A few random thoughts before I get to the heart of the matter…

*There is a pot of sap burbling away on my stove. It makes the house smell like candy, in a wondrous sort of way.

*Sweetsie turned six and together we made a banana flower cake, complete with yellow frosting and chocolate chip-outlined petals and yellow sparkly powder.

*I spent Saturday cooking mountains of food, as though I thought my cooking days were numbered. They aren’t (whew!), but an outsider could have thought I was imagining that.

*I have discovered how to cook a certain food that has always alluded me. I feel all-powerful and kitchen goddess-like. Just as long as we stay in our respective domains and do not cross any lines, I will share my secrets (soon) because I think the world would be a better place if everyone experienced kitchen deism every now and then.

*Speaking of toes (oops, I was talking about toes, but then I edited that part out), or feet, rather, my heels are getting all icky tough again so last night I put udder balm on them. Mr. Handsome reported that I was mooing in my sleep, so I think it might be working.

*I said yes to participating in a little drama at church next Sunday. I play the part of “Selfish” and get to clutch a mug to my bosom and yell the word selfish over and over again. The role has great therapeutic potential. I expect I’ll be a new woman come Monday.

*Compliments are wonderful, but people really ought to be more careful when they give them to me. They don’t know this, but when they say, all off-handed and cool-like, that they like my dress or my lectionary devotional or my kids, they are in danger of getting smothered with kisses. Most times I’m able to restrain myself and smile graciously, but under my oh-so-smooth demeanor, I’m battling some seriously strong hug-‘em-till-they-pop urges. Consider yourself warned.

*Pie. Heart-shaped, pastry-topped, red raspberry-rhubarb pie. This is really what I wanted to write about when I clicked open my laptop, but I got a little side-tracked. It’s Monday, so the normal routine is allowed a bit of variance, right? I did water my plants though, a Monday’s job, and that is not something that always happens on schedule. I tell you this, the bit about Mondays and watering the plants, so you know that I’m not too much side-tracked, all things considered.

This pie would be perfect for Valentine’s Day if I were a Valentine’s Day celebratin’ sort of gal, which I’m not. Valentine’s Day, like Mother’s Day, is created for guilt and Hallmark, two things I try to stay away from as much as possible. And actually, I think every day ought to be Mother’s Day and every day ought to include a healthy dose of lovin’ (and, just for the record, lovin’ does not just involve sugary pink kisses and sticky hugs, but also hanging up our own bath towels and telling the truth and refraining from picking our noses in public [I’m all about realistic standards]). When you look at those holidays that way, they seem downright shabby, stingy, and pathetic. (And one more thing, mothers have no place being hoisted on to pedestals, idolized and worshiped for their glorious sacrifices—do not waste your breath singing my praises [not to be confused with giving me compliments], just chip in and wash the dishes and put away your laundry, thank you very much.)

Um, where was I? Oh yes, pie, red sweetheart pie. I declare, if I keep running off on tangents, this could be a very, very long post.

Let’s just say this, real quick before I veer off-course again: my mother made this pie for my brother when she was visiting him in his new (old) house in Pittsburgh, and she said it was really good and gave me the recipe in her a-bit-of-this and perhaps-a-bit-of-that imprecise and picky way. I promptly made it for myself, varied the ingredient portions, and then made it again. And then made it again. The final pie got carted to another brother’s concert and received compliments (in one case, in quick succession). I almost gave the complimenteers sticky, red kisses, but controlled myself. It’s a good thing they didn’t know the danger they were in.

I’m always looking for ways to use up our insane mountains of frozen red raspberries (remember all those pictures of red raspberry desserts that just didn’t quite cut it?), and I am proud (and relieved) to say that I have finally found the solution, and it’s a glorious solution indeed.

