup of joe, a corn cookie for lunch because, you know, there’s vegetables in there, a pint of Chocolate PB Cookie Crush in bed after a long day. You get it.