remedial eating

in Just-

 

in Just-

spring          when the world is mud-

luscious the little

lame balloonman

whistles          far          and wee

and eddieandbill come

running from marbles and

piracies and it's

spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

 

 

the queer

old balloonman whistles

far          and             wee

and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's

spring

and

         the

                  goat-footed

balloonMan          whistles

far

and

wee

 

—e.e. cummings

 

 

plant Magic dust

 expect hope doubt
    (wonder mistrust)
       despair

                   and right 
        where soulless our
   (with all their minds)
 eyes blindly stare

life herSelf stands

— e.e. cummings

 

 

Sarah threw Spring is like a perhaps hand up, a few weeks back, and I was stunned.  How had I missed an e.e. Cummings?  I pretty much marinated in his words, his playful grammar, his soaring syntax, his jesting and jousting and exquisite off-kilter, for the better part of college.  Which, in my case, was the better part of six years.  I thought I knew them all.  I was wrong.  I am thrilled.

 

(I also thought, for the first time, and pitiably, of the anonymous someone whose job it was to copy-edit his poems.  Do they award post-humous Pulitzers to copy editors?  I've a nomination.  It's a slam-dunk.) 

 

 

Tripping over it like that got me thinking about chance encounters, about the way they shape our days, outlooks, lives.  About the abundant unwelcome ones, errant cars and anonymous dents and mis-behaving body parts.  About all the others, the small serendipities, casual conversations, stories, words, friends, faces, that winkle their way into a day and twist the lens, let in light.  I had a hundred examples in mind.  Which is precisely where they'll stay.  Spring's no time for screen-staring.  

Today, I'll just perpetuate the goodness that is Cummings, and bittersweet, slightly salty, chocolate peanut butter bars.  

 

 

These bars are like buckeyes, only better.  By like buckeyes, I mean both are confections, pure, unencumbered by flour or distraction.  That both involve chocolate and that blissful situation known as fortified peanut butter. (Fortified, here, meaning not twelve vitamins and minerals, but emboldened by butter, salt and vanilla, and ample sugar, both brown and powdered.) 

By better, I mean vastly simpler, and quick enough to pose a near-danger. Simpler because this is a bar, built in a pan, in one fell bulk swoop.  No scooping, no rolling, no dipping, no drying.  Just dump, noodge, drizzle, impatiently waaaaaaaiiit.  The chilling hour is interminable.  But it does save a person from total ruin.   

 

 

Better also because said format allows for ratios ever-so-slightly more majestic.  A peanut butter ball can only hold so much chocolate, before the excess runs right of.  Veneer's the best one can hope for.  A 9x9" pan, on the other hand, understands the existential nature and moral imperative of proper peanut butter:chocolate proportions.  Also, it contains wretched excess nicely.

Which may sound untoward for a season when we're to live, I think, on asparagus and air.  But have you looked up lately?  Excess, excess, everywhere. Besides, mud-luscious makes quite the mess.  And messes demand something stronger than salad.   

 

Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars, Bittersweet + Salty
adapted from Nigella Lawson, How to Be a Domestic Goddess

I've tweaked the proportions and technique, converted the original milk chocolate to bittersweet, and added salt (naturally) to ping-pong with the sugar.  That said, the transformation of classic peanut butter cup to bar is pure genius, and pure Nigella.  Do mind the chilling/cutting notes, below.  Shattered bars (see above) are delicious as anything, but pure heartbreak if you plan to give or share.

for the base:
1/4 cup dark brown sugar
1 1/3 cups confectioners' sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon pure vanilla
1/4 cup salted butter, melted
1 scant cup salted, creamy peanut butter

for the topping:
11 oz. dark chocolate (72% or bittersweet), chopped
1 tablespoon salted butter

Line a 9x9" pan with parchment paper or foil, both directions, leaving "tabs" as handles on all four sides. 

Melt butter in a one-cup glass measure, and pour into the bowl of a stand mixer.  Measure peanut butter into the same cup, and add to bowl.  (This saves dirtying a second measuring cup and, better, ensures the sticky peanut butter releases easily).  Add remaining base ingredeints to the bowl, fit mixer with the paddle attachment, and mix on low-medium until fully combined, 30 seconds.  (Alternatively, mix by hand, with wooden spoon or strong spatula.) Scrape mixture into lined pan, and pat into a roughly even layer.  If you'd like a more polished look, fold the extra lining over the peanut butter, and press the back of a clean measuring cup onto the surface, to even it.

Melt chocolate and butter in the microwave, in 30-second increments, stirring well after each session, for a total of 60-75 seconds, depending on your microwave's strength.  Alternatively, melt in a double-boiler.  

Pour chocolate-butter mixture over the pressed peanut butter, and spread with a silicone spatula, to smooth.  Chill in the refrigerator until the chocolate sets, around one hour (or, wrapped, overnight).  When ready to slice, remove pan from fridge, and let sit 10-15 minutes at room temperature, before cutting. Attempting to slice directly from the fridge will result in cracked bars.  (I've learned the hard way.  Repeatedly.)  After the chill is off, use paper "ears" to remove entire bar from pan, peel paper from sides, and slice into 1 x 2" squares.  

