476: Big Internet Baking Energy with Broma Bakery's Sarah Fennel

0:28This episode is brought to you by Resi and American Express. And I think the idea that cake needs to be picture perfect is so silly. Like, people who want cake, they want just a giant piece of cake in front of them. They just want to eat that cake. They don't care if it's a little lopsided. They don't care if the frosting is really thin in between the layers, but really thick out. They're just like, they're so excited about cake.

0:54This is Taste. I'm your host, Matt Rodbard. Sarah Fennel is a self-taught baker and photographer. Her website, Broma Bakery, and her social platforms attract millions of fans monthly. On this episode, we talk about her great debut cookbook, Sweet Tooth, and all the things she is baking and cooking and posting about today. Sarah is such a fun hang, and we had a really, really cool conversation. I hope you enjoy it.

1:32Sarah Fennell, welcome to This Is Taste. How are you? It's so nice to meet you. So nice to meet you, too. I'm doing great. I'm so excited about this, and it's going to be a great time. We're going to have a good chit-chat. All right, so Sarah Fennell. Fennell, is that really your last name? It is really my last name. And the funny thing is, I got married, and I changed my last name to my husband's last name, Crawford. And a year in, I was like, I've made a huge mistake. Not the guy. Not about the guy. The guy's great. About the name. And so it's still legally Crawford, but I kind of like publicly switched it back to fennel.

2:04And I'm just, I think in time I'll maybe legally switch it back. It just like, it captures who I am. It's a food name in the food world. It's a food name. And so growing up, the fennel, like, did you enjoy fennel? Did you get teased by fennel? Did people celebrate you with fennel? Nobody knew what fennel was. So I would get called Sarah Fennell all the time. Oh, yeah. Fennel. The fennel family. Yeah, like, no. I would say I didn't really like fennel. I really don't like licorice. Licorice is not my thing. And then I realized that, like, raw fennel is different than licorice. And I love raw fennel.

2:39I love roasted fennel. Roasted fennel with chicken is amazing. Yeah, it's so good. Oh, yeah, it's so good. Even fennel seeds are good. I just don't like licorice. Frons. Don't forget the frons. The frons are amazing. So delicate and beautiful. Oh, love. Yeah. So you just moved to New York from Boston via Michigan, via some other spots. I'd like to get a sense. What's it like living in New York now? It's amazing. It's amazing. And I feel like that sounds so contrived. Like everybody who moves to New York is like, oh, my God, I love it. But I love it. And my husband and I live in Brooklyn. And Brooklyn, I think, was never something on our radar.

3:11I did my first years of undergrad at NYU, so I was like always a Manhattan kid. And especially I went to NYU 2009 to 2011. And Brooklyn was still like pretty, you know, like hipstery vibes then. but it's amazing. It's absolutely incredible. It feels so manageable, but there's also so much going on. It still has like a really nice sense of diversity in a lot of different ways. And there's also more greenery. We're in Fort Greene, and there's just these big trees, and so it just feels like the best of all city worlds. Great restaurants. Where are you hitting up right now? You're new to the city.

3:44You're new here. What do you like? Okay, so we've really been exploring like our neighborhood first and foremost. So we went to Sailor, which was, I thought Sailor was like, I would give it like eight out of 10. I thought it was really good. I would only want to go back like once a season. I think it was just like a little elevated for my taste. Yeah. I really like. Did it feel like it was like not as approachable? Yeah. Yeah. A little small space. Yeah. Yeah. And like the food was phenomenal. But I think just a little bit hoity for an everyday vibe. Got it. But you know, there's space for that.

4:15Our favorite in the neighborhood so far has been Miss Ada. Yeah. Which is incredible. It was so good. We also went to Romans, which was phenomenal as well. Yeah. Oh, we did one more in the neighborhood that was delicious. You're hitting some good spots. I love Romans. We're getting there. Neighborhood spots. So what brought you to New York to move here? My job. So my husband just finished residency, and it was a five-year program. We were in Boston. And then he took a year off, so we were actually there for six years. Six years too long? Six years too long. So I'm from Boston. I loved where I grew up.

