Sunny Side Up

A peek inside the joyful world of Molly Yeh

Story by Jeanelle Olson

In her sunny, south-facing kitchen Molly Yeh appears to be powered by a million-watt smile. And sprinkles. Perhaps bagels too. Throw in some marzipan, memories of Lunchables, delightful recipes from her mother-in-law’s old church cookbooks, and the promise of stumbling upon someone’s grandmother’s ancient cast iron at a yard sale. This is Molly.

If you don’t know who Molly Yeh is, you’ve probably eaten something Yeh-inspired (Yeh is pronounced “Yay!”). If you’ve had a dessert with tahini in it, that’s Molly. If you’ve heard of hotdish and you don’t hail from a very specific part of the Midwest, also Molly. If it’s ever occurred to you to dress up a cake with bits of custom-colored marzipan, you’ve probably entered Molly’s orbit.

And that’s no surprise considering how prolific Molly’s influence is in the ever colliding worlds of cooking and entertainment. She’s written two cookbooks, stars in Girl Meets Farm on the Food Network, posts almost daily for a devoted social media following, and continues to write a successful, long-running blog. Sound like a lot? The plot thickens: at the time of publication, she’ll be a new mom. Add it all up, and most people would be exhausted. Molly prefers exhilarated.

What’s her personal recipe? For starters, Molly is so joyfully, insatiably open to inspiration wherever she goes, so good at telling a story of how she came to love, say, those weird Italian rainbow cookies in New York bakeries and turn them into an entire cake (spoiler: she didn’t know they were almond-flavored until she did and then it was all over), so naturally, fearlessly inclined toward mashups and remixes of ingredients, that it seems almost everything she makes goes viral. Maybe she was born with it. With a Chinese dad and a Jewish mom, she grew up with “such good carbs,” she gushes, and a philosophy of, “If it tastes good together, eat it!” It helps, of course, that her personal style, which extends to her kitchen and the now-signature way she presents her food, is bright, yet authentic, never trying too hard, and always approachable.

Six years ago, Molly and her husband Nick moved from Brooklyn to his family’s generations-old sugar beet farm in Grand Forks, Minnesota. In fact, they live in Nick’s grandmother’s former home, the house where his dad grew up. She’s traveled the world for food, for music (she studied percussion at Juilliard and is a lover of classical music), and for the 2017 Pyeongchang Olympics (she’s a figure skating superfan).

In some ways, Molly says finding balance has been an ever-changing element of her career path. “Working for myself– having the blog and then working on a cookbook–has forced me to strive for balance,” she says. In the early days, when she and Nick moved to the farm and the blog was young, they both threw themselves into their work. “I was working seven days a week. Nick was working seven days a week. We were just beginning our careers and had this mindset of, ‘Oh, if we can work these hours, we should.’” Since that time, they’ve both harvested a lot, so to speak. Success, of course, but wisdom, too. “It’s because we had those few years of driving ourselves crazy that I felt like I could finally step back. And it showed me how burned out I could get. It made me realize that balance has to be a priority, and to close my computer on the weekend.”

She no longer obsesses over the perfect flat-lay photo–you know the kind, taken from directly above a table or other meticulously styled, posed surface, “like with the hand-carved spoons and all the ingredients just perfectly set.” She grins her excellent grin, and while you can’t see a playful eye roll, it’s in the air. And to be sure, Molly directs a good portion of this good-natured older-wiser thing back on herself. “I used to stress out about making a blog post out of a weekend outing with my family. Trying to make it look cute, dressing cute,” she laughs. “Now I’ve found it’s so much more fulfilling to just be present.”

She’s noticed a shift, too, in what kinds of visuals get traction on social media. Whereas a painstakingly perfect photo used to rule the feed, Molly finds now that authenticity and a refreshing absence of much forethought–“like an un-styled cookie,” she laughs, or something plopped onto a sheet pan–get more likes than they used to. Where does she think this stems from? “Relatability,” she says almost immediately, as if she senses our collective need to connect with food heroes as real-life people with messy kitchens or a basket of laundry just out of the frame. “People have a desire to feel like they can do something, like they are living meaningful lives,” and if posting that cookie helps make people feel as if they can make that too, so much the better.