Store in the refrigerator for up to 7 hours days. 

a real deficit

You probably noticed, long before I did.  How gracious of you to keep mum.

Me, I didn't realize the gravity of the situation until late Monday morning, around 11:58 a.m.  Monday is our quick-turn day, when we come home for lunch, only to turn around again.  We don't do this often, probably because slow-turns are much more my speed.  But Mondays, it makes sense, it's worth it, so we do it.  Even if, sometimes, we need a little help.  Last Monday would be one of those sometimes.

Which is why, just before noon, I was rummaging fiercely, poking about the chocolate cupboard.  And why I worked my way through three squares of a seriously mediocre bar.  And one hefty chonk of weak-kneed candy.  And half a bag of Reeses Pieces.  A King sized bag, dug from the recesses, still haunting our kitchen from last Halloween.

I don't even like Reeses Pieces.  

I don't even like chocolate all that much.  At least not as much as would be required to inhale such quantities of such lackluster junk.   

Which is when I realized what you no doubt noticed a while back: there's been a real deficit in the chocolate department, around here.  Nuts and seeds are nice, of course, and soups and salads, my mainstay, but still.  Seriously?  What gave?

Specifics, mostly.  We've been awash in sweets, birthday cakes and because cakes and ice cream pies.  There were pots of rice pudding.  Éclairs. Cupcakes. Two batches of chocolate chip cookies.  Maybe three.  Nothing, in other words, that fit the bill.

The bill, in this case, being the need for grab-and-go, jar-friendly, chocolate-pocked somethings.  After all, drop cookies are fair-weather friends, really only worth eating on day one.  (And rarely, anyway, surviving to day two).  Layer cake eaten out of hand's a disaster.  Éclairs on the road: awkward, at best.  Ice cream pie?  Rice pudding?  So not pocket-friendly.  

Ergo, desperate rummage.  Ergo, salted blondies.    

There is, after all, only one way to right the wrong of consuming so very much very, very bad chocolate.  Namely, make a batch of much better chocolate, in order to avert such disasters in future.  Anyway, we had a full fifteen minutes. Plenty of time to do blondies up right.

Blondies can be many things, most of them, not right at all.  Anemic brownies. Sawdusty pucks.  Treats that do sweet with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Fortunately, there's a well-established formula for good blondies, which has for some time been my starting line: one cube butter, one cup brown sugar, one egg, one cup flour, flavorings.  Haiku simple, guaranteed good.  It is syllables fifteen, sixteen and seventeen—flav•or•ings—which, I've found, separate good from grand.  

Blondies are butterscotch bars, first and foremost, which means we must take their sugared soul seriously.  It's our responsibility to keep them honest, to honor their dark side, to uphold their edge.  To this end, I've taken to doubling the vanilla, which rounds out the sweet and helps it glow.  One convex teaspoon of powdered espresso—not enough to scream coffee, not even to whisper—neatly plays up brown sugar's swarthy shadows.  And salt, twice, thrice what is often called for, is the tension all blondies need.  

Salt is the seat of a blondie's power, the backbone, the necessary conflict in the plot.  Under-salted blondies have all the draw of underwhelming stories, dull, tedious, flat.  I want blondies that eat the way Laura Ingalls Wilder reads: taut, warm, compelling, enveloping, inviting, heart-thumping, page-turning, wonder-filled.  Thrilling in small, merry, meaningful ways, grounded by just enough gravitas.  These, for me, are all that.

I mention for me, because I should add that I like my blondies bordering on fudge.  I bake them in an especially low oven, rap them mid-bake to quell uppity ambitions, then chill them to seal the dense deal.  All of this results in a bar that sits on the cusp between cookie and confection.  There is little crumb to speak of, the loft giving way to a rich, just-set squidge.  If you favor a more traditional texture, a bit of lift, the odd crumble, bake your bars at a more moderate 350°, let cool to room temp, and call it a day.  

Either way, they fill a cookie jar nicely, keeping their wits about them for days. Good to grab on a late Monday morning, or Wednesday post-supper, or Friday, before bed.  Right around Sunday afternoon, however, you may notice a real deficit in your jar, empty again save longing and crumbs.  At least the fix is clear.     

Butterscotch Blondies, Salted and Loaded
adapted from Mark Bittman, How to Cook Everything and Deb Perlman, SmittenKitchen
Yield: approximately 75 approximately 1 x 1 1/2" bars 

1-2 cups toasted walnuts or pecans are excellent here, though I've yet to convince my constituency.  If using ordinary table salt (vs. kosher), reduce quantity to 1 teaspoon.  We use a mix of chips, ordinarily one heaping cup of semisweet chocolate, plus half cups each of Guittard butterscotch and white chocolate.  Lacking Guittard, I use semisweet, only.  

