This week we get high on a friend’s supply and enjoy a cake that has…something fishy about it. We also welcome Guest Gulletier Cassie Kliesch to the table.
Stupid Fucking Desserts
by Greg
My friend Sam is one of those people who creates food on a level that’s mystifying, imagining dishes with zeal, curiosity, and often, a playful wink. A Wonka of the everyday kitchen, his ingenuity with ingredients is boundless and put on casual (and punny) display. If you invite Sam to a potluck, prepare to be gobsmacked when he drops a deranged showstopper on the spread. On vacation in Provincetown, he is the s’mores sorcerer of the annual beach bonfire, prancing around the circle, popping his unconventional pairings1 into open mouths producing a sweep of squeals and moans. And if you’re ever a guest at his house around dinner time, watch as he throws together a meal from stuff “that was just lying around,” which hits the table looking like it’s been plucked from the pages of Bon Appetit.
For the last couple of years, he’s been working on a series of goodies that he calls stupid fucking desserts. To the naked eye, they may appear like your typical PTA bake sale rice krispies treat, but these confections are packing something a little different. Forget a dark chocolate drizzle or a sprinkling of M&M's. In Sam’s version, swirls of savory ingredients are mixed into the marshmallows, creating dazzling dissonance and sweetly subverting expectations. The ideal stoner snack. Past inventions have included Totally Vegan Tortilla Chip, Cacio e Krispies, and Everything Bagel Bars (where the Cheerios are the bagels). When served among friends, he’ll often ask the group to take their best guesses at the flavor, delighting at the slew of inevitable wrong answers with impish glee.
This week, a new creation was on the menu: The Honey Trap. On the plate, the bake looked like delectable cloud puffs enrobed in a milky glaze, but once Sam listed the contents, my stomach lurched. It sounded like a catalog of shrapnel discovered in a frat boy's puke; Snyder’s Honey Mustard and Onion Sourdough Pretzel Bites, Honey Nut Cheerios, marshmallows, yogurt glaze, and a shower of coarse sea salt. After eating one, I could only shake my head. The tang of honey mustard against the silky sweetness of yogurt, the charming double crunch of pretzels and Cheerios padded in whipped confectionery sugar, the sharp sparkle of salt. Altogether, this strange, phenomenal mélange made me wonder what other disgusting combinations my palette has been denied.
The bitch had done it again.
The Verdict: Sometimes stupid is where the magic is.
Name Drops: Okaycook, Synder’s of Hanover Honey Mustard and Onion Sourdough Pretzel Bites
Dopamine Diet
by Cassie Kliesch2
Since I was a kid, I’ve experienced this sensation that I now refer to as a “dopamine hit” when I eat something delicious. A quick history of foods that have incited a hit; fresh packs of Gushers consumed during recess, medium rare London Broils at the family dinner table, and gorgeous aged cheeses that I always include on my dinner party charcuterie boards. When I take a bite of something and experience this telltale feeling, it arrives hard and fast. It could be an underlying condition of ADHD or just proof that food is one of my greatest pleasures. Having a dopamine diet has led to a relationship with food that feels thrilling and…slightly dangerous.
This response exists on a spectrum; eating certain foods produces a small tingle of pleasure, while others give rise to a euphoric tidal wave, like my current fave—luscious raw scallops. The smooth, buttery texture and briny yet sweet flavor is sheer perfection. My fiance, Arkady, and I like to ride this scallop high as often as possible, experimenting with them in different dishes like crudo and nigiri. We both moved from New Jersey to Rhode Island on separate paths, which crossed with a swipe on Bumble. Something we instantly bonded over was the fact that New Jersey is a sushi paradise full of all-you-can-eat restaurants and arguably some of the most reliable Japanese takeout. It was strange to move to the “Ocean State” and find seemingly worse options in the sushi department. Shortly after we met, the pandemic hit and we filled our days driving around our new home, searching for acceptable sushi takeout. One day we happened upon Andrades Catch in Bristol, which opened up a whole new world: we could buy our own sushi-grade fish. With Covid banishing us to my third-floor apartment, we learned how to make our own sushi, and it soon became our love language.
Raw fish in general is a big daddy dopamine hit for both of us. It goes so far that I fell into a perfectly-tailored-to-my-interests algorithm of “sushi cakes” on Pinterest. Among friends and family, I’m known for making cute little cakes, attempting countless recipes and decorating techniques. For my fiance’s 30th birthday, I even made him two entirely different cakes - one Oreo layer cake and one lemon because he loves both, and birthday boys shouldn’t have to choose. So what better way to celebrate another trip around the sun together than by pushing the boundaries and shaping a cake out of raw fish and rice.
I stocked up on our faves from Fearless Fish Market and Good Fortune Supermarket, and put my mini rice cooker to work. Four cups of sushi rice formed in mini cake pans served as cake layers with spicy kani salad, seaweed salad, salmon sashimi, cucumber, mango, scallop sashimi, tuna poke, and ikura standing in for my “buttercream frosting” filling and decor. When it was complete, I marveled at how nicely it turned out. I felt like a culinary goddess. I stuck candles in it, sang Happy Birthday, and shocked the hell out of him. I mean, the man literally didn’t have words. I’m a great gift-giver but I think this one did take the cake.
We cut it up into slices, tucking spoonfuls of the rice into nori sheets, folding them into cone-shaped handrolls, and dousing them in lemon or soy sauce, then adding a razzle-dazzle finish of Kewpie mayo. With each bite, we could feel the explosion of dopamine blazing inside us. The high lasted long after the cake was demolished.
I’m sure you’ve heard that our taste buds are always changing, always chasing new flavors to relish in or learn from. I’m not sure my buds will ever meet something as dopamine-inducing as this cake, but in our house, we’re always up for a new tasty challenge.
The Verdict: Dropping it low for some dopamine.
Name Drops: Andrades Catch, Fearless Fish Market, Good Fortune Supermarket, Kewpie Mayonaisse
A special thank you to this week’s illustrator, Jardley Jean-Louis3 ! See more of their work here.
If you’d like to be a Guest Gulletier or illustrator, drop us a note at putitinthegullet@gmail.com
My favorite Sam s’mores combo—Saltines, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and jam.
Cassie Kliesch is an operations manager by day, a boutique travel planner by night, and a food enthusiast always. Currently residing in the foodie haven that is Providence, RI with a fiance that loves her cooking and their two Persian cats.
Jardley Jean-Louis is a multi-disciplinary artist working in the visual arts, film and animation. When not creating, boxing class is being skipped, Jasper the cat is being chased and the days are taken slowly.
As a savory gal WOW am I emboldened to make some stupid desserts! Additionally so grateful to hear the backstory on this sushi cake that certainly needed to be seen by more people, esp me.