You know me well

My manuscript is due on June 1.  Hello from the Cave - or, as I first typed, "Hell from the Cave," which has a nice slasher-movie ring to it.  Hi.

For those keeping track, no, you are not crazy: the book was supposed to be due in March.  I had to ask for an extension, unfortunately, because of the small human under my shirt who makes me very tired, and because there’s been a difficult health situation in my family.  2012 came in roaring, and though I wish it would settle down and start acting its age, I doubt it’s going to.  I am, however, going to FINISH THIS BOOK.  If I can stay awake long enough.

Each night, when I get into bed, I’ve been reading a few pages of Nina Planck.  Her books were recommended to me by a couple of you, and clearly, you know me well.  For obvious reasons, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what I eat and why, and Planck’s defense of traditional whole foods like butter, eggs, and meat feels intuitive to me.  It’s been a nice, sensible way to close out my long days. (And so, I should note, has Friday Night Lights, which I just finished.  I miss Tim Riggins already.  I’m not proud to have fallen for the brooding-hunk routine, but I’m willing to own it.  I would also be willing, for the record, to watch an entire hour of close-ups of Taylor Kitsch’s lips, if the producers of the show ever decide to make a Best of Tim Riggins’s Makeout Scenes DVD.)

In any case, I was doing some research the other day, looking up granola bar recipes for a forthcoming Spilled Milk episode.  When I came across one on Smitten Kitchen, it leapt out at me - not only because it made a chewy granola bar, which I like, and because it came from Deb, who knows her way around a kitchen, but mostly because I loved the no-nonsense ingredients: oats, nuts, nut butter, dried fruits, butter, honey, and very little else.  The list of ingredients resonated with much of what I’ve been reading in Planck’s book, and that sealed the deal.  I decided to try it.  Of course, I did add chocolate.  Let’s be clear about that.

I love these granola bars.  They straddle the line between nutritious afternoon pick-me-up, which I’ve been needing lately, and dessert, which I never really need but want anyway.  For the most part, I followed Deb’s recipe - which she, in turn, adapted from King Arthur Flour - but I tailored the flavorings to suit my tastes.  For a nut, I used pecans, because I like them in granola.  I also threw in some big flakes of coconut.  And some dried cherries, though only a few.  (I don’t like a lot of fruit in my granola.)  And the chocolate.  I grew up on packaged granola bars with chocolate chips, and you know how I’ve come to feel about granola with chocolate, so it felt natural to throw in some chocolate chips that had been kicking around in the cupboard.  I didn’t bother to chop anything, not even the pecan halves, and I was glad for it later.  I liked all the lumps and bumps.  The whole process took less than an hour, most of which was oven time, and 72 hours later, only a couple of bars are left.  Brandon has been eating them for breakfast, and I took two to Matthew, and you can figure out the rest.  I’m already planning another batch.


Chewy Granola Bars with Pecans, Chocolate, and Cherries
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

For my first go at this recipe, I used ½ cup (100 grams) sugar.  That amount yielded a balanced, mildly sweet bar, but whenever I got a bite with cherries or chocolate, I wished that the base mixture were even a little less sweet.  Next time, I’ll try cutting the sugar back to 1/3 cup (67 grams).  Oh, and I should tell you that I used unrefined cane sugar.  Like this.  It’s what we use at Delancey, and over the past year, I’ve been using it more and more at home.  I find it to be 100% interchangeable with regular white sugar.

Also, I might leave out the cinnamon next time.  Maybe.  It’s nice, but there’s already a lot of good stuff going on in here.

For chocolate, I used Ghirardelli 60% chocolate chips, but you could chop up and use any chocolate you like, preferably bittersweet.  And if you’re confused by the thought of coconut chips, as I’ve been in the past, they’re the big, flat flakes. (Here’s a photograph.)  Last, you don’t have to use the pecan-coconut-chocolate-cherry flavor combination that I chose, of course.  You’re welcome to use a mixture of any fruits and/or nuts you want, ideally 2 to 3 cups in all.

