Pastry chef, psychologist, food columnist, longtime Ottolenghi collaborator, co-author of multiple bestselling cookbooks and star baker – Helen Goh is many things to many people. A Jill of all trades and master of many, she draws widely on Asian, Middle Eastern and Western influences in recipes found throughout she and Yotam Ottolenghi’s Sweet and Comfort, published online, and now in her first solo baking book, Baking and the Meaning of Life.
Her stellar debut is filled with recipes for bakers of all abilities – from an exceptionally easy riff on chocolate Guinness cake to a 10-layer honey cake worth dedicating a weekend to – Baking and the Meaning of Life is a rich and varied celebration of baking, each recipe united firmly by Goh’s signature curiosity and creativity.
Here she is now with how Baking and the Meaning of Life came to be, and how you can best put it to use.
If you take one thing from this book, it should be to save your egg whites! Store them in a glass jar in the fridge for up to a week (or the freezer for up to 12 months) anytime you have them left over from making custards or ice-cream and you’re halfway there to making financiers, pavlovas, chocolate chip cookies (read the introduction first though), a giant chocolate macaron or a terrific sugar crackle topping for shortbread.
I wrote Baking and the Meaning of Life after letting go of my grandiose ambition of writing the kind of book that could win a James Beard Award. Both Ottolenghi Sweet and Ottolenghi Comfort had been shortlisted in their respective years and in my mind, the next project had to be the one that brought it home. But Comfort had a long and difficult gestation, interrupted by the pandemic, and I realised I no longer had the energy – or desire – to create another book. So I was turning my focus back to my psychology practice and re-reading the psychoanalyst Irvin Yalom’s Momma and the Meaning of Life. His reflections on the existential questions and the quiet, profound power of human connection made me think about what a huge role baking has played in my life in terms of offering a tangible, expressive way of enacting that connection. The notion of baking as a powerful connector, as cultural and creative expression, as an existential act, and as a way to create meaning in ordinary moments took root in me. Somehow, in releasing the pressure, expectation or approval from any awards committee in my head, I had inadvertently opened up space to think about what really mattered to me. And it was about the surprisingly profound weight of the simple act of baking.
The main thing I learned writing it was about the quiet, transformative power of what Anne Lamott calls the “shitty first draft”. When I first read Bird by Bird, the idea of writing a book felt completely paralysing. I had long let go of the idea of the Beard Award, but I hadn’t yet let go of the perfectionism that made every step feel impossible. Lamott’s insistence that writing was hard and messy and trying to control everything perfectly only blocks creativity, gave me the permission to start imperfectly.
But the real revelation was how this lesson bled into my recipe development, not just the writing process. I used to sit with an idea for days, overthinking, doubting myself, afraid that any misstep would prove I wasn’t cut out for it. The notion of a “shitty first draft” shifted everything. Suddenly, a recipe didn’t have to be perfect, heck, it didn’t even need to be good! It could simply be a question, an experiment, a place to be curious. The pressure lifted. I could make mistakes, explore, and iterate without judgment. Liberating myself from harsh self-criticism didn’t just make writing easier, it made cooking, experimenting, and creating more fun! And it made me want to keep going, keep writing, show up every day, until the book was done.
I’d love it if you tried spinach and coconut cake with cream cheese icing. It’s not a gimmick – the spinach turns sweet and nutty with baking. Its slight metallic character is rounded off by the coconut oil and it is just delicious.
If you’re a relatively new cook, give the chocolate ginger beer cake a try. It’s a tweak on the chocolate Guinness cake, made famous by Nigella Lawson, swapping out the Guinness for ginger beer. It has a lovely, easy-to-eat texture and is quick to make – the batter is made in one saucepan and with a hand whisk. Don’t forgo the icing though – because it looks good and turns the cake into something lush.
If you’re looking to extend yourself a bit more, meanwhile, try the roasted veg pasties with kimchi and cheddar, or the blackcurrant Champagne cake or the Matilda’s cake or the 10-layer honey cake! Make these for a celebratory get-together or just as a project, and feel yourself grow a foot taller with your accomplishment.
Melbourne features prominently in the book. It was where I came of age culinary-wise. From the first job in a bakery while I was at uni, to the boyfriend who opened a cafe just so I could cook all day and night, to my seven-year apprenticeship at Donovans, to the lifelong friends I made at Spoonful, it’s the city that made me a chef.
When you’ve finished reading Baking and the Meaning of Life I hope you’ll realise that baking is life!
Images and text from Baking and the Meaning of Life by Helen Goh, photography by Laura Edwards. Murdoch Books, RRP $55.00. Baking and the Meaning of Life is out now and yours to purchase from great Victorian booksellers such as Readings, Hill of Content and Books for Cooks.