4:51I grew up right outside of Boston in a town called Belmont. It was amazing. I think Boston as a creative and as a person in the food scene is not the most conducive. There's just not. I mean, it's interesting. It's like there's a lot of opportunity, but there's a lot of barriers in place to really help to bring up a lot of like young independent artists. So that was really hard. And I was really looking forward to sort of ending my tenure there. And so my husband has one more year in fellowship. So he's a spine surgery fellow. OK. So he does the real deal spine surgeries. And he is like so good at what he does.

5:33And I'm so proud of everything he does. But I don't want to continue to move for him. No. Especially when it's this one year. You spent six years in Boston. I spent six years in Boston. And we were in Detroit before that. And I loved Detroit when we were there. But we were there for his med school. And so, you know, I have this career as well. And I think a lot of times when people have medicine spouses, The medicine spouse is the one really doing the career thing. And then you as the spouse or the other spouse are like an add-on. And we both have our own careers. So we really both do, I think, a really good job at like respecting each other's career goals.

6:06And it's not like he resents me for wanting to be here for the year. He's coming on the weekends. I'm going to Philadelphia where he's on the weekends. He's in Philly. He's not here. Oh, yeah. So you're rolling solo in Brooklyn. I'm rolling solo. Watch out. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, but it's nice because like he's so close that we're able to still have that time together. And then we're able to focus on our careers during the week, which is great. It's so interesting when you say add-on because like for fans of Broma Bakery, you're not an add-on. I mean, you've been doing this for 15 years, which you're like a teenager.

6:33Like your website, your blog, you were blogging when it was called blogging. And to me, you've grown this community and your book is like the big breakout of the year. It's going to be like truly the biggest book. and I love it and we'll get into why I love it. But I want to get a sense of why I write the book now 15 years after you launched it. I mean, that's crazy. Yeah. I think a few reasons. So one, I've always been such a perfectionist and I fully recognize that when you're creating something so tangible like a book, that's there forever. and I have never felt comfortable until the last two years in my career to say, no, I know I can look back on this in 15 and 20 years and still be really proud of the work I put in and not be like, oh, I wish I had waited until I knew more about this or I knew more about this.

7:25Like I feel proficient in everything that I do. And I also feel like, I mean, really, so many people since the pandemic have had these big career shifts and you've seen so many new people in the food industry, so many people who've been in the food industry like me for a while that saw all these new creators and this whole new type of content that really, I think, humanized a lot of the food space. And I think I needed that shift and that sort of growth in order to feel really comfortable with doing something like writing a book where I could put as much of my personality as I did into it. I'm hearing a lot of like you needed a few more like web-centric slash TikTok centric authors to write books.

8:08Totally. As to feel the community, which we publish many. Yeah. Versus it being like the old guards, et cetera, et cetera. Absolutely. And I love that you're being honest about that because I think it's a real anxiety. You've been doing it for 15 years. You should have done it like 10 years ago probably. But you didn't have that feeling of community that you have now. Totally. That's what I'm hearing you say. Totally. Absolutely. And I think too, I mean, I still struggle with when I meet somebody who doesn't know what I do, like saying, what do you do? Because food blogger doesn't really fit. Yeah.

8:36Like influencer definitely doesn't really fit, but I am both of those things. And so I think to like seeing all these other people do it where there's not necessarily an exact title. You're like, OK, no, it is legit, even if I can't name it in one or two words. Do you stop on the street in New York? Yeah. It's cool, right? It is cool. You know, I it's not like I like look forward to it or despise it or anything. Like I think it's really sweet when people come up to me and like know who I am. And like I think because I've been doing this online for so long, seeing people in real life, it's such a validation that I'm actually reaching real people, which is so cool.

9:13Yeah, it must be nice to hear and get feedback that people are actually making the recipes. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Because, I mean, I think that's one thing I really like about food and like influencing in the food space. Like fashion influencers, home influencers, lifestyle influencers, they're still doing something to make people's lives better. But there's something about food that is so heartwarming and like that literally changes people's lives. So what was the last encounter you had with the fan who said they made something? Did something come to mind? I was in the line at Whole Foods and this guy kept like looking over at me.

9:47And usually when I'm with my husband, like I'm a little spacey when I'm out. So usually my husband will be like, that person definitely knows who you are. He's the beater. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I was looking at this guy. I was like, okay, I think he knows who I am, but like, whatever. You know, like, what are you going to do? And then I'm going up the escalator and he goes, excuse me, are you Bromop Bakery? And I was like, yeah. And he was like, I literally just bought all the ingredients to make your double chocolate zucchini bread. And he like pulled up his bag. He was like, I'm trying to make it with monk fruit because I have diabetes and I'm going to see how it turns out.

