• Missing it already

    October 7, 2009

    Have you heard the news? Gourmet magazine is shutting down.

    Even though I’ve never subscribed to the magazine and have opted instead to snatch the issues off the library stacks and photocopy the recipes that appeal to me, I’m sad. There is something special about a once-a-month magazine, each new issue a scrumptious present for every food-loving subscriber (or borrower) with its seasonal recipes and stories. And while I can find lots of that information on the web, there is something uniquely satisfying about taking a thick, sleek magazine up to bed with me, flipping through all the glossy pages to the end of the magazine to finish off an article or find that caramel corn recipe, and, when tired of reading and ready to turn off the light, allowing the magazine to flutter-smack its way to the floor where it will stay till I scoop it up in the dusky morning light before tip-toeing down the stairs to make my cup of coffee. I’ll miss that.


    While I don’t go for all the magazine’s recipes, it certainly has opened my eyes to the wide variety of flavor combinations and has given me quite a few delicious recipes (here’s one, and another, and another, and still another).


    The magazine has given me some duds as well, the most recent one being the apple pie with cheddar crust that I tried last week. I’ve never been a fan of cheddar cheese with apple pie, though I love apples and popcorn and cheese for a Sunday night supper, so I decided to give the recipe a shot—maybe slipping the sharp white cheddar into the crust would be just the thing that would sway me, turning me into a classy apple-pie-and-cheese-eater. Alas, the pie was good, but it resembled more of a baked apple in a cheese crust type of thing—it wasn’t pie, sweet and spicy, how we think of it. The kids didn’t really like it, and I forgot about it so it molded. The chickens appreciated my efforts, though.


    A couple months ago I tried another of Gourmet‘s gourmet pie recipes, the peach caramel pie. I didn’t like that one either. There was too much crust and the flavors were ho-hum. I much, much preferred my peach tart. Gourmet wasn’t doing too good a job on their pies, as far as I was concerned.


    But then, in the same issue as the apple cheese pie, there was a recipe for pear butterscotch pie. Figuring that one pie out of three had better turn out okay, I decided to try it. And guess what? My efforts finally paid off! Simple, sweet, fruity, gently spiced, buttery, not-to-juicy and not-to-dry, the pie was all around delightful.


    Whatever am I going to do without Gourmet? I don’t know. My future library trips don’t seem quite so thrilling. Ah me, and oh well. I do know that whenever I make this pie, or any of the other yummy recipes I have gleaned from its glossy pages, I will think fondly of the mother of all food magazines and of the few years that I got to savor it.


    (I do have quite a few photocopied recipes that I still haven’t tried. That’s something, no?)

    Pear Butterscotch Pie
    Adapted from Gourmet magazine, the September 2009 issue

    3 pounds pears, peeled, cored, and each pear cut into six wedges
    ½ cup brown sugar
    3 tablespoons flour
    1/8 teaspoon salt
    ½ teaspoon nutmeg
    1 teaspoon cinnamon
    1 teaspoon vanilla
    1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
    1 tablespoon butter, cut into little bits
    1 beaten egg mixed with 1 tablespoon warm water
    white sugar for sprinkling
    1 recipe of rich butter pastry, divided into two disks and chilled
    accompaniment: vanilla ice cream

    Place a baking stone on the bottom rack of your oven and turn the oven to 375 degrees.

    In a small bowl, combine the flour, brown sugar and spices and add to the sliced pears. Sprinkle the vanilla and lemon juice over top. Gently toss to coat the fruit. Let the fruit macerate for 15 minutes or so while you roll out the pastry.

    Fit the bottom pastry into a 9-inch pie plate, allowing the extra dough to hang over the edge. Pile the pears in the pie shell. Dot the pears with the tablespoon of butter.

    Roll out the second disk of pastry and position it over the fruit. Remove excess pastry (too much crust and you’ll overwhelm the fruit; too little and the crust will burn before the pie finishes baking) and crimp the edges together. Cut several air vents into the top crust, brush the top crust (including the crimped edges) with the egg mixture, and sprinkle liberally with sugar.

