The Secret Life of Food was a delightful event hosted by the National Press club featuring Shirley Corriher and Susan Delbert. Shirley is a biochemist and winner of the James Beard Foundation award who just happened to write a couple practical and tasty books; Cookwise: The Hows and Whys of Successful Cooking and Bakewise: The Hows and Whys of Successful Baking. Aside from her impressive resume she is a delight to listen to. Her insightful and witty anecdotes about food and why it acts the way it does when interacting with other foods were both educational and entertaining.

She covered such varied topics as why potatoes won’t get soft during the baking of an au gratin to why some crème brûlées come out like scrambled eggs instead of custard. The first issue has to do with acid from such sources as vinegar and the second due to the use of beet sugar versus cane sugar in the brûlée. Her animated storytelling was engaging considering most of what she was speaking on was heady science topics pertaining to food. Overall, the evening was a hit with demonstrations explaining how to fix a rock hard mess of chocolate in a pan by adding water and so much more delivered to a packed room. I am hoping she will do more events such as this in promotion of her books. I know I will be in attendance.

As one would expect of such an event there were appetizers provided as well as Sangria and a cash bar. The Sangria was lovely with large chunks of apple inside that were particularly flavorful. The buffet-style offerings included mini spanakopitas, or spinach pitas, raspberry goat cheese tarts and deep fried ham and cheese balls. The spanakopitas were light and flaky filled with a mixture of spinach, feta, egg and herbs. It was a touch heavy on the dill for my liking but otherwise they were lovely, buttery and delicious. The tarts were a particular favorite of mine with a melt-in-your mouth crust topped with raspberry preserves and a touch of tangy goat cheese that blended perfectly. Luckily they made up for the more bland ham and cheese balls. The could have used a bit more seasoning in my opinion.

But putting aside the sampling of foods, this was a night well worth finding parking downtown and trying to locate the entrance to the National Press Club. The levity, information and engagement provided by Shirley and her lovely assistant Susan Delbert were the jewels of the evening by far.

-AMQ