New routines and a cake recipe

I have met a hundred people this week and cannot remember anyone's name.  I gave thirty-eight cents to a homeless man and didn't look him in the eyes.  I think I am coming down with a cold, my body is achy.  I slept for fourteen hours and made biscuits in a skillet my sister got me for Christmas.  I haven't kissed anyone in ten days. This week has been distinctively marked for me.  One night, I had decaf coffee for dinner.  Another, a bowl of white rice.  My body doesn't need sustenance the way it used to.  Instead, I listen to the small taptaptap's of the dog in the apartment next to mine and that is enough for the night.  I have nightmares about bugs crawling in my mouth and on my skin and I take two showers a day, because I do not pay for water at my new place.  I am always thirsty and I cried reading an old poem I wrote to a boy once.  I notice my oven is gas range and I can smell it strongly when I first preheat it.  I am scared of the ice on the roads, of cancer, of losing the last vestiges of my good, good life that I had before I decided to pursue independence.

This week was my first week of my new job as an administrative manager for a hotel down in San Antonio.  Meeting upon meeting, I was told how I can improve the site, how many granola bars we need to order, how to increase revenue and profits for in the next quarter.   I saw the words, the business idioms, but they are hollow.  In the back of my head, i think about how all I want to do is write, bake, sleep.  When I get home, I look at the wilting flowers that stood erect a day before, and I trim them to be used later for decoration somewhere else.  Nothing can be wasted right now, everything preserved, so I don't have a reason to leave the house.  Eggs used for meringues will make a custard with the yolks.  Scrambled eggs, give the embryos to the stray dog that scratches at houses in search of leftovers.  I used old parchment paper as scratch paper, a quick drawing I did of a logo I want for packaging.  I used some lip balm on my cold and dry hands.  It's been raining here, cold at nights.  The space heater next to my bed runs and squeaks all night.  I am just not used to this sort of life yet.

But I have time to think now, to bake and to write.  I find inspiration in those half-dead and cut flowers.  They were beautiful in their youth and I wanted to lay them on a pillow of buttercream.  I put them on a vanilla cake,  poked their stems into the meringue, and served them to my employees in an effort to show I cared.  When I came home, the flowers had wilted, and my record player was still spinning from when I forgot to flip it over that morning.  Noiselessly, it ran and I laid down on my bed, mouthing the words to a song that wasn't playing.  It rained that night and in the morning there was ice, but at least I made something beautiful.  I have time for beauty now.

Vanilla Cake with Italian Meringue Buttercream

For the cake: Use Molly Yeh's Vanilla Cake recipe to make a two layer 8" cake

For the Italian Meringue Icing:

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/8 cup water
• 3 egg whites, room temperature
• 1/2 teaspoon white vinegar
• 1/8 cup sugar
• 1 cup butter, room temperature and cut into tablespoons
• 1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla (alternatively, use any other extracts, floral essences, or zests --or coffee!--that you may want to try.  I just went with the basics here)

Directions:

1. In a mixer (i suggest stand mixer here, but that is not to say a hand mixer would not work), beat eggs with sugar until stiff peaks begin to form and the white triple or quadruple in volume.
2. Add vinegar to stabilize the meringue.  Add the vanilla.
3. Continue to beat.  Set aside while you work on the simple syrup
4. For the simple syrup necessary to cook the egg whites and create the meringue, Place 1/2 cup sugar and water into small saucepan and put on medium-high heat.  Be mindful that it does not start to burn, due to the small surface area of so little sugar and water
5. When the temperature on an instant read thermometer reaches 238 degrees Fahrenheit (or, if it becomes really tacky as it bubbles, or if you do the water drop test), the syrup is ready
6. Turn the mixer back on and slowly drizzle in the syrup, making sure to take your time.  Keep beating the mixture for a few minutes until it has cooled down (if you add the butter too soon after the hot simple syrup, you risk the butter just melting and clotting and your meringue to be oily)
7. Once the mixture is cool enough to touch (you can tell by touching the bowl), start adding the butter one tablespoon at a time.  Have the mixer on and make sure the last tablespoon is full incorporated before adding a new one.  It may start to curdle and separate as you add them, but it will reconstitute once it works into an emulsified state
8. When the last tablespoon of butter goes in, mix to incorporate and you should have a beautiful, not-too-sweet and silky buttercream that is elegant and simplistic.
9. Assembly:  As Molly's cakes cool, put on on the plate, add a layer of buttercream, put other cake on top.  Slather cake in buttercream, decorate, enjoy!

