Ours To Keep

“And I asked myself about the present: how wide it was, how deep it was, how much was mine to keep.”

― Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt, I asked myself the same question this morning. I poured myself some coffee, looked at my squash and tomato starts on the kitchen counter, safe from the snow coming down more violently than usual outside, and thought for a moment that all of the present — the deep, the shallow, the long, the short, the good, the bad, the snow, the sun — is all mine, and ours, to keep.

Whole Wheat Belgian Waffles with Mascarpone, Thyme, and Strawberries 

• 1  1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast
• 1 cup warm water
• 3 cups whole wheat flour
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
• 1 cup milk or milk alternative
• 1 stick unsalted butter, melted
• 2 large eggs, separated
• 1 orange, zest and juice
• 1 pint fresh strawberries
• 20 springs fresh thyme
• 1-2 cups mascarpone cheese
• 1/3 cup honey, plus more for finishing

Melt butter over low heat in a small saucepan, set aside. In a small bowl, mix and dissolve the yeast. In a larger bowl, combine salt and flour. Whisk together the yeast-water, milk, butter, egg yolks, and honey and combine with the dry ingredients. In another small bowl, beat the egg whites (like a crazy woman) until frothy. Fold into batter with 1/2 cup mascarpone, zest of half the orange, and leaves of 10 springs of thyme. Set aside, covered, for 10-20 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 200′. Turn on your waffle iron to medium-high heat. As it warms, cut strawberries into slices or quarters in a bowl. Mix with extra honey, the remaining thyme, and the juice and zest of your small orange. Set aside.

Grease your heated iron with butter or coconut oil. Pour a heaping cup of the batter and cook until golden and crispy on the outer edges. Transfer waffles to the oven to keep warm and repeat with remaining batter. To serve, smear with marscapone and top with a heap of gussied strawberries and a drizzle of honey.

Cookies and Angels

My favorite view in Colorado can be seen through our North-facing upstairs bathroom window. In the morning, when it has snowed overnight, I sit on the counter and press my left cheek against the cold pane to watch the colors change to the East as the sun rises over white roofs and lawns. Snow, I have discovered recently, has the same sort of reverent, sweeping effect on my spirit that the ocean once had. It is snowing now as I write this from the bathroom and if I’m lucky it will stick through the morning. Shaun is on a work trip  for a few days and seeing that I have the day off tomorrow, and to myself, I will make a pilgrammage to the park and make snow angels again along the running path for the walkers and runners and lovers. They are strangers whose lives I will never know yet somehow always know. For the beautiful, radiant young souls who were taken from this earthplane too soon, I will lay my head back in the snow, next to my angels, your sweet too young angels, and look to the sky to say thank-you a million times for my full and undeserving life. I will blow out my candles for each of you next week with tears in my eyes for every painful, awkward, surprising, perfect moment I have been given and you have been robbed.

“I closed the box and put it in a closet.
There is no real way to deal with everything we lose.”
― Joan Didion, Where I Was From

Persimmon Oatmeal Cookies

From Margie, the mother of my childhood friend, Kelly, who grew persimmons and made the most marvelous and memorable cookies. Thank you, Margie, for graciously sharing this recipe with me and the world. Adapted from “Use and Enjoy the California Persimmon” University of California Cooperative Extension, El Dorado County.

1 ½ cups Whole Wheat Flour
1 cup Brown Sugar
½ Teaspoon Baking soda
1 Teaspoon Salt
¼ Teaspoon Nutmeg
¾ Teaspoon Cinnamon
½ Teaspoon Cloves
¾ cup butter
1 Egg
1 Cup Hachiya Persimmon chunks
1 ¾ cup Rolled Oats
½ cup chopped pecans

Sift together flour, sugar, soda, salt, nutmeg, cloves, and cinnamon into mixing bowl.  Cut in butter.  Add egg, persimmon pulp, rolled oats, and nuts.  Beat until thoroughly blended.Drop by teaspoonfuls, about 1 ½ inches apart on ungreased cookie pans.  Bake in a moderately hot oven (350F) about 15 minutes.

Full

We’re scraping together some semblances of rhythm and routine around these parts. Week to week, there is almost nothing that resembles our old life in San Diego let alone the day we cut a check for the new lease. I just rolled the dice in June and haven’t stopped throwing them up to the sky since. There have been a few Sunday mornings reading the Times, cutting out articles that inspire over a hearty breakfast and a few cups of coffee, but haven’t exactly found that same sort of grounding consistency of days past that puts our souls at ease. No complaints, none at all. Just an observation. All summer long we’ve bounced around the country and this new place rounding up jobs and memories. Not busy, just full. I might be maxing out on stimulation here, the months of activity and new-ness since our move is starting to catch up with me I think. I feel it in my knees. I see it under my eyes. I anticipate (I hope) that when Autumn arrives at the end of the month we will have found or created some balance for our weeks.

There was time for a bit of cake this weekend. Oh, and a glacier. That was nice.