Now, back to love and Valentine’s Day and all that jazz. You’re a bunch of plenty smart readers so I’ll just say my little two cents and then let you draw the connections between pie and true love: exuberant red raspberry plus tangy-sour rhubarb equals one punchy pie that’s filled to the brim with lip-puckering character and juicy sweet richness.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

Red Raspberry-Rhubarb Pie
Adapted from my mother’s creation

2 cups red raspberries, fresh or frozen
2 cups rhubarb, chopped into 2-inch chunks, fresh or frozen
1 rounded tablespoon tapioca
3/4 cup sugar
½ recipe butter crust
cream and sugar, for glazing

Toss the rhubarb with the tapioca and sugar. Add the red raspberries and stir gently. (The red raspberries will disintegrate at some point in the process, but I like to operate under the illusion that they may, perhaps, stay whole.) Allow the fruit mixture to sit at room temperature for 1-8 hours, stirring gently every hour or so, until it is nice and juicy.

Put the fruit in an unbaked pie crust and top with cut-out crust hearts that you have brushed with cream and sprinkled (liberally!) with sugar.

Bake the pie at 400 degrees for 40-60 minutes, or until the juices are bubbly and the crust is golden brown. (I cover the edges of the crust with a ring of tin foil from the very beginning of the baking time to keep them from scorching.)

About one year ago: another birth story. This year she again chose spaghetti and meatballs. She knows good food when she tastes it, and then latches on and never lets go.

I let my children run around in the snow in their bare feet. Actually, I encourage it. I tell them, “Kids, go outside and run around in the snow. NO! Do NOT wear shoes! What are you, crazy?” And then, because they’re gaping at me, I have to explain, “It’s more fun without them, didn’t you know?”

The other night Yo-Yo and Miss Beccaboo ran out to collect the eggs in their bare feet, of their own volition. It appears I’ve trained them well.

They charged down the path to the pen, leaped inside, raided the nests, and plunged back out the door and up the path towards the house. As they got closer to the porch, they started yelling, “Open the door! Someone open the door!”

By the time they got on the porch they were shrieking, their voices edged with pain, “OPEN THE DOOR NOW! PLEASE OPENTHEDOORNOW! ”

My mom did the same bare-feet-in-snow thing to me when I was a lass. She only did it to me once, but I remember her dare that snowy night when I was about fifteen. I dare you to run around the house in your underwear! I took her up on it, but I don’t think I got anything from her for it, other than a fit of giggles. Goes to show I wasn’t a very smart lass.

(My mom had a thing for dares. She once dared our neighbor girl, a sweet child of about nine, to eat a raw egg. Mom said she’d pay her twenty-five cents if she did. The girl took the dare and got the quarter. [Come to think of it, the same girl said her mother wouldn’t let her and her brothers eat the apples we gave them for Halloween. We thought that was totally ridiculous considering we played at each others houses all the time, but in light of the egg incident, maybe she had a valid fear?]) (I sometimes feed my kids raw eggs, too, but I don’t give them money for eating them. In fact, they don’t know they’re eating them ‘cause I hide them in creamy fruit smoothies.)

On to other topics… like garlic and soup (rocky transition, no theme, so sorry.)

Oh yes, now I remember the connection between bare feet and snow and eggs. This soup has garlic in it and garlic is healthy. Some people say running around in the snow buck naked is healthy. (When I was a kid—before I was a lass—we had a neighbor, a doctor, who would steam himself in his sauna and then crack the ice in his pond and jump in. Naked, of course.) And some people say raw eggs are healthy. This soup I’m going to tell you about (when I finish with all the preambles) has lots of garlic and some eggs (only tempered, not fully cooked); it’s fabulously healthy for you. If you want to be fanatical about it, I suppose you could slurp it down while soaking your feet in a tub of snow, but as for me, I’ll eat it like a normal person, in a warm house with slippers on my feet.

I must tell you, Mr. Handsome was disgusted when he heard he was going to have garlic soup for supper. “Garlic water? You can’t be serious!” he pleaded.

But I was serious. “It’s soup, honey, soup,” I corrected him. “And it has chicken broth and cheese and is absolutely delicious, so just shush up, will you? Geesh.”

