Winner of Your Best Recipe with Fresh Ricotta

By SML Office • March 30, 2011 • 10 Comments

Congratulations to SML Office, whose Louisa's Cake won this week's contest for Your Best Recipe with Fresh Ricotta, earning her a handsome Provence Hand Painted Serving Bowl from Williams-Sonoma, plus big prizes from Viking, OXO and Tiny Prints, and a spot in the next food52 cookbook!

Q&A with SML Office

Describe an early food experience that has influenced the way you think about food and/or cooking.
That is such a great question and I wish I had a definite answer because baking and cooking started very, very early for me. Like my son, I believe it was age 4. And I remember obsessing over and organizing recipes in the second grade. But where it came from is a mystery. I remember seeing the Julia Child parody on SNL in the 70s and feeling bad for her, thinking that I felt the same attachment to the kitchen and wondering why people mocked her attention to detail and enthusiasm.

What's your least favorite food?
Coconut

What is the best thing you've made so far this year?
Eggplant Parmigiana. It's all about The Aubergine these days for some reason. Mostly grilling it with a brush stroke of olive oil and sea salt at the end.

Describe your most spectacular kitchen disaster.
Every buttercream for the kid's birthday cakes has ended in disaster. Without fail, year after year.

What is your idea of comfort food?
Spaghetti Bolognese with Coca-Cola in a glass bottle.

Apron or no apron?
Apron!

What's your favorite food-related scene in a movie?
Emma Recchi (Tilda Swinton), eating a plate of prawns in I am Love.

If you could make a show-stopping dinner for one person, living or dead, who would it be?
I would have my brother with me in a mountain chalet while it's snowing like mad and I'm making him the perfect Swiss fondue. He loved cheese more than anyone.

You prefer to cook: a. alone, b. with others, c. it depends on your mood
C. It depends on my mood

When it comes to tidying up, you usually: a. clean as you cook, b. do all the dishes once you've finished cooking, c. leave the kitchen a shambles for your spouse/roommate/kids to clean.
The answer used to be C. but now after living in Switzerland it's become A. cleaning as I cook.

SML Office's son in the kitchen; the lovely Provence Hand Painted Serving Bowl she's won from Williams-Sonoma!

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I am an American living in Zürich—curious about all cultures and food. I love family, cooking, gardening, nature, modernism and books (especially cookbooks). Professionally I work with my husband Nico as an art director/graphic designer. I'm Mom to Ella 7, Emilio 5 and Carlotta 9 months. Working with my hands and being outside is most essential.