For a bar with more loft and crumb, bake at 350° for 20-25 minutes.  This recipe halves neatly; simply divide by two and bake in an 8x8" pan, checking for doneness 1-2 minutes sooner.

1 cup (2 sticks) salted butter, melted and cooled slightly
2 cups light brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon vanilla
1 generous teaspoon instant espresso powder or coffee granules
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
2 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
2 cups semisweet chocolate, butterscotch, and/or good white chocolate chips  

Preheat oven to 325°, and place rack in middle position.  Line a 9x13" baking pan with parchment, length and breadth, allowing enough to overhang edges an inch on all sides.  These handles will allow you to release the entire bar easily, once baked.  

In a medium bowl, mix melted butter and brown sugar, stirring well with a whisk to dissolve sugar.  Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well between additions, to combine.  Add vanilla, espresso powder and salt, and mix well, to combine.  Add flour, and stir gently, just to combine.  Add chips, stir with a rubber spatula to disperse, then scrape mixture into prepared pan.  Smooth surface.

Bake blondies 25-28 minutes.  If you prefer a dense, fudgey blondie, remove pan after 15 minutes, give it a few sharp raps on the side of the stove, and return it to the oven to finish baking.  Blondies are done when the center is set, and the surface is a pale shade of butterscotch, matte, crackled, and beginning to pull away from the batter below.  The standard knife test won't work here; you'll get sticky results.  Visual cues are best.  Remove pan from oven, and cool completely, 1-2 hours.  For an especially dense blondie, cool in the refrigerator for a few hours, before cutting.  

Blondies keep beautifully, airtight, for 5 days.   

slowly, slowly, slowly

What a difference a week makes.  

We are all so, so much better.  (Thank you, for your kind notes and wishes.) Mending, mended, better-rested, depending.  Much improved, in every case. Still—or, maybe, Therefore—I keep finding myself humming this tune.   

It began back in the hospital, where I heard Heber's familiar strains wafting through 5B's halls, and without quite meaning to, switched up the refrain. Holy, slowly, close enough.  

In those days, and in those that followed, 'slowly' was rather more myth than reality.  More a reminder to breathe, and pause, and not knock myself cold tripping over the IV stand.  I would stand there, RUSH written all over everything, and hum Holy, Holy, but with speed-limit lyrics.

Slowly is so not my normal pace.  Doubly so with three sick kids.  (The yuck hit, right after we hit home. The other two went down, with school-cancelling coughs and scary-high fevers.  The week before Christmas took on comic proportions.  The house, hospital-ward-like precautions.  The carols, a reality TV turn:  "On the fourth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me ... Four tissue boxes; Three dosage charts; Two Motrin bottles; and a new Braun thermometer!")  The less our days looked like a hymn, the more I hummed.  

It worked.  

(Eventually.)

Not all at once, of course.  Not even particularly quickly.  It's hard to hurry slow.  (Believe me.  I've tried.)  But as I look back over these last ten days, I spy all these sneaky corners around which Slow bellied up, staked us out, and settled in.

Usually where I least expected it.

Take the messes.  They were everywhere.  Tinsel, trees, glue, red and green galore.  A trail of Christmas schrapnel from two littles, mostly left to their own merry-making, amidst the tissues and walkers and water re-fills.  I groaned, then.  I grin, now.  They kept the Making flame alive, against some pretty fierce headwinds.  Glory be.

The lights strung up, in not the normal rooms, to bring Christmas to those who couldn't come to the tree.  The decision, split-second, unprecedented, excellent, that a half-decorated tree was wholly enough.

The games.  Inevitably, I resist.  I'm not naturally the gaming sort.  (So much still, so much focus, so precious little multi-tasking.)  And yet, games always reward me, thrice over.  (So much still, so much focus, so precious little multi-tasking.)  Ingenious is an old favorite; Spectrix, a new one; Seasons, still waiting for me to say yes.  

The pear chair, or rather the pear cushion, brought up from the basement for temporary kitchen residency.  To accomodate one increasingly ambulatory boy, who can now join us at the breakfast table.  Joy!

This.  

And this.   

And the quiet afternoon, in the middle of the crazy, to sit alone in the silence of the local library.  Very possibly, the season's best gift.  

The solace of soft flannel PJ's.  Presents were wrapped in them.  Pictures colored.  Meals eaten.  Christmas photos snapped.  Gingerbread baked.  Games played.  Snowmen built.  Stories read.  All in PJ's.  Sometimes, comfort trumps all.  

The story to which I said, Yes.  Let's read.  And sat down.  And read.  And listened, actually listened.  We'd been reading all week, mind you, stacks of stories to pass the sniffly time.  I always enjoy stories, but there's a difference, you know?  A pace.  A here-ness.  A not-thinking-about-what-comes-next-ness. This is a nice state of mind for a story.  This is a nice state of mind for a life.

The tea that soothed throats.  The thyme that tamed coughs.  The big double pot of snowy rice pudding, which may not aid ragged respiratory passages one whit, but which soothes ragged spirits like nobody's business.  