Nowadays, Molly uses an app called Forest to gently remind her to put down her phone. She recognizes that sometimes, especially while shooting her show during pregnancy, she needs to insist on 10 hours of sleep. She’s also made peace with the occasional sleepless nights that have seemed to pop up more often during pregnancy; instead of panicking about how tired she might be the next day, she looks at it now as reading time, or a chance to putter around and get things done in the middle of the night. “I never want to take for granted the fact that I have this luxury with the blog, with my own deadlines that I can push back,” she says, “but I’ve lightened up on myself.”

Happily for her fans, Molly has never strayed from a certain brand of lightheartedness in her writing and cooking. Marzipan party animals on a birthday cake. Obscure delights from the upper Midwest, written about with adoration, like mazariner (Swedish almond tarts), lefse (Norwegian potato flatbreads), cookie salads (yes, they’re a thing), and a dizzying variety of those hotdish recipes. And of course, sprinkles everywhere.

Molly’s kitchen eminates colorful happiness.

Molly’s favorite recipes and life stories are collected in cookbook Molly On the Range.

Molly Yeh appears to be powered by a million-watt smile. And sprinkles."

Even her green smoothies have sprinkles—in the form of a flax-chia super seed mix. In fact, those smoothies are a bit of a clue as to how Molly keeps balance in her kitchen. Certainly, there are a lot of sweets–her blog offers a whopping 75 cake recipes, and that doesn’t even include muffins, donuts, cookies, or other treats–hearty comfort foods that stick to the ribs, and legacy dishes like knoephla soup, all manner of dumplings, and her mom’s matzo brei. Yet some of Molly’s most interesting twists and mashups occur in places where, she admits, “I have to coax myself into eating a salad by way of putting some ridiculous carbohydrate on it.” Behold: kale matzo pizza, bagel dog salad, falafel fattoush, and salad pizza (you’ll find the last two of those recipes in this issue). “There has to be that one element in there,” she insists, “that makes you say ‘Oh, I want to eat that!’ And then you’re okay with eating the salad that comes with it.”

Molly knows herself well enough to know that it’s not her style to abruptly adopt something like a cleanse, or a detox, or other restrictive style of eating in the name of balance. “I have to do things in moderation,” she says, and her use of the word “coax” above feels just right. All she needs is a milky ball of burrata to nestle into some greens, or a pizza-esque base on which to pile all the leftover vegetables in her fridge, to get to a place where she feels back on track.

After our interview, Molly is ready to get into nesting mode. She’s excited about stocking the freezer with all manner of sustenance for when baby arrives. She plans to take a few months off, then the Food Network crew will return to her kitchen to finish filming season three of Girl Meets Farm. Whatever the future brings, it seems that Molly, miles from where she and the blog started, has found a solid sense of home here on this farm. Food has been her way of connecting with her husband’s family and staying close to her own. “Time with my family is so meaningful,” she says. “Family is just everything.”

There has to be that one element in there that makes you say ‘Oh, I want to eat that!’ And then you’re okay with eating the salad that comes with it.”

KALE SHAKSHUKA

Yield: 6 servings

Special equipment: A medium cast-iron skillet; 6 mini cast-iron cocottes

2 tablespoons olive oil

6 cloves garlic, minced

1 1/2 teaspoons sweet paprika

1 pound kale, stemmed and coarsely chopped

Kosher salt

1/2 cup chicken or vegetable stock

4 ounces feta cheese, crumbled

Freshly ground black pepper

Pinch of red pepper flakes

Juice of 1/2 lemon

6 large eggs

FOR SERVING

Greek yogurt

Za’atar spice

Fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped

Crusty bread

Preheat the oven to 350° F.

In a medium cast-iron skillet, heat the oil over medium heat. Add the garlic and paprika and cook, stirring, for 30 seconds. Add in the kale in 2 of 3 batches, allowing it to wilt slightly between batches so it all fits in the pan. Add a good pinch of salt and cook, stirring often, until the kale is softened, 7 to 9 minutes.

Stir in the stock and cook until slightly reduced, about 5 minutes more. Add the cheese, a few turns of black pepper, a pinch of red pepper flakes and the lemon juice. Taste and adjust the seasoning as desired.

Distribute the kale mixture among 6 mini cast-iron cocottes and create a well in the center of each. Crack an egg into each well. Bake, uncovered, until the whites are cooked but the yolks are still runny; check for doneness at 12 minutes.