10:18But like, I love your recipes. And it's just so sweet. That's really, really sweet. And it's got to be like a little weird, obviously, when people come up. But then it's really reassuring when people actually literally have the ingredients in their bag. Oh, it's wild. That's wild. How do you decide on what project you're going to take on? You know, your book, Sweet Tooth, it covers such range, which I think 15 years of writing a publication will give you that range. But like when you're doing the original content on either your socials or on your website, how do you decide what you're going to tackle?

10:50I think that first it has to be something I feel creatively inspired by. So sometimes that creativity can come in the form of just seeing somebody else do something and it sparks an idea of my own. Sometimes it's something that I've been chewing on for a while that I finally feel like, let's bite the bullet and do it. So creativity, I think, is really important. And I also think that one reason I've been able to have such a long career in this space is because I really keep tabs on like where the market is headed, what the market is doing. Like I feel very analytical in terms of like noticing trends and noticing where, you know, oh, I've seen three people do something in this style.

11:32And this seems to really be like something people are gravitating toward. Are you literally analytical? Are you looking at Google Trends? I'm not looking at Google Trends. But I would say like as analytical as you can be in your mind and sort of just like making like a little like mental note of like keep this in mind, keep this in mind, keep this in mind. You're like fondant is back. Absolutely. Right. Absolutely. Yeah. Things like that. Things like that. Yeah. Like and I think sometimes that there's trends that like absolutely don't make sense. So I won't hop on them. But when I do see a trend that people are really gravitating to and people are really enjoying, I mean, like you have to hop on that.

12:04But not just trends like food trends, like trends like industry trends. Like I think two years ago we were seeing a lot of people do really well on video when they were doing like hands and pans style videos. Not like tasty hands and pans videos, but like, you know, doing ASMR, like putting things in bowls, really keeping the camera like that. Three quarter shot, right? Yeah. But three quarter. Yeah. Absolutely. And now we are seeing so many people who are just putting the camera right in front of them and just talking to the camera while they're making something. And so seeing that shift, it's important in my content for me to have that shift, too, to just sort of keep up and keep people's attention in the way that they're already liking.

12:42What about dump cakes? Were you on that trend? I was not on that trend. I've never made a dump cake. I would happily eat a dump cake. For sure. A dump cake and what is it? Like the Sprite pie? Oh, Sprite pie. Yeah. Yeah. I would totally eat that, but I haven't. Yeah. I'm more like exactly like you. Like I'm not going to turn down like a mug cake or a dump cake. Yeah. Like I'll eat it happily. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll house it. I'll house that. But you're not fully subscribed to it. Yeah. I think that the type of dessert that I like, and the type of food I like, the type of dessert I like, is dessert that has those nostalgic flavors, but done in a slightly, I don't want to say elevated, but done in a slightly more exciting or unique way.

13:27Well, you talked about creativity at the jump. Yeah. And that's what it's all about. Yeah. We'll get to some specific recipes. But I love your baking lessons. There's some real point of view here, and I want to go over a couple of them. One is nobody cares if your cake isn't picture perfect. They just want cake. Great lesson. Thank you. Yeah, I think so. All these baking lessons, they are at the end of the book? No, they're at the beginning, which is a good place to put them. We had so many iterations. Bro. I know. No judge. Oh, my God. Your book, you don't know where things end up. Yeah. Okay.

14:03So it's at the beginning of the book. We'll edit that in. Just kidding. We'll keep that in. So there's these 10 lessons and they're just lessons that like they have nothing to do with anything besides just really motivating people, making people feel seen, heard, inspiring people. And I think the idea that cake needs to be picture perfect is so silly. like people who want cake they want just a giant piece of cake in front of them they just want to eat that cake they don't care if it's a little lopsided they don't care if the frosting is really thin in between the layers but really thick out they're just like they're so excited about cake so i think bringing that attention back to the baker who's making it and being like hey if this is your first time making cake yeah you have permission to make it incorrectly there is no real incorrect like it's it's just cake and people are gonna love it no matter what it's a really good lesson.