2 cups (190 grams) quick-cooking oats, divided
1/3 cup (67 grams) to ½ cup (100 grams) sugar (see above)
1 cup (110 grams) raw pecan halves
½ cup (25 grams) unsweetened coconut chips
½ cup (85 grams) chocolate chips or chopped chocolate of similar size
¼ cup (40 grams) dried cherries
½ tsp. fine salt
¼ tsp. ground cinnamon (optional)
1/3 cup (85 grams) peanut butter
1 tsp. vanilla extract
6 Tbsp. (85 grams) unsalted butter, melted
6 Tbsp. (120 grams) honey
1 Tbsp. water

Preheat the oven to 350°F.  Lightly butter an 8-inch square baking pan, or grease it with cooking spray. Cut a rectangle of parchment paper to line the bottom and two sides of the dish, leaving a little overhang.  Press the parchment paper into the dish.  Lightly grease the parchment paper.

Put 1/3 cup (30 to 35 grams) of the quick-cooking oats in the bowl of a food processor.  Process until finely ground.

In a large bowl, stir together the remaining 1 2/3 cup oats, ground oats, sugar, pecans, coconut chips, chocolate chips, dried cherries, salt, and, if using, cinnamon.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the peanut butter, vanilla extract, melted butter, honey, and water. Pour the wet ingredients over the dry ingredients, and stir well, until the mixture is evenly moistened. Transfer to the prepared pan, pressing the mixture firmly to ensure that it molds to the shape of the pan. (A piece of plastic wrap helps: just lay it over the pan before you begin pressing.  Much less stickiness.)

Bake the bars for about 30 minutes, or until they’re brown around the edges and just beginning to color on top, too.  (I set a timer for 25 minutes and began checking on them at that point, and I was surprised to find that they were already browning at the edges.  I left them in, however, for another 5 minutes or so, until the tops had a hint of color.)  The mixture will still seem soft and almost underbaked if you press on it, but it’ll set as it cools.

Transfer the pan to a rack, and allow the bars to cool completely in the pan.  When cool, run a sharp knife along the edges of the pan; then pull up on the parchment paper to lift the sheet of bars out of the pan.  Cut the bars into squares.  Or, heck, rectangles.  Whatever you want.

Note:  I let my bars cool for a number of hours, and they cut very neatly, but I noticed that some commenters on Deb’s post mentioned issues with crumbling.  Here’s what she suggested:  If your bars seem crumbly, refrigerate them in the pan for 30 minutes to further set them, and then try cutting them while cold.

Another note: I stored my bars on a cutting board wrapped in plastic wrap, but if you’d like to put them in an airtight container, consider layering them between sheets of wax paper, so they don’t stick to one another.  In hot weather, you might need to refrigerate them.

Yield: 16 squares

No such thing

Earlier this week, I think it was, one of you kindly wrote to me, asking if I might do a post about what I’ve been eating for lunch lately. The reader who wrote to me is pregnant, and there are a number of foods that us pregnant ladies are told to avoid, making quick, easy lunches hard to come by: no deli meats, no (uncooked) cured meats, no high-mercury fish (tuna, for example), no cheeses of certain types, and so on. I am going to spare you, however, a post on what I’ve been eating at my desk lately, because my lunches are about as riveting as C-SPAN. The post would go something like this: nut butter sandwich, carrots, tangerine, nut butter sandwich, carrots, tangerine, nut butter sandwich, carrots, tangerine, hard-boiled egg, bowl of soup, nut butter sandwich, carrots, tangerine, and if you are still awake at this point, you win a pound cake.

A pistachio pound cake. With citrus.

I haven’t found myself with much time for cooking lately, or not outside of recipe testing for my manuscript, but this cake caught my eye as I was thumbing through the latest issue of Bon Appétit. The merest mention of the word “pistachio” can turn my head, and not surprisingly, this cake shot to the top of my to-do list, above more sensible tasks like making spinach-cilantro soup or poaching chicken for salad. This, for the record, is how a 33-year-old woman winds up lunching on nut butter sandwiches and carrot sticks, the official midday meal of American first graders. I blame the editor at Bon Appétit who, as the headnote explained, ate this pound cake at a restaurant in Houston and declared it her “dream dessert.” You can’t use words like that and expect people to go on living their lives as though nothing had happened, as though there were not a pistachio pound cake recipe to be tried.