As he hesitatingly took his first bite of soup (he always tastes new food with a great show of hesitation which is totally ironic—one minute he praises me for being a gourmet cook and spoiling him rotten, and the next minute he acts like I’m out to kill him), a look of pained sheepishness crossed his face and I burst out laughing. This was no garlic-water soup and he knew it! I think I might have crowed.

I thought about this soup for a number of months before breaking down and making it. I thought it seemed complicated what with all the chopped garlic and herbs and the tempered eggs. But it’s not difficult at all; in fact, I’ve made it twice in the last week and it gets easier each time. The next time I’ll probably be able to make it blind-folded.

Simply throw some herbs and chopped garlic in a pot of broth and give it a leisurely simmer. In a small bowl whisk together some eggs and cheese, add a bit of olive oil, and then, whisking steadily, add some of the hot broth. Whisk the egg mixture back into the broth, heat through, and—voila!—supper is served.

Don’t make the same mistake I did, hear? Please, hasten to the kitchen and whip yourself up a pot of this soup. It’ll keep you healthy, and it’s a lot more pleasurable than running around in the snow in your bare feet.

Creamy Garlic Soup
Adapted from 101 Cookbooks

This may seem like a lot of garlic, and it is, but it does not overpower. However, if you have a shaky relationship with garlic, you can dial back the amount considerably and the soup will still be quite yummy—like a creamy, herbed chicken broth with a hint of garlic.

Heidi uses water in her soup, but I use chicken broth; I have tons of broth-filled jars rattling around in my freezer and I seize every possible opportunity to use them up. I think the chicken broth gives the soup depth, not to mention it adds all those wonderful chicken-y nutrients. Cluck-yum.

1 quart chicken broth
1 bay leaf
8-12 cloves garlic, minced, or ½ cup minced garlic
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
14 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon dried sage
1 egg
2 egg yolks
½ cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese, plus extra for garnish
1/4 cup olive oil
Crusty bread, dry (or buttered, or olive-oiled) toast, matzo pancakes, croutons, etc

Combine the broth, bay leaf, garlic, salt, pepper, thyme, and sage in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium-low, cover with a lid, and simmer for 30-40 minutes. Remove the bay leaf and discard.

In a small bowl, whisk together the egg and egg yolks and cheese. Drizzle in the olive oil, whisking steadily. Add about a cup of the hot broth, a little at a time, whisking steadily. Pour the tempered egg mixture into the pan of broth. Keep whisking. Heat through (do not boil). Check to correct seasonings.

Tear the crusty bread (or one of the other choices) into a bowl and ladle some soup over top. Sprinkle liberally with more Parmesan before devouring. (Or, more simply, serve the soup in a mug sans the bread, and consume via vigorous slurps.)

About one year ago: Butterscotch Ice Cream.

Continuing on with foods I’ve made but never posted. There are so many! (I think I’ve already mentioned that before, but still, it bears repeating.)

I kind of like this little series. I work on it when my brain is empty, when I can’t summon the energy to spout off on important, life-changing topics like, like, like… Oh never mind. Like I said, I work on this when my brain is empty. I wasn’t kidding.

These posts are kind of therapeutic. They make me feel like I was once, a long time ago, productive. It’s a resting-on-my-laurels-type post. Not that anybody gave me any laurels when I first cooked these dishes. But still.

Enough of the empty chatter. Let’s get on with the food.

Oh, and one more thing. There is nothing healthy in this post, and almost everything was a flop. If you want to go hang out at some other place in bloggyland, I’ll understand.

Okay, now where is that “unposted food” folder? Ah-ha, here it is.

Nectarine Coffee Cake. Too sweet, too gooey, too bland, too yuck.

I can’t quite tell from where I’m sitting, but I think this is a Sour Cream Nectarine Pie. Or maybe it’s peaches instead of nectarines. In either case, it was no good. Perhaps the sour cream curdled, but I’m not sure about that.

