Blood Orange and Peach Fruit Roll-ups

I was a junk food prince as a kid, wrappers strewn across my room. I ate aimlessly and without purpose. I ate to make my teeth sore and to turn my tongue the unnatural shade of "blue raspberry". I ate because my father ate the same way. I ate because it was the only food in the house. 

My sister's birthday is the day after Halloween; we'd always go to the dollar store to buy the discounted candy on our way to her birthday party. For Christmas, I would remind my parents every year that I wasn't partial to chocolate, but loved fruit snacks and gummies. When Nolan and I lived in California, I would make a stop to the 7-Eleven for Mike and Ikes when I was stressed from school or work. And when I was in kindergarten, I got an ulcer from stress, too, and my father brought me a candy bar when I wouldn't stop crying because I wasn't a very good reader at the time.

I'm a snacker, a grazer. I munch absentmindedly to pass the time between loads of laundry and replies to my emails. But I'm 25 now and my metabolism is changing and I change with it. I was nervous to reinvent anything from my childhood, but I was excited to use these blood oranges I bought on a whim. And so I made fruit leather, but they'll always be fruit roll-ups to me.

Blood Orange and Peach Fruit Roll-ups

A true blast from the past, these are my favorite kind of recipes. I love sharing with you what it was like growing up in Kentucky and Pennsylvania and the kind of food I ate there. These are so easily adaptable to any fruit, just replace the whole fruit with another of your choice and adjust the liquids and sugars accordingly. Keep in mind that the oven temperature is long and broad and to check periodically, especially the edges, which may burn a bit.

Ingredients:

2.5 lb peaches, roughly chopped

Juice from 3 blood oranges, strained

1/2 cup white sugar

1/4 cup water

1/4 teaspoon salt

Juice of 1 lemon

Directions:

Preheat oven to 200*F and prepare a half sheet with parchment paper

Combine peaches, orange juice, white sugar, water, and salt in a large pot and heat to boil

Reduce heat to a simmer and let simmer for 15 minutes or until peaches are tender

Puree in a blender or food processor until smooth

Strain into a large mixing bowl

Add lemon juice

Pour pureed mixture onto your parchment paper smooth out evenly with a rubber spatula

Bake for 4-6 hours or until it is not sticky to the touch

Peel and check the backs--if still sticky, flip over and bake an additional hour

Place on parchment paper, roll up, cut into segments and tie with string

Can be kept for up to a week in an airtight container, but may get a little stickier in high humidity

Ina Garten's Halloween Bark: My First Non-Recipe!

When I was younger, Halloween was always my favorite time of year. Other than for the obvious reason (my sweet tooth), Halloween was the entree into the holiday season. The leaves that fell were raked into piles, my sister and I would roll in them as children. We got older, she got a boyfriend, and still I loved Fall. To dress up, to be someone else, a form of drag and an exercise in imagination. 

I wasn't invited to a lot of parties, so I dressed up as a cowboy, a princess, and one year when we were very poor and very lazy, a dining room table. The cheap dollar store masks that stuck against  your face, breathing the stale, moist, reused breath all night. My mother and I would eat candy, watch a movie, go to sleep with a wrapper clutched in my hands. Our town was not set up for trick-or-treating back then, so we'd buy our candy in bulk and snack on it into Christmas. Santa-shaped sugar cookies found themselves next to orange and black wrappers on the buffet.

We don't do this anymore, traditions change and I changed, too. But now we have Lana, my niece, and we think back to all the old things we did as children and how we can improve on those things now. I updated a simple recipe, chocolate bark, to get rid of all of that chocolate sitting around before the holidays roll in. And it just so happens that Rebecca over at Displaced Housewife had a very similar idea too!

Halloween Candy Bark

This is essentially a "non-recipe" due to the fact that it doesn't take any skill, is totally adaptable, and requires no prep of any sort. Further, this is labeled as Ina Garten's because that's who I went as for Halloween this year!! A picture (and video!) follow the recipe below! 