14:55Another one that really stuck out. The biggest secret in the baking world is under baking. I love that cosine. Talk about it. Okay. So you can have the most amazing recipe for a cake, a brownie, a cookie. If you over bake that thing, it's not good anymore. It's just not. And there's so many factors that go into things being baked correctly. So one is the type of equipment you're using. Like if you're using a dark colored sheet pan versus a light colored cheapy on. That makes such a difference. If you're using an oven that says it's at 350, but really it's at 375, that makes a huge difference. So no matter what, keeping tabs on making sure you don't overbake something.

15:35And in fact, underbaking just slightly is like the best thing because underbaking just means that it's still fully cooked, but you're going to get that moisture in there. It's like that like little magic moment before all the moisture goes out of that baked good and it's still fudgy. It's still chewy. It's still... We all went to middle school and we had those underbaked chocolate chip cookies. And they were the best. They were the best. Yeah. I mean, like when they're so underbaked that sometimes you'd lift them up and the middle would just stay there. Not a bad thing. Not a bad thing. I love it.

16:04It's great to have that permission to underbake a little bit. I actually overbaked one of the... I baked your peanut butter chocolate chip cookies from the beginning of the book. That's on me though. Oh no. Because I didn't use my oven thermometer. I know. And so especially peanut butter can be really tricky because that overbakes in like a split second. So you really want to make sure. And the thing I would say with cookies is for everybody. Cookies you really want to take out when you are like 99 % certain they're underbaked. Like you're like, I don't know about that. Like take the cookies out and then let them rest on the sheet pan because the sheet pan itself is still so warm.

16:36It's going to bake it more when it comes out. Now, Sarah, you have an absolute passion for baking. And it's interesting to me because I think you're like sneaky, creative, sneaky, smart about everything. And you really, really, really have this dedication to it. And I want to get a sense what interests you about this hobby, this job, this cookbook, this world that you kind of create with your socials. You could be doing a lot of other things. You're very talented. But baking has been it for you. Why? Wow. Great question. I think there's something so special about baking and I talk about this in the front section of the book but baking is completely unnecessary.

17:21Like we don't need to bake to eat. But we do it because it brings so much joy and it brings so much joy to us as we're doing it. It brings so much joy to us as we are able to share it with the people we love. It brings so much joy to people who eat it. It just creates so much joy in the world. And I think there's very few things in life that, you know, scratch that same itch where you're doing it for people you love. You're doing it because you want people to, like, feel happy. Like, it's just it feels it's just such a heartwarming feeling. I also think that my personality lends itself to baking.

18:00Like, I am very technique forward and not technique like classic French pastry technique. But just like I love when things have a beginning, a middle, and an end. I love when I know exactly what I need to do to get exactly to where I need to go. But we talk about the math. Oh, yeah. I mean, you're like into math. Like obviously you're like a math person. Well, I mean, I did do well in math in school. There you go. And I did do well in science in school. Okay. But I still really need help when I like do the tip at restaurants. So like I don't know how good at math I am. Yeah. Move the decimal point one and double it.

18:32That's what I do. But I am good at like ratios. Or give it more than double. Yeah. You want to go over 20 Yeah exactly You want to go 25 And then like Even if you move it over Then sometimes If you have to carry anything The carrying can be hard It's too much for me I get it I always Yeah It's like do it over Double it Plus a little bit of X Yeah and then just a little bit of extra And then Yeah But clearly Matthew You get it Yeah ratios I'm really good at Love ratios And I really like Once I like Once I understood enough about baking I really liked Like knowing those things that you can only know from baking for so long and be like, OK, well, we can't do it this way.

19:12So we're going to add a little more of this. But if we add a little more of this, we've got to go down on this. And like it's just like this fun little almost like orchestra in your head that you're like the conductor of. I just love it. And I think, too, I, like so many other people, grew up with a mom who was always cooking and baking. and they weren't like crazy things. Like my mom doesn't have a good chef's knife. Like my mom doesn't know how to chop vegetables finely, but she was always making things homemade. And the same went for her baking. Like they were not these like three layer, like five component different baked goods.