The assembling of these funny blue Make + Do kits, late one night for my littles, for Christmas, with Mamo.  Late nights are no recipe for tranquility, long-term, but sometimes?  They're as soothing as tea, thyme, and pudding, together.  Especially when wool is involved.      

The first snow, last Friday, a few fleeting inches.  Soft wet stuff, not long for this world, but enough to justify snow suits and mittens.  Enough to make a small snow duck penguin man.  To make the season feel finally right. To mark Winter's onset, on its first day.  

The second snow, yesterday, a proper snowfall.  Inches, suddenly, unexpectedly accumulating.  Three, maybe four, the high octane stuff, the sweet fluff that falls on the 32° cusp.  Just right for a four-foot-high snowman.  And an afternoon's worth of companionable shoveling.  (It's hard to hurry snow.)   

The illuminated-manuscript sculpey letters lying about.  Bedraggled stuffed animals, at long last repaired.  Kit!  Evidence, everywhere, that Mamo's arrived.  Mamo always sets a new pace.  So does saying goodbye to the last cookies.  

Exhale.   

Time to chop figs.  There's no fast way with figs.  They are sticky, and dense, and a tiny bit truculent, and frank in demanding five full minutes of time.  I give it.  Once, twice a year, for a batch of panforte, all the better to withstand the winter months ahead.

Panforte—strong bread—is often considered a Christmas confection.  For a few years, I made it accordingly, nestling dark sticky wedges into cookie boxes. Until I finally came to my senses, and postponed my panforte until after the holidays.  Publicly, I maintained it couldn't compete with its cute, colorful cookie-tray brethren.  Who, after all, picks murky dark stick over sparkly sugared trees and chocolate-topped mountains? 

(Well, the brilliant Rachel, perhaps.  I also, this week, made the splendid discovery I'm not alone in finding panforte the perfect final resting place for candied peel.  This year, I followed my old favorite formula—enough new already, this December.  Next time around, I'm giving Rachel's a go.)

Privately?  I couldn't bear to share.

I wasn't always so greedy.  For years, I dodged panforte recipes, its name all but sounding an audible *brrring!*, like the page-turning signal in a child's book on tape.  I'm no fan of dried figs.  I abhor spice-spiked chocolate.  (Both are lovely.  Separately.  But why, oh why, ruin two good things?)  And then there's the whole medieval angle, which I found endlessly compelling in art history, but far less so, in the kitchen.  (Stargazy pie, anyone?)  Medieval baked goods tend, for lack of a better term, toward the stodgy-dense-heavy-completely-antiquated.  Pre-widespread winter butter.  And eggs.  And chocolate.  Case closed.  

Or so I thought.  Until Alice came along.

Several years ago, Alice Medrich published Pure Dessert, and I focused, for the first time, on panforte.  Actually, I focused on the 2 1/4 teaspoons of crushed fennel, mid-way through Medrich's ingredient list.  Dried figs I can take or leave.  Fennel seeds I adore.  I read on.  And I listened, actually listened.

I heard "toasted hazlenuts" and "toasted almonds", and pretended I heard "salted pistachios".  I heard, in hushed tones, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and fresh pepper, and nutmeg, and other happy sounds.  I read between the lines, which with panforte, is where the most interesting parts play out.  

I inferred the fennel would temper the figs' sweetness.  Deduced that the small toss of cocoa powder was not chocolate, per se, but hue, tenor, mystery, backbone.  Understood candied orange peel would feel right at home, even if Alice was mum on the subject.  

I began to see that maybe, just maybe, I might even like this weird Gothic cacophony.  I did, sort of.  More accurately, I adored it.     

What I met, that first time out, was one strapping brick of a cake, as intimidating in weight as in countenance.  The sucker's heavy.  But pour a cup of tea, and work out a narrow wedge, and settle in for a heady, harmonious nibble.    

Because what you have is a stout, jewelled slice, cobbled with nuts, studded with orange, blushing a bit from the faint glow of spice.  There is fig there, yes, to bind and blend, and the deep sweet of honey, faintly dark at the rim. There is serious crunch, and solemn chew, and more flavors than seem possible in anything so brown.  And no quick way from narrow tip to wide edge, save to savour, slowly, slowly, slowly. 

Medieval Energy Bars (a.k.a. Panforte Nero)
adapted from Alice Medrich, Pure Dessert 
A few ingredient notes: I added the pistachios, for flavor and color, and a love of as many nuts as the dough could hold.  Feel free to omit them, if you wish. Choose plump, dark Mission figs, available in the bulk bins of natural foods stores and well-stocked grocers.  The pale, strung Turkish figs tend toward dry. Fennel seeds can be lightly crushed in a mortar and pestle, or placed in a Ziploc and banged about under a can.  You're after bits, not powder.  Homemade candied orange peel is excellent, here, though the grated zest of 2 (unsprayed) oranges make a fine substitute.  Finally, I am endlessly devoted to Holmquist Hazelnuts.  (As is Saveur, which named them #97 in their Top 100.). 