Ingredients:

• 40 oz of chocolate (see note below)
• 1 1/2 cups chopped Halloween candy bars, M&M's, etc
• Pinch of flaked sea salt

Directions:

1. Prepare a half sheet pan with parchment paper
2. In a medium-sized microwave-safe mixing bowl, pour 2/3 of the chocolate you are using into the bowl (split this up if you are using 2 different flavored chocolates or chips!)
3. Microwave at 20 second increments, stirring when timer is done, until chocolate is melted
4. Add remaining chips that were reserved (this is a very easy way to "temper" your chocolate, actually learned by Ina!
5. Using a rubber spatula, pour onto your parchment paper and spread out into a rectangle
6. Repeat if using any other flavors
7. Immediately add your candy, pressing down slightly
8. Sprinkle with sea salt
9. Put in fridge for an hour or two before breaking up and serving

Note:  I had white chocolate chips and peanut butter chips on hand, but really anything will do. I do think that higher quality chocolate, even in part, would have improved this recipe, but not necessary

And here, for documentation purposes, is my Ina Garten Halloween costume!!

Duck Fat Caramels with Smoked Salt

I was an alchemist this week, I created gold from sugar and cream.  I left the pot boiling and filled the dogs' water bowl while it simmered in sticky excess of itself.  A wooden spoon sat sideways off a plate, dripping liquid sugar, hardening in stalactites of golden-browns.  

Candy making is a simple pleasure.  It brings joy; so I make it.  I whisk things into an emulsive state, I tuck them away in boxes and blankets of tissue paper.  I do it for the pleasure of family practice, to keep the heartbeat strong between my mother's craft and my hobbies.  I do it to feel her pulse on every countertop surface.  She showed me at Christmas how to temper chocolate and three months later I began a candy business.  She showed me at Christmas how to make caramel and I haven't stopped trying to perfect the recipe.  

I make candy to remember my past.  To remember my mother, to remember my high school friends who passed around bags of Werther's Originals in AP Chemistry.  The nostalgia I feel is simple, heartbreakingly simple.  

I make candy so I don't forget those feelings, those memories.  I can create magic through baking, I'm able to revive the dead.  Necromancy vis-à-vis the Maillard Reaction.  I created these caramels with this intention.  To layer all my old selves into one complicated morsel, to embrace those resurrected memories and wrap them in wax paper, tuck them away in a small and pretty box, and pull them out when I start forgetting where I came from.

Duck Fat Caramels with Smoked Salt

Savory and sweet caramels topped with a curious salt.  Makes 81 pieces. 

Directions:

1. Heavily grease a 9x9 brownie pan and line bottom with parchment (use a lot of room temperature butter here and cover all surfaced).  Set aside
2. In a 4 quart dutch oven, combine all ingredients except vanilla and salt
3. Heat on medium-high and allow to simmer until butter is melted.  Stir occasionally to incorporate ingredients.
4. Once butter is melted, bring to a boil on high heat. Boil for 5-7 minutes.
5. Lower heat to medium and simmer for 27-35 minutes.  Bubbles will appear tight and sticky.  Do not stir once reached this stage, but allow mixture to continue to caramelize.  It will become slightly fragrant, smelling fatty and slightly nutty.
6. Once temperature reaches 240-243 *F on a candy thermometer (or, if you're old-school and the caramel has reached the hard-ball stage), splash in vanilla and give a quick stir with a wooden spoon
7. Pour into prepared pan (be EXTRA careful) and allow to cool for at least 6 hours, until slightly hardened but pliable.  Invert onto a cutting board.  Sprinkle generously with smoked flaked salt
8. Using a ruler, mark and cut into inch pieces.  Cut using a sharp knife or bench knife.  
9. Wrap in wax or parchment paper.

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1 1/2 cup dark brown sugar, packed
• 1/3 cup butter, cut into small cubes
• 2/3 cup duck fat (pref. Rougie)
• 1 cup light corn syrup
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Smoked sea salt

Back Home.

In three days I packed up my life in San Antonio and moved back in with Nolan in California.  The West Coast has some magnetic pull on me, the way water always run down to the deepest crack in the tile.  The way the black mould builds around it, the deep doubts that went into my decision to ever leave my home in San Diego.  

In three days, we tore down the home I had built for myself, broke book shelves into splinters.  Unhooked pictures I had hung to hide holes I had punched into the wall.  I lost a set of keys and found them in an old shoe.  I tucked my passport in a folder with pictures of my mother.  Things I valued made their way into suit cases, things I could replace found their way into trash bags that were advertised to hold 40 gallons of dead grass, debris, springtime detritus.  Everything I owned could fit in my Nissan and we stopped by coffeeshops to say goodbye to the friends I had made.  We promised to be different in our return, I'm holding onto that promise.