The first things I did in my new place.

I licked my wounds when I was alone.  I sat on my bed and listened to the train roaring two blocks from my window.  It was so loud, the coffee pot shook.  The little space between your eyes and your brain shook.  But that could have been because I was trying to comprehend my commitment to the big unknown that comes with taking out your own trash, sleeping alone at night, sitting in silence with only the big, big train to bully you to sleep. That was the first night.

The second night was not different, except I wore thick, woolen socks to bed.  It made me feel warm and comforted and like I wasn't so alone when I was bundled up and sweating.  I created a womb from "tumble dry" socks and big cardigans I only used to wear on walks with the dogs and to get the mail.  It was all survivalism.  It was all ways to trick myself that I was just on a very expensive, very revokable vacation.  And maybe it is.  But what if it isn't?  I spent time thinking these two questions over as I drove to Starbucks and cried in the parking lot.  I didn't make eye contact with the barista and the name written on the cup was Brad.  The man that set up my internet thought my name was Bratt.  I guess I could be anyone and no one in this central Texas town.  I guess, in many ways, I'm both at once to myself right now.

Four years.  Four years of not knowing anyone but one person, and know I have a whole world to use as my backstory.  Someone today didn't believe I was born in Indiana.  Another woman said I was too pale to have just moved from California.  Someone said I didn't talk like I was from Texas.  Everyone was confused and, having lived in seven states and having a story for each one, I was a little confused, too.

I keep pulling a thread from my flannel shirt and it's bunching where the stitching is missing.  I wonder how much power I have to unravel, to mend.  To create and to tear.  I wonder what other things I have fabricated along the way.  Maybe my whole life, maybe nothing at all.  I am always amazed at people who can create, who can take the proverbial (or real!) block of marble and turn it into a sculpture.  When I was in Italy, we studied the blue-chalked lines of da Vinci's blueprints.  It is a craft I don't have.  Instead, I can create lies and lives and false memories, fake accents, tell people I'm born and raised in a place I've never been.  But to manufacture a whole, working, livable product...I lack the care and attention, the tenderness of mind and creativity that someone more talented than I possesses.

One such case of talent and beauty, Aron Fischer's Facture Goods.  I was given a black walnut rolling pin by Aron and have fallen in love with its sturdy design and natural elegance.  I was inspired by his provisions to create something that would sustain me, comfort and nourish me.   With my small artillery of baking supplies, including the rolling pin and an old ravioli cutter my mom got me for Christmas, I was inspired to make some savory crackers.  Natural, simple, and versatile, these crackers were my take on being inspired by Facture Goods' rolling pin (because I couldn't think of making anymore cookies with it so soon after the holidays!).  See the recipe below and go visit the Facture Goods online store (I'm probably ordering the grain scoop by Gin O'Keefe soon!).

Parmesan and Lemon Pepper Crackers (makes 12 large or 24-30 small)

Ingredients:

• 1 stick butter
• 3 oz parmesan
• 1 1/4 cup flour
• 1/2 teaspoon smoked sea salt*
• 1 heaping teaspoon of lemon pepper

Directions:

1. With a stand or hand mixer, cream butter for a couple minutes until airy and pale
2. Add all remaining ingredients and mix until well blended.  Make sure to use a rubber spatula for the bottom part, in case the mixer missed anything (I found the flour to have not mixed with the butter once the parmesan was added by the mixer alone)
3. Flour a board or work surface lightly and roll dough out.  Form into a ball or rectangle (this will depend on how you want to cut your crackers out.  If you want to make round ones, then form into a log about a foot long.  If you want to make shaped crackers, form into a rectangle by rolling out with pin into desired thickness.  I suggest about a half-to-quarter inch thickness for this recipe).  Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 20 minutes.
4. Preheat oven to 350 degrees while dough is resting and prepare a baking sheet or two by lining it with parchment paper
5. When dough is firmed up in the fridge, take out and either cut into thin rounds (if in log form), or use desired cutters for squares/shapes (you can use ravioli cutters, biscuit cutters, cookie cutters--it's up to you!)
6. Place onto prepared baking sheet.  Poke a few holes in the crackers to release air and so they don't puff up and crack too much
7. Bake for 22-25 minutes until golden brown and crisp
8. Allow to cool (will crisp up more as they rest)
9. Enjoy with soup or by themselves!