Peaches in White Wine, with a couple red raspberries thrown in for color and Just Because. I liked it, but not too much. I enjoyed it more when I added a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top. Then it was like a fruity-wine-y ice cream float. Come to think of it, I really did like that combination. Maybe I’ll try it again next summer.

What do you think these are? I’ll give you three guesses.

Taffy? Nope.

Pickle Spice Taffy? Nope.

Snot Balls? NO! (That is so gross.)

Before you go any lower, I’ll tell you what it is: Vinegar Candy. I think it came about after the pickled taffy event. Yo-Yo was repulsed by the sinus-cleansing vinegar smell that infiltrated the whole house, so I informed him that there is a candy that’s made out of vinegar. Of course he wanted to try it. He made it twice; the first time we undercooked it. He ate a bunch, but the majority went to the compost.

Peanut Butter Banana Pie. Just all around totally disgusting. Period. If you want a peanut butter pie, make this instead.

Glorified Gingerbread. I made this when I was floundering around trying to discover my shoofly cake recipe. It was certainly no shoofly cake, but it was a very fine gingerbread, better than the one I already posted. But wouldn’t you know, I returned the cookbook from whence it came to the library before I copied the recipe down. Shame!

Ah, now this. This is a Red Wine Pear Tartin, and it was lovely all around. It was lovely to prepare (a reduced cinnamon-spiked and buttery red wine sauce, oh my) and lovely to eat. In fact, we ate all but one piece in one sitting. There was plate-licking involved.

Date-Nut Loaf. I first ate this at a friend’s house and loved it, but I changed it up a bit (too much so?) when I made it myself and as a result didn’t appreciate it as much. Instead of dates, I used some of these that I had made and didn’t like (perhaps this is a bad starting place—using something I already don’t like as the foundation to another recipe?) and it just wasn’t the same. I don’t know how I could’ve expected it to be, under the circumstances.

Date Nut Balls, from a recipe that MAC gave me. These were good. Mr. Handsome adored them, actually. They are addictive—crunchy, chewy, caramelly, coconutty, yum-yum-yummy-yum-yummy.

Once again, it’s hard to tell what this is exactly, but I think it just might be a Caramelized-Nectarine Pie. I can tell because of the black boot lying there on the deck. I don’t think we liked this. There was too much crust and too little fruit and the fruit there was was bland.

Sour Cream Rum-Raisin Pie. This was a recent creation. We didn’t like it. The rum was too rummy, the raisins too raisiny, the meringue too meringue-y. But the concept was really neat so I have plans to play around with it. I have twenty-some quarts of raisins in the freezer, so I kind of have to find a good pie recipe. Any suggestions?

These are the Mini Pavlovas that I told you about. They were delicious.

Lemon Tea Cookies. I used to make these when I was a kid. Lemon-y and buttery and thin and crispy, these are very good. The dough is shaped into logs and then sliced, and each slice is topped with a sprinkling of sugar-lemon zest mixture before baking. They’re addictive.

Joy Cupcakes. These come from Joy the Baker. Overall, I haven’t been impressed with her recipes (though the honey-whole wheat cake I got from her has justified all the time I’ve spend skimming her posts), but this one, though a bit too time-consuming, was tasty. The process is simple: make a thin layer of gooey brownie in the bottom of a lined muffin tin (do not over-bake), freeze it, top with ice cream of your choosing (I used mint chocolate chip and butterscotch), freeze, and then top with a creamy ganache and freeze again.

Chocolate Truffles. I made several kinds, but in this picture you’re looking at rum-coconut. I wasn’t sold.

Shoofly Pie. This recipe came from The Pie and Pastry Bible and it involved coffee, cinnamon, and nutmeg, as well as molasses. It was quite exotic, but it wasn’t what I was looking for.

And that wraps it up for today. If you’re the type of person who puts on weight via your eyeballs, I’m sorry. And I’m sorry that you wasted valuable calories on such unspectacular food. Well, except for the pear tartin. That was worth every single calorie.

Next time I’ll post something with green in it. Maybe.

About one year ago: Reverse Cleaning.