I am iron-fisted and yellow-bellied.  I didn't want to make it on my own anymore.  I didn't want to have my pride in the way of a life shared with someone.  The bravest thing to do is to love someone, the hardest thing I've ever done was drop Nolan off at the airport and wave goodbye, smiling.  In three days, I quit my job and left the Hill Country I tried so hard to romanticize.  I'll miss the white-walled sanctuary of a creative space to call my own.  I'll miss the train that screamed its presence like a mockingbird.  I'll miss the way the asphalt smelled in the post-rain break in the humidity.  I'll miss a lot of things, but I'm a different person now.

I'm older now.  Six months can do that to a person.  

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We left when we wanted to and hit El Paso by dusk.  We chased elements along the way.  We hit fog in some mountain range that I couldn't tell you the name of.  Everything I had and loved was in that car, I didn't want to lose it all to the fog and my lack of depth perception.  In the gossamer veil that covered the mountaintops.  Deadly, smokey.  Miscarried clouds that threatened me, I woke up Nolan from his nap and had him drive through it.  He was confident, comfortable.  I know I can't do some things on my own, and that solidified why I made the decision to go back.  His calming presence, his reliability.  His ability to save me when I'm white-knuckled and shaggy-breathed.

We chased the rain, too.  Big puddles.  Giant puddles.  We hit them on the way to his sister's house.  We saw Las Cruces in the distance and passed signs that advertised authentic Native American goods.  We saw Las Cruces in the distance, we took an exit that advertised a new Wendy's opening.

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The two days' drive out to California was punctuated like that.  Element diverting.  Pointing to distant towns, they had words like Halcyon and Sunshine in their names.  They promised things, artifacts of the manifest destiny that led the founders on their journey.  They had probably never felt a sun so hot.  It all felt like hell sooner or later and a lot less like paradise.  And up close in those small roadside towns, we saw boarded up windows, dogs on chains, billboards to buy 2,000 acres of land for $13,000.  We stopped at a gas station where the coffee pot had been on so long the remaining brew was scorched and sticking to the pot.  We stopped at another where the bathroom was to the side of the building and didn't have any soap.  We got some spiced gum drops, the kind our grandmothers used to eat, and some cold ginger ale and left soon after in a dust cloud.  We continued on out west and never shook anyone's hand along the way.

The car rides were silent sometimes, we held hands sometimes.  Milo came along, too.  We took turns holding him, we took turns napping.  We took turns paying for gas or food or the odd scratch-off to break up the monotony of one road and a thousand miles ahead of us.  We didn't eat well those few days, we slept even less.  We never talked about the future, because the future was right in front of us on the I-10, merged with us onto the I-8.  And when I could taste salt in my mouth, I didn't know if it was from tears, sweat, or my imagination running wild at the thought of the ocean.  

The desert can play tricks on you sometimes like that, but I beat the coyote at his own game.  I left Texas, left the desert, left the southwest altogether.  You can find me in San Diego now, at coffeeshops and Chinese restaurants, having the life I was supposed to when I moved into this house for the first time a year ago.

Homemade Ginger Ale and Spiced Orange Peel Candies

Inspired by our road trip snack choices, a refreshing ginger ale and spiced orange peels.  Pair with a scratch-off and you're all set for your next road trip.

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For the Ginger Ale

Ingredients: 

• 1 piece ginger, 6-8 inches by 2-4 inches (hard t gauge, but the more you put in, the more gingery it will taste), peeled* and cut into small rounds a quarter-inch thick
• 3 1/2 cups water
• 2 cups sugar
• Pinch of salt
• Squeeze of orange slice
• 1 liter tonic water (pref. Schweppes) 

Directions:

1. In a medium saucepan, combine water and sugar.  Over medium-high heat stir until sugar is dissolved. 
2. Add ginger slices and bring mixture to a boil
3. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for 5-7 minutes.  Watch so sugar does not caramelize.
4. Turn heat off.  Mixture should be syrupy and fragrant.  Add a pinch of salt squirt of orange juice.
5. Put lid on saucepan and allow to steep for 30 minutes to 1 hour
6. To assemble drink:  
   1. For an individual drink:  Pour ginger syrup in a glass about a quarter way full, top with tonic water, then with ice
   2. For a whole bottle:  Use a decanter (for immediate use) or a hermetic bottle for later use (recommend within half an hour).  Add all of the syrup and top with tonic water slowly with a funnel. Chill in refrigerator. Enjoy with the spiced orange peels.