2015: A Beginning

How many things can we say are ours completely?  We are told time is borrowed, experiences shared, and even God is collectively "Ours".  This maddened me, I became an insomniac over the thought of never having anything be truly mine again.  I had skipped first grade in elementary school and perhaps never learned to share very well.  But, I began to have an itch for something that was personal, mine.  Something to hold close to my heart and take pride in.  I was a magpie, I collected small and beautiful objects and wouldn't let others in to see, to enjoy, to feel.  I believe baking became a characteristic of this growth, this yearn, this gut-want for a sense of accomplishment that came from one's own and personal doing.  It was something i had missed out on before. "Before" will always a very specific moment in my life and if you could cut me open like a tree, you would see four years of strong growth, knots in my grain, and some rot where self-doubt and jealousy ate at me like termites.

The week between Christmas and New Years is blurry and sits in the small corners of my mind that are usually reserved for insecurities and small, insignificant jokes.  They come out at the wrong time, make me feel awkward when I dwell on them too long or when I try to express them to others.  That liminal, in-between week meant a 20 hour drive, two hundred and fifty dollars just spent on food.  Maybe a hundred in gas.  I don't know, I lost count.  I lost count because I was listening to my own voice singing in the car and to the sound of the air conditioner and the tongue stick to the roof of my mouth when I forgot to drink water and just kept talking, talking, talking to fill the inevitable void of asking, "Where are we going?"  Because we knew to follow the I-10E for 550 miles, but we didn't know what to call it all, all those moments that came after the before once the car pulled into the driveway of my new apartment I got for myself.  Once we bought the furniture.  Once we moved the sofa bed up two my second-floor apartment.  Once we had sex and tried to have sex.  Once we said goodbye at the departure terminal.  Once it all came crashing down at 11:02 on a Friday morning when I was drinking coffee and couldn't figure out if I wanted to cry or move the bed to the opposite wall.

I want to write about it all, all those moments. To savor them, to cherish them, to try to dissect some more meaning from them and make them seem important to me on more than one level.  Like a biblical literalist, I want to extrapolate all the meaning I can from the psalms of his body and his words and each look that meant something and didn't mean something all at once.

And a large portion of me doesn't want to talk about it at all.  It's private and I am still figuring it all out.  To say, for the first time in four years, "I'm sleeping alone tonight." isn't easy, but nothing has been for a very long time.

But I am the magpie I grew to become and I have collected secret, beautiful things and secret, beautiful moments all my life.  And I finally got to have them, have them all to myself.  And I am proud of this space, this home I created for myself.  This studio apartment in San Antonio, Texas.  In a portion of the giant, giant state they call Hill Country.  On the second floor, across the street from a woman whose bumper sticker says she "Loves Her Midwife".  I am proud to show it off.  I am proud to have it as my own, and I am happy to share it with you all today.  I took these photos over the course of one day, and I tried to capture the beauty of every moment I had.  To cherish it, to appreciate it.  To resolve a new sense of self that wasn't found through any other means but my own, here, in this little apartment of mine.

My New Apartment... (see below for details)

-Brett

1. Ikea Måla Easel and a silk scarf I picked up in Italy at a flea market | 2. My favorite Birkenstocks (sorry I ever made fun of you, mom) | 3. First editions of Mastering of the Art of French Cooking Volumes 1 and 2,  lots of glasses, and a cast-iron deer head from Founder's Crossing in Bedford, PA | 4. Missoni journals, and papers for letter writing (I'll write to anyone who asks) | 5. Ikea PS 2014 book shelf.  Notice all the Joan Didion, Judith Butler, and Simone de Beauvoir | 6. A small figurine my mother got me of a baker, she has confidence in me enough to suggest quitting work and going to culinary school | 7. An old birch box that held coffee once, a handblown vase with dollar-store flowers, and my daily essentials of iPhone and Timex | 8. Breakfast in bed--handmade ceramic mug from Bedford, PA, a Hammond's cookie dough bar, and some potassium | 9.  My favorite place these last few days has been my bed.  I've had that decal for four years this coming Valentine's Day | 10. I'm a little Lodge-obsessed in my kitchen

Christmas Eve.