    Bake the pie for 30-45 minutes, checking every fifteen minutes or so, and placing some foil around the edges of the pie if the crust is darkening too quickly. When the pie crust is golden brown and the juices are bubbling, remove from the oven and cool to room temperature.

    Best eaten, the same day it is baked, with vanilla ice cream.

    About one year ago: Sweet Rolls.

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  • A touchy subject

    October 6, 2009

    Ever since I’ve been blogging, I occasionally get comments alluding to the importance of spanking children, and then other people comment in response, advising against the practice. I find this interesting—the polarization, the undercurrent of strong emotions. No one seems to ride the fence on this matter, except for me.

    Here’s what I think:
    *Spanking isn’t evil.
    *Spanking isn’t the best option.
    *Spanking can be extremely detrimental.
    *Spanking is lazy discipline.
    *Spanking can be helpful.

    And…
    *Parents who spank can be excellent parents (and vice versa).
    *Parents who don’t spank can be excellent parents (and vice versa).
    *Parenting to be The Best is too stressful—it’s more encouraging, practical, and realistic to strive to be Good Enough.

    I also think:
    *It is dangerous to advise people to spank because you don’t know their situation and all the variables.
    *It is important to encourage parents to think of creative ways to discipline children.
    *It is unhelpful to stand in judgement of other parents.

    And…
    *To assume that parents will always be consistent and calm when administering spanks is a dangerous assumption—we are all deeply and irrevocably human.
    *There are an infinite number of personalities and temperaments (both parents and children alike)—to assume that we know all about the different types of children based on our two or four or eight children is another dangerous assumption.

    How do all these beliefs play out in my life? I try to discipline my children using other methods besides spanking, but sometimes, in my less glamorous moments, I spank my kids. I am not proud of that fact. I don’t think it is effective or helpful, and I feel lazy when I do it. So I keep pushing myself to try to rise above that inclination—sometimes I succeed fabulously and sometimes I fail horribly.

    I don’t think spanking (or not spanking) makes (or breaks) a good parent-child relationship; from my experience, it’s the quality time, among other things, that cements the bonds. (My parents spanked me, and not usually in a gentle, calm, consistent way, either; we have a very close relationship.) Spanking can be a deterrent to deep relationships, but so can many other things—a too-busy household, sarcasm, the inability/refusal to celebrate each other, and a focus on materialism, just to name a few.

    I have not even come close to fleshing out all the information and perspectives surrounding this very touchy subject. Everybody offers a different slant, a different reason, for what they believe. I would love to hear what you think.

    A Most Important Note! Please, please, please, comment with gentleness. Remember, we can all better understand each other when we share bits of our own stories, our insecurities, struggles, mistakes, and hurts; if you feel a need to criticize, please be vulnerable first.

    About One Year Ago: Donuts!!!

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  • Serious parenting

    October 5, 2009

    Mr. Handsome and I take our role as parents very seriously. We think it’s of the utmost importance to teach our children what’s important, things such as playing in the dirt, washing dishes, saying please and thank you, going to church, and reading lots of books. Last night we added something to that list, something that’s just as fundamental as playing with sticks and doing chores, but sadly enough, is so often missed by many other well-intentioned parents. Last night we became enlightened parents.

    We sat our children down and introduced them to the glories of Napoleon Dynamite.

    The kids were spell-bound. And slightly confused. They watched (everyone but The Baby Nickel who repeatedly expressed his intense dislike of the movie) intently and somewhat blankly, trying to puzzle out the reason for Mr. Handsome’s chuckling and my hooting. Miss Beccaboo took it literally (everyone was being mean to poor Napoleon!), but Yo-Yo was able to catch the nuances and see the humor behind it.

    The kids’ favorite part? La Fawnduh’s googly eyes.

    My favorite part? Napoleon’s free-fall from the chainlink fence.

    At the end of the movie I informed the children that we would be watching this movie every year between now and when they move out of the house. “Really?” they asked, incredulous at their good fortune.

    “Absolutely,” I said. “I expect you to have memorized most of the lines. And I want you all to learn how to fall over a fence like that, body horizontal with the ground, feet waggling. Got it?”

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