1 cup whole hazelnuts, toasted
3/4 cup whole unblanched almonds, toasted
1/2 cup salted pistachios (optional)
2/3 cup unbleached, all-purpose flour
2 generous Tablespoons cocoa powder
2 1/2 teaspoons whole fennel seeds, lightly crushed
rounded 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
rounded 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
rounded 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper (20 grinds)
rounded 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
rounded 1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1 teaspoon instant espresso (optional)
1/2 cup quality candied orange peel, diced
8 ounces dried Mission figs, tough ends trimmed, sliced to 1/4"
2/3 cup honey
2/3 cup granulated sugar

Grease well an 8" round cake tin.  Cut a parchment circle to fit the bottom, and a 2" cuff to fit the sides, and tuck in place.  Grease again, well, this time coating parchment.  Set a rack in the lower third of the oven, and preheat to 300°.

In a large bowl, combine everything, save the honey and sugar.  Set aside.

In a small saucepan, combine honey and sugar, and set over medium-high heat. Cook, stirring often, until the center hits a rolling boil, several minutes.  The honey at the edges will bubble first; continue to fold in and stir until sugar is dissolved, and center of mixture boils vigorously—this is your rolling boil.  Boil for 15 seconds, then remove from heat, and pour into nut mixture, working quickly with a wooden spoon to combine.  The syrup cools quickly.

Scrape mixture into the prepared pan, smooth the top as best you can, and place in the preheated oven.  Bake 40-45 minutes, until you see bubbles percolating at the center as well as the edges.  Cool panforte in the pan, on a rack, several hours or overnight.

Invert panforte onto a plate, peel away parchment, and invert again, right side up.  Dust with powdered sugar, if desired.  Serve in thin wedges that look slightly of stained glass, preferably with coffee or tea.  Store, well-wrapped, at room temperature, for months. 

shouted from mountain tops

Dear Me of Just Over Two Years Ago:

You will become a person who makes pants.  Weird, I know.  Weirder still?   You'll dwell on this fact for two weeks running.  

Because you'll look up and realize that last week's output—six pair?  seven?  plus another dubbed "pajamas"?—was really a postscript to a whole lot of sewing.  Even though it didn't feel like a lot, because sewing is a very occasional behavior around here.  Weeks go by without a stitch.  Months.  Entire summers.  But still, looking back?  You'll realize many yards have somehow passed between feed dog and presser foot.  Not just pants and PJ's, but curtains, pillows, small stuffed people.  So many what-nots, you'll lose count.  So many yards, you'll stop keeping track.  

(Don't worry, you'll let it rest, thereafter.  Because you'll still be entirely un-romantic about it all, thinking homemade pants about as critical as Kool-Aid to a proper upbringing.)  

But before moving on, there are things you should know, things that will smooth the journey immensely. Things probably covered in any basic sewing manual.  If you ever bothered with manuals.  Since you're no better at reading instructions than recipes, I'll shout them out.  Listen up.  

Buy a pants pattern, right off the bat.  Wiser souls will tell you to trace an existing pair, add inches for seams, ba-da-bing!, stitch and go.   Do not believe them.  You are not them.  You are the one who aced Algebra, not Geometry.  They, being wise souls, can achieve such miracles.  You will waste umpteen yards, and at least as many hours, spoiling fabric and ripping seams, before you (wisely) seek professional help.  You are a person who will want a pattern. You are a person who will NEED a pattern.  

And while you're at it?  Pick up this paper.  Because, get this: you don't actually CUT along the dotted line.  Or the dashed-dotted line.  Or the dashed-dotted-dashed line.  No, see, the pattern is intended to be traced, onto special tracing paper, sold separately.  It's like toys and batteries, back in the day.  Only they don't announce this on the envelope.  No, "Don't cut the contents!  Or you'll regret it.  Because when your 3T goes 4T, you'll be sunk.  Unless you use tape and all the fiddly trimmings.  Or can convince the children to shrink."  

Talk about weird.   

Speaking of which:  "Measure twice, cut once" applies not only to fabric, but windows and kiddos, as well.  When measuring the family room for curtains?  Take your tape beyond the pane.  Because curtain rods don't hold well when installed directly into glass.  And drapes just look odd when they don't reach the sills.  Which means you'll wind up one yard short.  Of a lovely, discontinued print.  

And just because last May you cut a pants pattern, and remembered to trace it, and successfully stitched it into something recognizeable?  Doesn't mean you should use it again, come October.  Because zucchini doesn't have the explosive growth market cornered.    

And when you do make something too long/short/wide/whatever?  Be kind, be patient, be forgiving with yourself.  Mistakes happen.  Often.  If you're you, more often than not.  Those brown pants with blue flowers?  The courderoy runs sideways.  The flower smock made last spring?  Too small, from the get-go.  

The dress made last week?  After so many successful pants?  Your first foray into tops after the aforementioned failure?  Equally off, in the other direction.  Maybe she'll grow into it by age 6.  Maybe she'll become a linebacker.  Too broad in the shoulders by a mile.  We're talking Eli Manning territory.  

