“Baking Wisdom” with Anna Alson

Affectionately known as “Canada’s baking sweetheart”, Anna Olson is as genuine and sweet as the taste sensations she creates. That’s not to say she’s saccharine by any means. Anna has earned her billing as a top chef through hard work, dedication to the craft and a true passion for creating and sharing in the kitchen. 

Catching up with this master of multi-tasking as she cleaned the black icing from her fingers (Halloween baking was in full swing), we had a great chat about what’s going on in her busy life – spoiler alert: a lot! She also generously shared a pair of fantastic harvest recipes from her cookbook “Baking Wisdom” so you can wow your friends and family at Thanksgiving dinner. Thanks, Anna! 

Q: What inspired you on the baking path? 

A: My original influencer was my grandmother. I think for a lot of people who love to bake, there is that family influence because you witness a sense of calm and joy and sharing in the kitchen. It wasn’t as much about ‘what’ my grandmother made, it was the fact that you could just feel she was in her happy place when she was baking – and I wanted to be there and be a part of it. 

Q: You’re creating all the time, what inspires you?

A: Ideas come from a lot of places. I’m one of those people who can be awake at 2 am and things pop into my mind. Also, with social media, I’m in direct contact with my viewers and readers in a way that I wasn’t before. I can glean so much interest and information from the questions people ask. I may be posting a simple chocolate chip cookie recipe but then you get that next level of questions and inquisitiveness. 

It’s a different dialogue than it was a few years ago; everybody’s culinary vocabulary has increased ten-fold and I’m always reminded of that when I speak to young people. The fact that a child can have a perfectly calm conversation about a chocolate ganache with me and ask me why it’s splitting… when I was 10 years old, I didn’t know what ganache was, let alone dealing with ‘Am I heating it too much?’ or ‘Is the fat content of my chocolate too high?’ Wow.

Q: Do you test recipes in your kitchen at home?

A: I do. Because I write my books and recipes for the home baker, I create in my home kitchen. When I’m writing, I test a recipe and I bake alone. I do my own dishes and it’s amazing how that can be a motivator to make a recipe more efficient. 

After I’ve created the recipe to the point where I’m happy with it, I have two recipe testers. They follow a template with distinct questions – they don’t get photos or added notes. I need them to bake blind. After they do it, they send back their notes and we compare. When they send their pictures and it doesn’t look like what I made, I think, where did I go wrong? Because those instructions may sound formulaic but the visual cues, the timing details, are meant to guide you. So if they’re not clear and concise, I’m steering you wrong. That’s the value of that testing process. It also helps that one of my testers has teenagers at home and the other has children in elementary school. So you really get some honest feedback.

Q: What’s on the Olson’s Thanksgiving menu? 

A: We love hosting Thanksgiving and we have all sorts of traditions, but we rarely cook turkey. My husband, Michael, is a chef as well and between us we spent so many years cooking Thanksgiving turkey for other people that maybe that’s why we opt out of it now. Interestingly, our favourite Thanksgiving meal usually involves fish and seafood. In the industry, we know it’s when you find the best sales because everyone is buying turkey. So you go to your fish guy who has beautiful lobster or crab or sushi-grade tuna. But we still do a lot of Thanksgiving side dishes. Roasted or mashed potatoes, brussels sprouts, roasted root vegetables and maybe a squash soup. Then I love doing the traditional apple and pumpkin desserts. But at the heart of it we have fish and seafood.

Q: Tell us about the big and bountiful “Baking Wisdom” cookbook.

A: The book didn’t start out to be so massive but it grew and thankfully I have a wonderful publisher who told me to keep going. Technically, anyone should be able to follow any recipe because the ingredients and the instructions are there but often information is withheld that could help avoid mistakes. Maybe you’re new to baking but I’m not and I am happy to share with you what I’ve learned. Especially with young people, I really see an increase in self-confidence – when you can cook or bake something successfully, you feel good about what’s in front of you. And that’s what it’s all about for me.    

Q: Are you a fan of farm to table ingredients? 

A: Yes. I’m such a big supporter of our local growers. What brought me to live in the Niagara area originally was the fact that you could embrace the seasons by what was available in the moment and the simple philosophy ‘what grows together, goes together’. 

Speaking to fall, peaches are winding down, plums are one of the last things, then you’re moving into apples and pears and onions and I love celebrating squash in all its different varieties. When you cut into a squash in fall and it immediately releases this dew on its surface because it is so fresh… you know it’s packed full of vitamins and the flavour takes care of itself. If you’re buying local fresh ingredients, you’re probably saving money because you’re not dealing with a middle person, you’re supporting the local economy. You’re eating things at their peak nutritional value and peak flavour window and you don’t have to do much to it to enjoy it. annaolson.ca 

*Anna Olson’s Baking Wisdom published by Appetite by Random House®, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited.