A Meaningful Life: Helen Goh on Baking, Ritual and Joy

This week on Kitchen Tape, Rose and Crystal sit down with Helen Goh, internationally acclaimed pastry chef, longtime Ottolenghi collaborator, columnist for the Sydney Morning Herald and The Guardian, and author of Baking and the Meaning of Life and Sweet. Featuring 100 recipes that weave together Helen’s Malaysian and Australian heritage with Western and Middle Eastern influences, Baking and the Meaning of Life asks a larger question beneath the recipes: how do we build meaning in our lives? Through eight essays woven throughout the book, Helen explores baking as a practice of mindfulness, agency, competence, ritual, and connection — not simply as a way to make food, but as one of the many small acts that help us create purpose and community in a chaotic world. The conversation moves through her enviable cookbook collection, existentialism, the meanings of color, psychology, flavor, memory, and the quiet rigor behind recipes that feel both deeply comforting and profoundly intentional.

Mentioned in this episode:
• Baking and the Meaning of Life: How to Find Joy in 100 Recipes
• Sweet by Helen Goh and Yotam Ottolenghi
• Cooking: Simply and Well, for One or Many by Jeremy Lee
• Kate Spade Green
• The Australian Women's Weekly Children's Birthday Cake Book
• The Flavor Thesaurus by Niki Segnit
• Stars Desserts by Emily Luchetti
• Flour Hour Baking Podcast hosted by Jeremiah Duarte Bills and Amanda Faber
• Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
• Ma Vie en Rose by Rose Levy Beranbaum
• The Artful Baker by Cenk Sonmezsoy
• Jikoni by Ravinder Bhogal