Why My Vermont Table Author Gesine Bullock-Prado is Big on Cheese

Pastry chef and cookbook author Gesine Bullock-Prado fell in love with Vermont at first sight. She was born in Washington DC and grew up between DC and Germany – she has family in Bavaria. But during her first trip to Vermont, after a football game with her husband in New Hampshire, “I was immediately infused with ‘this is home’ energy,” she remembers. “Vermont towns are incredibly charming, but not just for display. They are places of community. I just knew this was where my life would be.” Could the cheese have something to do with it too?

Bullock-Prado left her home in Hollywood to make a new home in Vermont almost 20 years ago, and she hasn’t looked back. Her new cook My Vermont Table: Recipes for All (Six) Seasons showcases that unique magic of Vermont through more than a hundred recipes and stories. At the heart of the book is the Green Mountain State’s flavors and six unique seasons. Spring, summer, fall, and winter all claim their place at this table, but a true Vermonter holds extra space for maple-forward mud season―that time of year before spring when thawing ice makes way for mucky roads―and stick season, a notable period of bare trees and gourds galore prior to winter. The book is “a love letter to Vermont and to our life,” says Bullock-Prado.

In My Vermont Table, Bullock-Prado takes readers on a sweet and savory journey through the seasons by way of recipes like blackberry cornmeal cake, Vermont Cheddar soup, shaved asparagus toasts, and maple pulled pork sliders. Local produce, wine, flour, and cheese are the foundation of these dishes. And quintessential Vermont flavors are updated with ingredients and spices from Bullock-Prado’s own backyard.

Cheese In Vermont

Bullock-Prado sees cheese as integral part of her cooking and her life – as well as the ethos of the state that inspired her book. “I feel I am primarily made of cheese,” she says. “I am very dairy forward – I cannot live without it.” Her recipes celebrate the complexity, versatility, and deliciousness of cheese.
“Vermont is rich in cheesemaking artistry,” according to Bullock-Prado. At her home in White River Junction, she usually has a wheel of Harbison from Jasper Hill in her fridge, one of her all-time favorite cheeses. From Lazy Lady and Von Trapp Farmstead to Cabot and Vermont Creamery, “The Vermont makers make the best – we are so lucky to have this bounty.”

Chef & Vermont Enthusiast

Bullock-Prado is a renowned pastry chef, cookbook author, baking instructor and television personality. In her 18-year career, Gesine has run her own pastry shop, become a popular baking instructor at King Arthur Flour’s Baking Education Center, has been the contributing food editor of both Runner’s World and Food + Wine, co-hosted Cooking Channel’s Unique Sweets and is a regular on the Today Show. She hosted Baked in Vermont on the Food Network and was a main judge of Food Network’s Best Baker in America.

This is Bullock-Prado’s seventh cookbook and sixth book, and she sees this as, in many ways, her most personal. Usually, her books have been styled and photographed in studios; this one was made entirely in her home. Her husband took the photos, she cooked and styled “exactly what we would and eat anyway.” The book doesn’t just aspire to genuine-ness, it really is genuine. “Nobody takes themselves overly seriously here,” she says. “It’s the same approach to food – it’s full of whimsy, joy, and love, and I want to share that with everyone.”

“The Vermont vibe doesn’t have to stay here in Vermont,” says Bullock-Prado. “I’m bringing the Vermont vibe the world.”

What exactly is that vibe? “It’s relaxed, it’s joyful. It’s thoughtful and comforting. It’s about quality, not glitz.”

Vermont Cheddar Soup captures all that joy and comfort in one flavorful bowl.

Note: Bullock-Prado references Cabot Creamery’s Seriously Sharp Cheddar. A couple other Vermont Cheddars to consider include Grafton Village 2 year aged Cheddar and Jasper Hill Farm’s Vault 5.

Vermont Cheddar Soup

10 servings

There is no thing as Vermonty as Vermont sharp Cheddar. Maybe maple syrup. Okay. Fine. There’s no thing as Vermonty as Vermont sharp Cheddar and maple syrup. And hoppy IPAs. And Ben and Jerry’s. Now I feel better. And while it’s all well and good (and delicious) to consume your Vermont Cheddar in large slabs on a lovely chunk of bread, I’ve come to revere it as a soup and is what I’ve come to call “Vermont’s second liquid gold.” Maple syrup is the first, naturally. You’d be forgiven for assuming that a Cheddar soup would be gloopy, a slightly less viscous queso or fondue. But it’s not at all. In fact, it’s a proper soup. It’s creamy, but not too creamy. It’s Cheddary but not overwhelmingly so. What it is, at its core, is comforting. Add a healthy chunk of bread, and it’s sublime.

1 tablespoon canola oil
1 cup finely chopped sweet onion (from 1 small onion)
1 cup finely chopped carrot (from 1 medium carrot)

4 garlic cloves, sliced wafer thin
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons dried thyme
2 quarts low-sodium chicken stock
11⁄2 cups starch water (see note)
1 bay leaf
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon light sweet miso (optional)
1 tablespoon pure maple syrup
1 bay leaf
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
14 ounces (398 g) freshly grated Vermont sharp Cheddar (I use Cabot Creamery Seriously Sharp Cheddar)

11⁄2 cups heavy cream

Heat the oil in a Dutch oven over medium heat until it just starts to shimmer. Add the onion, carrot, and garlic and sauté until tender, about 10 minutes. Transfer to a small bowl.

In the same pot, melt the butter and then add the flour and thyme, to make a roux. Stir over low heat until combined and then continue to cook for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. The mixture will gently brown.

Slowly add the starch water and chicken stock, whisking constantly. Bring to a simmer, add the bay leaf, vinegar, miso (if using), and maple syrup, and cook for 10 minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Lower the heat to low.

Add the Cheddar all at once, whisking until melted and combined, and then add the cream and sautéed vegetables. Heat through, remove bay leaf, and serve immediately with hearty brown bread.

NOTE: Be careful not to scorch the soup and make sure that the cream you use is as fresh as possible. Overheating the soup and using cream close to its sell-by date could lead the soup to curdle.

STARCH WATER: Like brown butter, starch water isn’t something you buy and it isn’t some- thing you necessarily make on purpose (well, maybe now you will). What it is, is the leftover cooking water from cooking pasta or potatoes, the stuff you pour through the colander and down the drain. I harness all that leftover good- ness to make everything from eggs and omelets, from yeasted Liège waffles to bread. The stuff is amazing. You just have to remember to capture it before you mindlessly dump it. I keep a large Weck jar full of it in the fridge (it lasts about a week) and use it several times a week. Then, when I need more, I leave the jar very conspicuously by the sink to remind myself to capture the stuff when I’m making pasta or potatoes. When a recipe calls for starch water, this is the stuff I’m talking about. Nothing fancy but freakishly magical.