Time Travel Kitchen — A Chat with Joy the Baker

And she brought her Dad’s Browned Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe with her; Also: What’s coming up on Tuesday at TTK

Joy Wilson aka Joy the Baker at home in NOLA. Photo courtesy of Joy Wilson

If you’re not following Joy Wilson (aka Joy the Baker) on Instagram, do yourself a favor and join the party. There are a half-million of us already there.

It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway, Joy is a fantastic baker. She’s also a terrific teacher and following along on her Instagram stories and reels when she’s creating something wonderful is, well, a joy.

She’s also hilarious as you will quickly discover by following her @joythebaker.

A self-taught baker with a degree in English literature, Joy is also a successful entrepreneur, launching a line of baking mixes exclusively with Williams Sonoma. She’s a cookbook author and photographer, writes an award-winning blog, and puts out a twice-yearly magazine. She also just learned how to ride a motorcycle.

One of my favorite things Joy shares with readers is baking and cooking with her Dad — especially his signature browned butter chocolate chip recipe.

These are delicious and the recipe worked perfectly. Photo: Jolene

I made them this week and I’m here to say: make a batch or six - they’re that good. The browned butter adds a slight nuttiness with a hint of caramel, the cookie is tender and crisp but also a little chewy at the center. Mine were done in 12 minutes.

Here is the recipe link — DEFINITELY make them. You will be a hero to all who know you. Link:

https://joythebaker.com/2021/04/dads-very-best-browned-butter-chocolate-chip-cookies/

The original chocolate chip cookie was a ‘happy accident” according to New England Today and were invented by Ruth Wakefield in 1930 at the Toll House Inn, outside of Boston. If you’d like to learn more about the birth of America’s favorite cookie, here is the link:

https://newengland.com/today/food/toll-house-cookies/

But now…

A Chat with Joy Wilson

Jolene: Hi, Joy, thanks for being here. I know you are originally from Los Angeles, but you’ve made your home in New Orleans. What drew you to NOLA?

Joy: New Orleans is a magical city. She’s a character more than a city. I feel like New Orleans will call you if you’re meant to live here. So…I was simply called by the city and I’ll be here as long as she’ll have me.

Jolene: How did you get started as a baker?

Joy: My Dad and my Aunt taught me how to bake. My family was very health conscious as we were growing up so we didn’t have a lot of packaged sweets.

Joy and her Dad baking together. Photo: Courtesy of Joy Wilson

“The one loophole we had in our family was if you could make it from scratch — it was fair game. Of course I immediately learned to make brownies from scratch and I’ve been guided by my sweet tooth ever since.”

— Joy Wilson

Aunt DeDe, watching over things. Photo: Courtesy of Joy Wilson

Jolene: You’ve often mentioned with great affection your late Aunt, Aunt DeDe, being an early and continuing influence in your life. I loved what you said about her and this portrait in some of your Instagram posts from last year and about her guiding spirit:

Joy: My Aunt DeDe had her portrait painted at the LA County Fair in 1965 and now is my prized possession in my home where she keeps a very close eye on all the cakes.

“Every cake I pull from the oven, stack and frost, or dollop with whipped cream was passed down from my Aunt DeDe.” — Joy Wilson

Jolene: I’m always touched when I read or hear about your Aunt DeDe.

Jolene: You are so encouraging to bakers via your really fun and lively Instagram account, starting with your daily greeting, “Good Morning Friends, how are you?”

Along with all the great baking, you occasionally do these hilarious ‘spirals’ where you tongue-in-cheek answer followers life questions with the disclaimer “for entertainment purposes only.” How did this start?

Joy: Oh, gosh, hahahaha! How does any spiral start? It’s hard to pinpoint. I absolutely love sharing my life on Instagram and I suppose I’m also full of mediocre but funny advice. It’s very fun.

“I love what we all share in that space.” — Joy Wilson

Jolene: And so do your readers. Thank you, Joy.

The Spring/Summer issue of Joy the Baker is on sale now at magazine stands and at https://joythebaker.com

Coming up on Tuesday: We’re blasting into the 1960’s and ‘70’s

Thanks Judy Jetson and Astro for giving Tillie and me your seats. This version of The Jetsons courtesy of C. Bentley. Original Artwork, Hanna-Barbera

Thank you so much for last Friday’s successful launch of a paid subscription option for Time Travel Kitchen.

Also, Time Travel Kitchen hit a milestone last week — 1,000 total subscribers. I’m very grateful to every one of you and to Substack.

Thank you for this notification, Substack!

I’m really looking forward to putting together posts for us that focus on the food and culture of the 1960’s and ‘70’s and I hope you’ll consider joining TTK as a paid subscriber.

This Tuesday I’ll be writing about the proliferation of the era’s Avocado colored kitchen designs and so that calls for some quick and delicious Avocado recipes to take us through the summer.

My kitchen. Just add Avocados 🥑

I’ll also be writing about what I saw at a recent show I happened upon at the Museum of Contemporary Art here in Chicago while I was at the Farmer’s market this week —MCA is right next to the market.

It got me thinking about the defining symbols of the 1960’s and ‘70’s, (this symbol actually originated in 1958) and I want to tell you more about this stunning career retrospective of the work of artist Nick Cave.

Peace symbol from Nick Cave’s installation ‘Spinner Forest’ at the MCA, Chicago 2022

So that’s it for this week. It feels appropriate to end today with the symbol of peace because the world could sure use some right about now.

Many thanks again to Joy Wilson and to all of you.

Peace. ✌️

Jolene