Pumpkin Cornbread Donuts (for dunkin' and snackin')

Last weekend was Lana's first birthday party.  A year ago, I had made these muffins for her. Things have changed between my sister and me - I go to her more. I call her. I don't hang up quickly or make excuses. I stay over for the whole night. I don't leave by nine, saying I like to sleep in my own bed. 

We didn't grow up with family, really. We lived too far away and there were bridges burned before I was even born. It made for disappointing Christmases and silent phonecalls that never came for birthdays. So it's a learning experience for us. We're learning from mistakes we couldn't always understand before. We hug now. Kiss goodbye. I tell her I love her. It's all for Lana. We patched a lot up quickly for her.

Lana, beautiful and curious and temper-prone, fills the room with a lightness that I've only experienced as the awkward voyeur of other people's families. We crouch and coo with her. We play a game of trial-and-error, trying to figure out what makes her happy and what makes her sad. We kiss her more than she likes. We feed her small cereals and watch her smile with her four teeth.

And I was more than happy to make something when my sister asked if I could. We had a small party at a church hall where her baby shower was held. My sister made three soups and my mother made the cake.  We helped decorate and I made a Midwest staple - cornbread for the chili. And it just made sense to make them in a donut pan, for small hands and streamlined dunking.

And on the floor of the church hall, I sat with Lana and told her she was special. Because she is, with her big eyes and long hair. Because she is, because it only took 9 months to fix 25 years of silence.

Pumpkin Cornbread Donuts

Ingredients:

• 1 cup flour
• 1 cup cornmeal
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1/4 cup buttermilk (or whole milk with a 1/2 TB white vinegar)
• 3/4 cup pumpkin puree
• 3 TB butter, softened
• 2 TB honey

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 425*F and grease a standard donut pan
2. Sift together all dry ingredients
3. Whisk together all wet ingredients
4. Create a well in the center of your dry ingredients and fold in wet
5. Beat vigorously until batter is smoooth
6. Transfer to a piping bag and cut the tip off
7. Fill the donut indents about 3/4 of the way full
8. Bake for 15-18 minutes or until golden brown
9. Repeat if you have a 6-donut pan and remember to re-grease your pan!
10. Enjoy dunked into some hearty chili on a cold day!

Toasted Cornmeal "Dutch Pancake"

It's been unseasonably warm lately. The dogs are learning to play Frisbee and I am learning to play Monopoly (I haven't won, but I have a rematch with Nolan tonight). We ordered a rug; we are decorating slowly. We are researching composting and burned all of our trash in the firepit just off the trail to our creek. The smoke still stuck to his hair while we watched TV last night, I could smell it on my fingertips this morning, too.

Or maybe it was the brand of Camel he likes to smoke. A pile of them, stubbed out at different angles, hide under rocks and in porch crevasses like small mushrooms. He'll stop when things slow down. I only smoke to look cool to strangers. It's never worked, but I keep trying.

I'm writing to the local papers more, telling them how I feel about the world these days. My best friend is going to London in May. I traced my mother's grandmother's grandmother back to Ireland and bought three pairs of reading glasses with a coupon I had in my email. Life keeps moving forward, slowly but surely. I keep baking, I keep drinking more coffee than I should. I keep forgetting to pay bills and I sleep to pass the time. But I'm happy. Happier than I have been in years and years and years.

Toasted Cornmeal Dutch Pancake

This recipe is if a Dutch Baby and a cornbread had an affair in a skillet. It's eggy, sweet, nutty, and light. It's not dense, but is denser than it's dutch baby cousins, so will not puff up to the same extent. It's perfect with lemon, cherry jam, or even just more sugar on top.

Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup cornmeal, as fine ground as you can get (but not flour)
• 2 TB butter, unsalted
• 2 eggs, room temperature
• 3/4 cup whole milk, room temperature
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 425*F
2. Pour your cornmeal into a dry cast iron skillet (11 or 12 inches) and heat on medium-high
3. Stir once or twice so as to prevent browning, but allow your cornmeal to toast and give off a nutty-sweet scent
4. Now, pour your toasted cornmeal into a bowl and replace with your butter in the pan
5. Put pan into oven to melt butter
6. Whisk all remaining ingredients together vigorously. Remove pan from oven for only a second to pour batter into skillet and then return to oven
7. Bake for 20 minutes. As the ingredients are slightly heavier, they will not puff up, but dish will still be light
8. Enjoy immediately