And so were your comments from the last post. Boy, just floating on all that love and good energy. Thanks guys.

Almond Bundt

• 2 cups Gluten Free or AP Flour
• 1 cup Almond Meal
• 3 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• pinch of salt
• 6 eggs
• 1 1/2 cups sucunat sugar
• 1 cup melted, lukewarm coconut oil
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp almond extract
• 1 cup canned light coconut milk
• 2 baskets green figs

Frosting(s) 

• 2 cups cream cheese
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• juice of 2-3 lemons

dairy free option 

• 2 cups soaked cashews
• 1/2 + cup coconut milk
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 drop almond extract
• 1/2 cup brown rice syrup or Grade B maple syrup
• juice of one lemon

Preheat oven to 350′ F. In a medium bowl combine flour, almond meal, baking powder, cinnamon, a salt. Set aside. In a large bowl, lightly beat 6 eggs until just broken up. Add sugar, coconut oil, vanilla, almond extract, and coconut milk one item at a time, mixing lightly between each addition, until combined. Fold in flour mixture to liquid one cup at a time, stirring lightly until just blended. Grease bundt pan with coconut oil or butter, dusting with flour to coat and prevent sticking. Pour in batter slowly and distribute evenly. Bake for 45-55 minutes until it passes the toothpick test. Let the cake cool for 30 minutes before trying to remove. TRUST.

Cut fresh figs in quarters or halves, toss with sugar. Set aside.

For the cream cheese frosting, beat blocks of cream cheese in a stand mixer for 2-3 minutes. As it begins to smooth out, add powdered sugar (I make my own in my blender using turbinado sugar), vanilla, and lemon juice. Beat together. Taste. Does it need more lemon? More sugar? Adjust to taste. If you’d like to achieve the drippy look on the bundt cake, add a bit of coconut milk or water to thin.

Cashew frosting: use this technique, but add vanilla, almond extract, maple syrup while blending or after straining.

Pour frosting into a piping bag, or, as I did, into a large ziploc bag with a hole cut in the corner. Drizzle generously over the bundt. Top with sugared figs.

Onward

• 2 ½ cups flour (I used a GF blend)
• 2 tbsp turbinado sugar
• 1 
tbsp baking powder
• ¼ 
tsp salt
• ½ cup cold coconut oil or butter, cut into chunks
• 1 + cup chopped fresh strawberries
• 2
 tbsp minced basil
• ½ cup full fat coconut milk
• 2 
eggs

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. In a large bowl stir together the dry ingredients. Scoop out or cut in butter or coconut oil. Stir in minced basil and hulled, and quartered strawberries. In a medium bowl stir together eggs and the milk. (Cream, half and half, or regular milk would work here too.) Add egg mixture to flour mixture in one pour. Stir together until completely moistened, using your hands when necessary.

Turn out onto a parchment covered baking sheet. Press into a 1” thick circle. Cut into 8 wedges. Brush with extra milk and sprinkle with sugar. If you use butter instead of coconut oil, place baking sheet with cut wedges in the freezer for up to 20 minutes before baking. It will make them magically fluffier and more scone-y. Bake for 15-20 minutes, depending. Finish with a good dollop of local honey or clotted cream.

Burning

“The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars.”

Jack Kerouac, On The Road

These ginger cookies are for you, you with the fire in your belly. For you who has a burning thing inside your being that says “you must create, you must go, you must love, you must dive head first, you must stand up, you must be brave, you must not be afraid to fail.”

Feed and surround yourself with the fuel that lights up your soul. People. Places. Things. Thoughts. Torch it all. It’s the one true thing you really have to offer this world. Don’t let others put it out. But more importantly, don’t get in your own way by worrying what others will think of that brain you were given, that heart that beats loudly in your chest, that burning thing you’ve cultivated and believed in. Throw it out and set it all aflame. Watch it glow. Watch it spread. Watch it change this world.

Ginger Oat Cookies 

slightly adapted from Jude Blereau

• 1/2 cup dried dates, chopped
• 3 cups rolled oats
• 3/4 cup cooked oatmeal
• 1/2 cup pecans or walnuts, chopped
• 1/2 cup glacé (crystalized) ginger, chopped
• 1/2 cup coconut oil
• 1/4 cup brown rice syrup
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 eggs

Preheat the oven for 350.’ Cook the oatmeal on a stovetop first 1/2 cup of oats to 1 cup water. Set aside, let cool. Soak the dates in 1/4 of extra hot water, and mash with a fork. Add the vanilla to the date paste when room temp.

In a large bowl, combine oats, oatmeal, nuts, and ginger. Add mashed up dates/vanilla as well as the coconut oil, brown rice syrup, and eggs. Mix together with your hands until well combined and coated. Mixture will feel wet and not overly sticky. Shape into balls and place onto a baking sheet covered with parchment paper. Bake for 15-20 minutes until lightly browned on the edges and top.

More on the cake-y side than in cookie camp. I think these would make excellent morning-0n-the-run bars if pressed into a 8×8 pan and cut into squares.