19:48They were things that, because she was a single mom working a full-time job, she would just whip up and we would eat it and we would all love it. And it was just a really cool like combination of having this person in food who inspired me to love food, but also not treating it so delicately. Yeah. I think it translates to what you do. Yeah. Because you bring human elements to it. This isn't like an experiment. This isn't like a math equation back to that. Yeah. There's definitely some human element. I get what you're saying. What were some of those dishes that your mom made, like on the baking side of the coin?

20:24So the thing she made the most was chocolate chip cookies. Yeah. And she pretty much did the chocolate chip cookie recipe on the back of the Nestle Toll House chocolate chip. Yeah. Super fair. But, like, she still doesn't know technique. Like, sometimes she would use melted butter. Sometimes she would use softened butter. And so they would come out differently all the time. And we had fun sort of guessing how those cookies were going to come out. Yeah. She did boxed brownies all the time. Girodeli, double chocolate brownies. Yep. If you know, you know. You know, you know. She had some really good coffee cakes.

20:52There was a cinnamon chocolate chip coffee cake that was amazing. Her carrot cake is phenomenal. I riffed on the carrot cake in the book. It's now called Rebe's Chocolate. Excuse me. It's called Rebe's Carrot Cake, which is my sister's name. Because my mom would make this carrot cake every year for my sister growing up. It was like the cake she requested every year on her birthday. So things like that. Just like very simple but delicious. Your mom's awesome. I like hearing about her. This is great. Let me ask you about the London Fog tea loaf. You call it quiet luxury. Very funny. Why is it quiet luxury?

21:26Okay. So quiet luxury is like elevated basics. And I feel like that's what the London Fog Loaf is. So this London Fog Loaf, it is a loaf cake flavored with Earl Grey. And you actually soak Earl Grey tea bags to make this cake. And then it's topped with a lemon icing that just goes over. And the lemon really brings out that floral, acidic nature of the Earl Grey. and I think that it's like it's like you eat it and it doesn't go like like it's not like oh my god like you eat it you're like lovely like you just lovely yeah yeah like it's a London tea cake yeah it's a London tea cake and I think it's just it's quiet luxury I love that you good reference good 2023 reference alright make the case for making a pavlova okay okay so pavlovas are not difficult they just look difficult yeah It's literally like three ingredients.

22:25Is it three? Eggs, sugar, and like— Air? Yeah, and like cream of tartar. Like it's so easy. And salt, but like that doesn't really count. Doesn't count. Oh my God, it's so easy. So like you put it all into a mixer. You just whip it up until like it's really, really, really mixed. And then you put it in the oven. The thing that people struggle with pavlova is they take it out too soon. And with pavlova, it's very delicate when you take it out. It's still really warm. And if you take it out when it's still warm, it can end up, like, sweating on itself. It can end up getting moist and soft. So what you want to do, bake it, then open up the oven a little bit.

22:57Then you're just going to leave it in the oven and let it slowly cool off in that warm oven. But, like, pavlovas are so fun because people think that you know how to bake. They look fancy. They look so fancy. So what are you putting, like, sauce-wise in them? Okay, so we have a pavlova in the book. And it has, like, you know those cherries that come in the containers that are, like, blue and yellow? and I think they look Greek or something. Oh, yeah. They're, like, beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. Totally love those. So we put those on. So they're, like, this just marinated cherry. And then we do some chocolate shavings that we put on top.

23:31And it's just, like, this black forest situation. They're, like, Luxardo cherries? Luxardo cherries. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And so just cherry, chocolate, and then whipped cream, pavlova. It's so good. It's so good. I love the simplicity of it all. And it feels like you really speak a language. You speak, you're accessible with your recipe development. Thank you. I really try to strike this note between being accessible and accessible in terms of flavors, but then being different or unique or just exciting in terms of where those flavors go into the form, right? So there's this whole chapter in the book and it's basically taking familiar flavors and putting them in new forms.

24:13Yeah. And I think that's like one of my favorite chapters in the book just because it's all about taking things that you like – you know what to expect when you eat it but you haven't ever eaten it in that way. And it's just so fun. Very smart. Okay. You remove checks from Puppy Chow. You remove checks from Muddy Buddies. As a product of the Midwest. Yes. I found this to be rash, brash. I have a lot of emotions. I love it but I don't love it. Yeah. Please explain yourself. Okay. So I'm not opposed to Chex and Puppy Chow. I think Chex and Puppy Chow are great. And I love how the chocolate goes into the middle of the Chex.