The anticipation used to kill me, trick me, tease me.  Christmas break would start on a day before Christmas Eve and last all the way through to January 3rd.  I would cry when I didn't get what I wanted, I would cry when I had to go back to school.  I would eat turkey and ham and lasagna and seven different types of fish with my family.  We would play cards, pretend to like each other.  It was tradition and now I realize how ephemeral it really was.  How days moved like molasses, and then quick like warmed syrup.  From a small flurry to a blizzard, we wrapped ourselves in fleece blankets and wondered how the cold got into our old, old house and made our bones feel just as old.

That's what I remember about Christmas and I used to envy how others described it as magical, mystical, something worth looking forward to.  All those years, it seemed like a chore and how greedy I was to ask for more, to count the dollar value or my gifts compared to my siblings'.  How sad it all seemed the next day, anticlimactic and messy.  I always wanted more, but I could never articulate what I wanted the most.  I think all I wanted was to feel loved, held, a part of a larger family than the small nucleus that was mom, dad, brother, sister.

Lately I've been feeling nostalgic and hungry, grateful and like I lost something and can't remember where I put it.  These feelings don't often hit me in such full force.  Going home last week to Pennsylvania (more on that later) brought something out of me that I didn't know was in me:  the power to create magic.  The ability to create peaceful, loving memories with my mother.  Instead of remaining bitter, remembering how a week before Christmas in 2010 I got tested for HIV and then threw a fit when I didn't get the new iPhone, I could laugh with my mom and hug my dad tight.  I was invited to spend the night at my sister's first place, I called my brother and congratulated him on his new house.  I was creating, making, forging, and shaping a future with my small nucleus to last longer than the one day a year we forced upon ourselves for tradition's sake.  And that's what Christmas is about, that is what my parents wanted all along.  And I want to return that favor to all of you.  Bake this cake, forge those memories, make someone smile and discover that all you needed was there all along.  It's one part Christmas and two parts mountain dessert, Appalachian baking.  A moon pie, a whoopee pie.  Whatever you call it, it's a survivalist attempt at decadence.  It's delicious and light, moist and dense.  A mile-high contradiction where you can splurge a little, if it helps you remember your care-and-calorie-free childhood a little easier.

I received a lot of presents this year -- marble and ceramics, wood and paper -- but the best gift I could receive was knowing that I'm loved by someone, and I can return that love to anyone who will let me.

Peppermint and Eggnog Whoopie Pie

Ingredients:

• 1 2/3 cup eggnog, divided
• 1 cup cold water
• 2/3 cup vegetable oil
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt (mix it up with smoked salt)
• 1 teaspoon instant espresso mix
• 2 cups flour
• 2/3 cups cocoa powder
• 4 oz butter, softened
• 4 oz cream cheese, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cup confectioner's sugar
• 1 teaspoon gelatin, bloomed in cold water
• 2 candy canes

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and prepare two 9" cake pans with butter and parchment paper
2. In a mixing bowl or measuring cup, whisk all wet ingredients (1 cup of the eggnog) together and set aside
3. Sift together soda, salt, espresso, flour, and cocoa in a large mixing bowl and create a well in the middle
4. Slowly begin combining wet and dry ingredients, mixing with a rubber spatula to scrape all sides
5. For an added level of smoothness, pour wet ingredients through a sieve and scrape sides with spatula into a clean mixing bowl
6. Divide batter between two cake pans
7. Bake for 35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean
8. Allow to cool
9. While cake is cooling, prepare the icing.
10. In a small bowl, combine 1 teaspoon of gelatin with a tablespoon of cold water and set aside while gelatin blooms
11. In a large mixing bowl, use a mixer to combine butter, confectioner's sugar, cream cheese, until combined.  Whip in the remaining eggnog and vanilla.  Add a pinch of salt, if desired
12. When gelatin has stiffened, put in microwave for 15 seconds or until melted and whip into icing mixture
13. Allow to set for 15-20 minutes
14. When cake is completely cooled and icing is set with the gelatin, you can assemble the cake
15. Put one cake onto the plate, then scoop and smooth icing using a wet icing spatula or butter knife.  Of course, this can be messy, so don't stress too much
16. Top with remaining cake
17. Pulse candy canes in a food processor until a fine dust
18. Brush VERY lightly with water on cake to allow peppermint to stick
19. Pour peppermint crumbs onto cake to taste's desire
20. Enjoy with your family!

Merry Christmas, everyone!

We have brioche at dawn.