Top each cocotte with a drizzle of yogurt and sprinkle of za'atar, parsley, salt and pepper. Serve immediately with crusty bread.

FALAFEL FATTOUSH

Yield: 4 to 6 servings

SALAD

Olive oil or flavorless oil, for frying

3 day-old pitas, chopped or ripped into 1- to 2-inch pieces

Kosher salt

6 cups spinach, lightly packed

1/2 English cucumber or 3 Persian cucumbers

2 medium tomatoes, sliced into pieces ³⁄₄-inch thick

1/2 small red onion, thinly sliced

2 radishes, thinly sliced

1/2 cup fresh mint leaves, chopped

Black pepper to taste

DRESSING

1/4 cup tahini

1/4 cup water

1 tablespoon lemon juice

2 cloves garlic, minced

3/4 teaspoon sumac

1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

Falafel (recipe follows)

To make the salad: In a skillet, heat 1/4-inch of oil over medium-high heat until shimmering. Fry the pita pieces until lightly browned, 30 to 60 seconds on each side. Transfer to a paper towel and immediately sprinkle lightly with salt.

In a large bowl, combine the pita chips with the spinach, cucumber, tomatoes, onion, radishes, and mint leaves. Season with a few turns of black pepper and salt to taste.

To make the dressing: In a bowl, whisk together the tahini, water, lemon juice, garlic, sumac and salt, stirring until thickened.

Drizzle half of the dressing over the salad, toss, top with the falafel, and serve with the remaining dressing.

FALAFEL

Yield: 14 falafel balls

1 tablespoon coriander seeds

2 teaspoons cumin seeds

1 cup dried chickpeas, soaked for 10 hours or overnight and drained

1 small onion, coarsely chopped

4 cloves garlic, minced

1/4 cup lightly packed cilantro leaves with stems, roughly chopped

2 tablespoons flour

1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice

Olive oil or flavorless oil, for frying

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

Black pepper

Pinch of crushed red pepper

Toast the coriander seeds and cumin seeds in a skillet over medium heat until lightly browned and fragrant, then coarsely grind in a spice grinder.

In a food processor, combine the cumin, coriander, soaked chickpeas, onion, garlic, cilantro, parsley, flour, lemon juice, salt, cinnamon, baking soda, crushed red pepper, and a few turns of black pepper, and pulse quickly, 80 to 100 times, until the mixture is combined, but still slightly grainy.

In a large skillet, heat 1/4-inch oil over medium-high heat until shimmering but not smoking. Fry a 1-tablespoon test patty until golden. Adjust the seasonings in the mixture as desired. Form balls of falafel mixture. 3 tablespoons each, packing them firmly and then flattening them slightly. Fry on all sides until golden brown. Transfer to a paper towel.

Jeanelle Olson is a food writer, recipe developer, and cookbook writer. You can follow her @bookandsalt and find her recipes at bookandsalt.com.

Back Story

At school, the percussionists often observed Waffle Shirt Wednesday, Food Stand Friday, and happy hour every day at Harry’s Burritos withTravis the chillest bartender in Manhattan. The percussionistswere creatures of habit, which sometimes frustrated me when I’d want to try new cool restaurants downtown and all they’d want to do was go to Chipotle; but it also comforted me when I knew that I could go to Harry’s any day at 4 p.m. and find Hammer and Kyle chain-smoking and drinking pre–studio class margaritas. Food Stand Friday came about because of the really tasty lunch cart that parked on the corner right outside of Juilliard. The guys would usually get a pile of meat on rice and I’d go for the very coriander-y falafel with white sauce and a little tiny bit of hot sauce. An extra-crispy crust and the heavy hand on the coriander separated this falafel from the refined dainty herby balls that I later discovered downtown, but it’s probably a draw for which falafel in the world is my favorite. As long as it’s salty and crispy and not at all soggy, it pretty much has my vote. Here, instead of stuffing falafel in a pita or serving over rice, I’ve counteracted the fried-ness with a bed of fresh vegetables, lemony sumac dressing, and squishy pita croutons. It’s not a traditional fattoush, but it’s a good one.

For all things Molly Yeh, check out her blog at My Name Is Yeh, and follow her @mollyyeh.