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Spiced Orange Peels

Ingredients:

• Peel of one orange, cut into strips
• 2 cups water
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ginger powder
• 1/4 teaspoon chili powder
• 1/8 teaspoon cumin
• pinch of black pepper

Directions:

1. In a pot of boiling water, simmer orange peel strips for 15 minutes.  Drain water and rinse with cold water.  Rinse again. Set aside.
2. In a medium saucepan, combine water and sugar and heat on medium-high until sugar is dissolved and begins to boil (watch again carefully for caramelization).
3. Lower heat to medium-low and add peels and simmer for 15-20 minutes until tender and gummy.
4. Put on a baking sheet with a paper towel underneath to drain some of excess syrup off.
5. While peels drain, mix remaining ingredients on a shallow plate with a fork.  Lay down parchment paper.
6. Dip peels in sugar mixture with fork or fingers and dip on both sides.  Lay on parchment paper to dry 8-12 hours or until dried.

A New Project and A New Website

Two different people.  I used to be this kid who wore black, that wore my grades as a mark of honor, who would smoke a cigarette and hold in my cough until no one was looking.  I used to live in a world of dichotomies, I took one direction, judging those who took the other.  Bitter and self-centered, I hated everything that wasn't within arm's reach, anything I had to work for.  I was this lazy with all the best relationships I've ever held onto--from Nolan to my mother.   I was like this in law school, in California.  I left this person there, too.

In the last two months of living in Texas, living alone for the first time, I've grown into a new person.  Soft and muted blues, greens, greys--I don't hide behind a layer of black, a 4.0, or in a puff of smoke, indiscernible from the fog that hung over Pittsburgh most mornings.  I appreciate beauty and tones, floral and minimalism.  I respect the curated life, the plant you buy for decoration and how it differs from the one you buy for herbs.  I work with my hands now.  I feel a vernal change in my bones to produce, to craft, to create.  I have callouses that have softened over from when I would hold a pencil too long, back in the day when I held a pencil to write at all. My working hands are toiling again.  I'm creating candy bars, confectionaries, memories.  Someone's breakfast, someone's "cheat day".  

I appreciate a good cup of coffee above most things, and that's something that hasn't changed between the old and the new life I have.  That is why I went to Press Coffee with a simple idea:  I want to sell candy.  A simple stand, a couple dollars a bar, for an hour or two to get my name out there and have some fun doing it.  Press was, to me, the perfect venue.  From its wonderfully curated decor to its light-dappled cafe tables, Press understands appreciating the small, everyday victories of the perfect cup of coffee, the first bite of a crisp pastry, finding the just-right leather chair to sit in and enjoy the morning for what it is:  an opportunity to create, relax, not take life too hard or seriously.   I would have never thought of the generosity that would come of Natalie offering to give me liberty on stocking them as often as I could produce them.  

I am dropping off my second order this morning.  Twenty-seven bars of Matcha, Cookies and Cream, and Peanut Butter.  They're delicate and snap when you break them.  They're wrapped in the same designs I used for Nolan's Valentine's Day present, florals for spring*.  They're one of the simple pleasures we allow ourselves to spend money on, and maybe one of my customers will share his with someone he loves today.  I hope, whoever buys one, they'll recognize the attention each bar got from me.  From cutting the wrappers to measuring the foil, to getting the perfect process of tempering and cooling, each bar was made from my hands, hands that once held pencils too tightly, cigarettes too loosely, and another boy's hand too recklessly. 

If you're located in the San Antonio-area, stop by Press Coffee at 606 W French Place 78212, and maybe I'll see you there, too! (Usually for only, like, five minutes in the morning before work, though).

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What my work desk usually looks like

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Matcha is probably my personal favorite.  Beau and I are hockin' these like it's 2012

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(they're not $2, btw)

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*groundbreaking

And finally, a special thanks to Samuel Nuñez  for creating such an amazing logo, that inspired so much of my work this last month--from the candy bars to actually making this website a thing.  Go check him out, too!