This all happened before I left for Pennsylvania, before I was reminded of the as it was.  Of the constant state of charm and chaos that exists when you visit a family home.  The kind that you can recognize the tired floorboards, the kind that are imprinted with your dad's shape on the couch.  All the good memories flood back and haunt you like a contorted zoetrope, and you're never really sure if you're dreaming or awake. I made these rolls with no intention of making these rolls, with no intention of being up until one in the morning, making sure I had turned the oven light off.  Intention wasn't the cause, but the end goal of having these with ham and jelly kept me going.  The soft pillows were enveloped in a hard crunch and I could taste them before I could smell them.  I knew they were special and simple and delicious.  I knew I wanted them to be impressive, I knew it before I ever intended on making them.

I have always felt that the grey morning light is terrifying.  One of the first poems I wrote, read out loud in the back of my parents' '98 Nissan Pathfinder, was about how I wanted to die when that grey light extended to my southward-facing bedroom window.  That was in Pennsylvania, when the whole month of December is one grey streak on virgin snow.  Out here in California, it can taunt you for two hours and be gone by the time you pull into work.  It's different here, but still frightening.

I've never been one for armor, but you can't hide from the ambient greyness.  Instead, you have to confront it.  Distract yourself from it.  Make it feel invited in a way that it can't smell the sick in you.  I distract myself from it, too.  I serve myself a beautiful breakfast when I realize how much I hate this kind of season, this kind of light.  The mild distortion of ephemera that only comes between the hours of five and seven in the morning.  And that can all be abated for a moment or two.  At the calm of the table, with the coffee pot scorching on the burner.  The small hiss of everyday life while the man you once loved and will love again sleeps in the next room, never aware that you only made the breakfast so you didn't think about your own mortality.  How you, too, could be gone by the time you pull into work.  And after that you would do the dishes, and after that you would take a shower, and after that you would get a towel and sit on the bathroom floor trying to stay warm.  The ritual of these brioche buns meant I was distracted, meant I didn't have to, for one moment, think about how suffocating mornings can be, when all you have is yourself.

Morning Brioche Buns

Ingredients: (this is for six buns, but I had doubled the recipe to share at work, as seen in photos below)

• 8 TB milk, slightly warmed on stovetop or in microwave
• 1/2 sachet of active dry yeast
• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut in pieces, room temperature
• 1/2 tablespoon granulated sugar or honey
• 2 eggs, lightly whisked (1 tablespoon of eggs for washing), room temperature
• 1/3 teaspoon salt 
• 2 1/3 cup flour
• 2 teaspoons flaky sea salt (such as La Jolla Salt Co.)

Directions:

1. In a bowl, activate the yeast in the warmed milk until beginning to bloom and bubbles appear
2. Cream butter and sugar (or honey) until light and fluffy with mixer
3. Add eggs and continue to blend gently until combined
4. In a separate bowl, sift together flour and salt for lighter, airier dry ingredients
5. Gradually add these to the wet mixture, stirring with a wooden spoon until crumbly
6. Pour in yeast mixture and stir until all ingredients are wet
7. Oil or flour hands gently and turn onto a lightly-floured board.  Knead by hand until gluten and yeast begin to activate.  The dough will become springy and malleable in about 5-7 minutes
8. Put in an oiled bowl and cover with a tea towel for about two hours, or until doubled in size
9. Put back onto floured board and cut into six equal buns.  Roll and shape into rounds, place on parchment-lined baking sheet for another hour and a half to inflate again and become puffy.  During this proofing period, preheat oven to 375 degrees.
10. When the oven is preheated and rolls are puffy, you can either keep them on the baking sheets or place them in a skillet or other oven-proof bakeware for a visually-stunning breakfast.  Either way, they taste great.
11. Gently brush all balls of dough with reserved tablespoon of egg and lightly salt with flaked seasalt.
12. Bake for 20 minutes or until golden
13. Allow to cool and serve as immediate as possible.  Put in airtight container for morning.
14. Note:  I found that, with all brioche, these dry out really quickly.  To reconstitute them a little, place in a microwave with a damp paper towel for about 10-15 seconds.  The steam should help to soften them up a bit.
15. Serve with jam, butter, or some honey-baked ham I'm sure we all have received in a Pepperidge Farms box from a relative or two this time of year.

And one more thing...

I want to give a special shout out to La Jolla Salt Co. for their great deal on this denim apron I purchased in support of small businesses in my area.  I was lucky enough to have a little bit of their salt for this recipe and I can say it gave it the perfect amount of balance and crunch the brioche needed.  Baking gets pretty messy and I've finally graduated from using old flannel shirts to a full-blown profesh apron now!