And yet.  A yoke was successfully built and installed.  The armholes actually aligned with the sleeves.  There were two of the latter, not one, not three.  Small victories.  Learn from your mistakes.

This will all be easier—no, scratch that—all be possible—no, scratch that—only be possible if you lengthen your stitch length.  It's allowed!  Why you thought you had to keep it dialed down under 1, which is approximately the length of a flea's eyelash, is a total mystery.  And absurd.  And completely unnecessary.  There's no extra-credit for elfin stitches.  Or for the penury of picking out said stitches.  An exercise, I'm afraid, which you'll perform often.  Life will be better, and sewing, simpler, if you nudge it down to a 2.  

The same is true of the odd fun project, the sort that brings smiles and squeals.  By and large, you are in this for the pragmatics, for pants that can dig, run, climb, jump and play.  Meeting the market where it fails: that's your beat.  But every so often, some thing calls out—a wee pouch, a Poppy, a doll baby sling—and the only thing to do is answer.  Pouches are useful, and Poppies great gifts, and as any four year old will tell you, all dollies need transport.  Practical, then, to a point.  But really?  Seams come together more swiftly, more sweetly, when they yield arms, legs and owls.*

(*Just not messenger bags.  Messenger bags aren't you.  Messenger bags will nearly de-rail you.  Messenger bags involve linings that can be installed inside out.  Repeatedly.  And straps which can be stitched down twisted.  Repeatedly.  And mind-boggling geometry which, well, see above.  And move on.  FLEE!)     

You will finally learn how to thread your machine.  Really.  Without even glancing at the diagram.  You will, on occasion, still thread it incorrectly, forgetting that last little loop doo-hickey.  You will, every time, not realize that this upstairs error is responsible for the horrible gumming-up of the downstairs.  You will wish you had had a V-8, or some sense, or at least the presence of mind to write a post-it.  

When you finally get through the mise-en-place, through the cutting/ironing/pinning, to the good part, the actual sewing, you will want to drive like Danica Patrick.  Don't.  Drive like a little old lady from Ballard.

But?  When your Bernina stops back-stitching, and you take it in for service, and they tell you only chain-smoking, bourbon-swilling, seventy-somethings still use these?  That this Bernina's day has come and gone?  And might we interest you some shiny new whizz-bangery?

Hold your ground.  Silent.  Steady.  Until they look up, see you're lacking a Beehive.  And thirty years.  And nicotine fingers.  Do not budge.  Like a real little old lady from Ballard.  Because although oil did not fix the problem, although it mysteriously resolved itself some six months' hence, although your Bernina may qualify for Medicaid?  You adore this machine, quirks, cranks and all.   

The list goes on, the lessons are many, but you'll learn as you go.  So long as you go.  It's that old journey of a thousand miles, whatever you can do or dream you can, Nike ca. 1988 business:  Start.  Small.  Somewhere, anywhere.  Now.  

And Dear Me, while you're there, please please please pick up the then-just-published Essential New York Times Cookbook?  Because otherwise you'll ignore it until 2012, which is two years without The World's Best Cake, which is not only a shame but a grievous waste.  As wasteful as ad-hoc'ing pants.  Thank you, Me.  

And now, You: Don't dawdle as I did.  Make this cake.  Now.  

This cake is the Almond Cake from the aforementioned, and the cake I mentioned in passing, in May.  I meant to bring it here sooner, truly, but wanted to test it again many, many, many a few times.  Just to be, you know, sure.  I did.  And I am.  Absolutely sure.  If I never make another cake, I will be happy.  

It's a simple thing, a cake about almonds, no layers, no frosting, no spice, no pretense.  It is hard to imagine, on the surface, that this buff wedge is anything special.  It is hard to imagine, after first bites, any cake exceeding this one.  You pick the measure.

There is the texture, dense but not heavy, hard to explain, impossible to forget.  Rich and tender and buttery, for sure, but that is only the outerbelt.  There's more.  Velvety, but not so flyaway.  Creamy, almost, if a cake can be creamy.  Squidgy?  Yes, arguably squidgy.  Fudgy might be better still.  The crumb of this cake is almost fudgy, but fudgy with almond, and sour cream, and butter.  And four egg yolks, just in case.  Fudgy without a fleck of fudge.  Exquisite is a serviceable synonym.   

About that almond.  This cake is all almond.  But mellow, round, deep, profoundly soft almond.  Because the almond here hails not from chopped nuts, but a full tube of paste, plus a splash of extract.  This has the curious effect of working almond into the very heartbeat of the batter, without so much as a hint of crunch.  Now, I like a nut's crunch, adore it even, but a strange and wonderful alchemy occurs when you channel a nut, no body, all soul.  This cake is an elegy to almond, almond as poem instead of prose.     

Which is good, because it looks a state.  A plain, dull, beige, hockey puck sort of state.  The surface rumples.  The top buckles.  The center collapses, once out of the oven.  It has all the tectonic integrity of Seattle.  All the aesthetic appeal of my hems.  Drab doesn't even come close.      

Which is why, when we sent one to Mamo recently, I was a little nervous about its reception.  I knew she loved almond, knew she needed cake, but it matched the cardboard, for goodness sake.  I sent a quick e-mail, pleading powdered sugar.  I needn't have worried.  It spoke for itself.  "Unbelievably, ineffibly wonderful, this must be what is what was served to the gods on Olympus!"  And that was five days, and 2,200 miles, away from the date and place of its baking.  

There was more, about it preventing revolutions, and tasting like perfection itself, but the relevant bit was the recipe request.  Mamo, here you go.  And because I believe all good things should be shared, and magnficent ones, shouted from mountain tops, here, as well, the rest of you go.  

Almond Cake
adapted from Amanda Hesser, The Essential New York Times Cookbook

This recipe, like all of Hesser's recipes, is pretty much perfect exactly as written.  The modifications below are minor, and were made to suit my tastes and equipment.  I prefer this with a bit of extra salt (in both the butter and dry ingredients), to balance the significant sugar.  Also, an added smidge of almond extract.  As to the mixing, Hesser calls for the food processor, likely because the blade helps break up the truculent almond paste.  I've tried it both ways, and find I prefer my Kitchenaid, which performs very well with freshly bought paste, and which saves the dirtying of an extra bowl.  Finally, you'll notice a wide range in baking times.  Hesser calls for 50-60 minutes, but my cake center is still liquid at the end of an hour, usually taking upwards of 70-75 minutes.  Possibly my oven.  Use the visual cues and benchmarks, below.    

Technicalities:  This cake keeps (and improves) like a dream, easily five days, maybe more.  It also travelled across the country intact, via the US Postal Service.  FYI.  I use this almond paste, widely available, though more important than brand is freshness.  Old paste hardens, and is hard to incorporate.  Leftover egg whites are ideal for these (just up the sugar to 1 cup).  Please note: this recipe requires a 9" springform pan.  Truly.  I tried it in a traditional cake pan.  Disaster.  Delicious disaster, but still.

1 cup sour cream, at room temperature
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups all-purpose, unbleached flour
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 pound (2 sticks) salted butter, sliced, softened
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
One 7-ounce tube almond paste (not marzipan)
4 large egg yolks, at room temperature
1 1/2 teaspoons pure almond extract
Powdered sugar, for dusting

Preheat the oven to 350°.  Butter or spray a 9" springform pan, and line the bottom with a circle of parchment.  Measure sour cream, add baking soda to cup, and stir to combine; set aside.  In a separate small bowl, whisk together flour and salt; set aside.

Cream butter and sugar in stand mixer, fitted with the paddle, or in a food processor, fitted with a metal blade, until pale and fluffy, 3-4 minutes.  Pinch off bits of almond paste, and add them to the moving butter, bit by bit, until incorporated and lump-free.  This will take several minutes.  Add the egg yolks, one at a time, mixing and scraping, until incorporated.  Add the almond extract and sour cream; mix until combined.

If using a stand mixer, add flour and salt, mixing on slow until just combined, a few seconds.  Remove bowl from stand, and fold in last bits by hand, if needed.  If using a food processor, scrape batter into a wide, shallow clean bowl.  Fold in the flour and salt mixture until just combined.

Scrape the batter into the prepared springform pan, and spread to evenly distribute.  Bake for 50-70 minutes, until the center has no more jiggle.  It will begin browning around 45 minutes, but carry on until the sides of the cake shrink away from the pan, a knife comes out damp but clean, and the center just springs back when pressed.  

Store at room temperature, well-covered, five days.

through new eyes

Hello, there.

Today, we are here.

Yesterday, we were elsewhere.

Me, I'm firmly planted somewhere in between.  Maybe over South Dakota. Maybe Mars.  My head and heart are in Seattle, still.  My eyes and toes, entirely in Ohio.  What a difference, twenty-four hours. 

A friend traveled by train from the West Coast this summer.  By train!  Can you imagine?  Two days it took, maybe three.  She said she thought it helped with the time zones. I think she is right, about time zones and then some.

Modern jet travel is a marvelous thing, but there is a bit of the whiplash about it.  Of the sleep cycle, for sure.  But more, of the spirit.  United might get the physical Me from Point A to B in eleven hours flat.  The rest of Me is more on Amtrak time.  

Hello.

All day today, between the great unpacking and extreme school prepping and refrigerator scrubbing (because isn't that one of the best parts of being away?  the returning home to an all-but-bare fridge?), I walked the house, seeing it all through new eyes.  Oh, hello, you silly old tiled counters, you.  There you are kitchen table, center of our universe.  And you, dirty sink, you shouldn't have.  Gadzooks!  The garden!  Sayonara, sink...

Doing that funny awkward sweet dance one does, when one's been away awhile.

Partly, it was all new, the outside of it, anyway.  There is no pausing the August garden.  "Look!  It's like CHRISTMAS!!", Henry shouted this morning, after spotting the tomato plants, all a-bobble with fruit.  He is prone to enthusiasm.  He wasn't exaggerating.  And it wasn't just the tomatoes.  

We left buds.  Returned to lush. 

Partly, though, it was just the returning.  To the apparently pent-up need to make: bread, painted acorns, spinning tops, jolly messes.  To the water tray overflowing with glasses, from friends immediately, joyfully called over.  To those gungy counters, piled with the day's gorgeous haul.  To fantastic coffee beans, plucked from my stuffed suitcase, finally, properly, able to be ground. To the old typewriter, which never grows old.  To the all-important familiar, in this still-new-to-us space, a little less-new with each passing return. 

It was good to be there.  It is good to be here.  More on the there, soon as I find up.

Until then, raspberry oat bars, which are perhaps the most contrary August recipe ever posted.  It's high summer, after all, the era of all things fresh.  And I don't even, mea culpa, mean fresh raspberries, but raspberry jam and pantry oats and hot ovens.  Bear with me. 

I've been meaning to mention these since July and forever, and today seems fitting, since of all things, these things need new eyes.  Because, I don't know about your jammy oat bar encounters, but mine have been almost uniformly so-so.  Stodgy, stiff, sludgy, stale, sickly-sweet, the S-list goes on ... and rarely includes the word stellar. 

Which is a shame, because stellar is exactly what any jammy oat bar ought to be.  I mean, oats, butter, brown sugar, raspberry jam.  Hello.  How can the sum of said excellent parts ever not equal at least awfully good?

How most don't, I can't explain.  How these do, I can't either.  Nor can I take credit for the magic of this equation, all of which goes to the late, great Gourmet.  I will suggest you don your new peepers post-haste, as these put all those old, bad bars to rest.  Also, I might mention that since I first baked these, ten years back, they've become my Platonic jammy oat bar ideal.  (Of course, Plato had a jammy oat bar archetype.  Also, and I feel almost certain about this, had Plato shared one with Socrates, Mr. Method would've retracted his distrust of the senses on the spot.  I'll allow this might be the jet lag speaking.)  

There are many small things that make these bars work.  A mix of sugars, brown and white.  Plenty of butter, just barely rubbed in.  More oats than flour, for texture and tooth.  Coconut, in quantity, a quiet, clever way to build a dough that is rich, nutty and differently sweet.  Extra salt, darker sugar, plus some tweaks in technique, these last few adjustments I've made over the years.  I don't toast the coconut, nor set any aside for topping, both of which were laid out in the original.  I know this sounds lazy.  Probably, it is.  But I've learned I like it better this way, the coconut toasting right in the buttered bars, the tender flakes entirely at one with the dough. 

What you wind up with is a slender humble little bar, downright unimpressive, flat-out addictive.  You get the whole caramelized salted-oat-butter-sugar thing, which is an established weakness for me.  But the flour adds a flick of backbone, just enough to sustain a thin ribbon of raspberry.  That thin ribbon concentrates in the slow oven into a tart-sweet intensity.  And then, and this is the best bit, in my book, the same dough is scattered, crumble-style, over all. Loose and exposed to the dry heat, these tidbits go crunchy and crisp and enchanting. 

Not quite as enchanting as August in Seattle, but that's hardly a fair comparison.  Stacked against other oat bars?  Enchanting as can be.

Raspberry Oat Bars
adapted from Gourmet, February, 2002

Bonne Maman is our go-to raspberry jam.  You'll need much (though not all) of a jar for these bars.  The original calls for a mixer, but as with crisps and crumbles, I find this simpler and more pleasing to make by hand, just a bowl and ten fingers.  Feel free to flip a switch, if you wish.

1 1/2 cups sweetened, flaked coconut
1 1/4 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour (white, white whole wheat, or a combination)
3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups old-fashioned oats
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) cold salted butter, cut into pieces
3/4 - 1 cup raspberry jam

Place oven rack in middle position, and preheat to 375°. Have on hand a 9x13" pan, glass or metal.  (If using metal, line with parchment strips, both directions.) 

In a wide, shallow bowl, add coconut, flour, both sugars, salt and oats, and stir to combine.  Add butter, and rub into dry ingredients with clean fingers, taking up handfuls and rubbing between your thumb and fingers to combine.  Continue until you have nubbly clumps, with pea-sized bits of butter still visible, as with pie crust, 1-2 minutes. 

Press 2/3 of dough into the baking pan, dropping in clumps, then pressing with fingers to distribute and flatten.  Aim for roughly even; perfection unnecessary.  Spread with the raspberry jam, using enough to coat the entire dough layer modestly.  Crumble remaining dough over the jam, clumping and scattering as you would with a crisp. 

Bake for 20-30 minutes, until bars are deeply golden on top.  Baking pans affect the time greatly, here: a glass pan will take less time; a metal one, more.  I like these as caramelized as I can get them, without burning the jam.  Your nose knows.  Cool completely in the pan, 1-2 hours, then remove entire cookie from pan.  Cut into small bars, 1" square or so, so you can eat several without compunction. 

Stored in an airtight container, these keep well for 3 days.