So one night last weekend, I baked a pistachio pound cake. It should be called a pistachio-citrus pound cake, really, because it contains juice and zest from three different citrus fruits. The basic batter is classic pound cake - plenty of butter, sugar, eggs, and flour - but into that go fresh lemon juice, fresh orange juice (or juice from a Pixie tangerine, if you happen to have some on hand; I highly recommend it), some zest from that same orange (or Pixie tangerine), and some zest from a lime. Then you fold in a generous dose of coarsely chopped pistachios, scoop the batter into its loaf pan, and put another generous dose of pistachios on top. Actually, I should warn you: it may seem as though you have too much chopped pistachio to cram onto the top of the cake, but you must persevere. There’s no such thing as too much pistachio.

Like other pound cakes I’ve made, this one bakes for a while (about 90 minutes) in a low-to-moderate oven, which is convenient, because it gives you time to redeem yourself by cooking something nutritious - or, if you prefer, to rest your feet and nurture your two-decades-long fascination with Sexy Frankenstein, also known as Jonny Greenwood, by reading that Radiohead story in the current Rolling Stone. Meanwhile, the house will fill with the scent of toasted pistachio and orange, heady and almost exotic. When you open the oven door to check on your cake, you’ll be rewarded with the sight of a tall, pistachio-crusted, perfectly browned loaf. I’ve done a lot of baking, and I can’t remember another time when I felt so giddy or so proud as I pulled a cake out of the oven. It’s a handsome thing.

We ate the cake plain, in sturdy slices, for breakfast or after lunch, and while it was very good right away, it gets even better, more delicate, once the flavors settle for a day. Like a proper pound cake, it’s firm and buttery, but it gets a gentle lift from the citrus, both in flavor and in fragrance, and then, behind it, there comes the deep, toasty, rumbling flavor of the pistachios. It’s an ideal afternoon cake. If I were going to dress it up for company, I might cut up some strawberries, soften them in a little sugar, and heap them on top of a slice, maybe with some lightly whipped cream - or, wait, even better, just spoon on some strawberry conserve. Or I might do nothing at all.


Pistachio-Citrus Pound Cake
Adapted slightly from Bon Appétit (April 2012) and Raymond Vandergaag of The Tasting Room at CityCentre

2 cups (260 grams) all-purpose flour
1 ½ tsp. kosher salt
1 tsp. baking powder
2 sticks (226 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 cups (400 grams) sugar
5 large eggs
2 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
2 Tbsp. fresh orange juice
2 tsp. finely grated orange zest
1 tsp. finely grated lime zest
1 cup (125 grams) shelled, unsalted pistachios, coarsely chopped

Position a rack in the middle of the oven, and preheat the oven to 325°F. Lightly butter a 9”x5” loaf pan, or grease it with cooking spray. Cut a rectangle of parchment paper to line the bottom and the two long sides of the pan, leaving a little overhang. Press the parchment paper into the dish, and grease it lightly, too.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and baking powder. Using an electric mixer, beat the butter on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add the sugar, and beat until well incorporated, 1 to 2 minutes more. Add the eggs one at a time, beating to blend between additions. Add the juices and the zests, and beat until well combined. (Don’t worry if the batter looks curdled.) Add the flour mixture, reduce the speed to low, and beat until just incorporated. Add ¾ cup of the pistachios, and fold in gently. Pour the batter into the prepared pan, smoothing the top. Sprinkle the remaining ¼ cup pistachios over the top.

Bake the cake, rotating it halfway through, until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean, about 1 ½ hours. Transfer it to a wire rack, and let it cool completely in the pan. Run a sharp knife along the short ends of the pan to loosen the cake; then pull up on the parchment paper to lift the cake out of the pan.

Note: The flavor of this cake is best on the day after it’s made.

Yield: 8 to 12 servings, depending on how thickly you slice it.

P.S. True story, and yes: a bar (probably) in July + a baby (probably) in September = we are nuts. But happy.

P.P.S. It’s a girl(!).

The first night

Hi from here.




I should clarify: not here exactly. These photos were taken at our dinner table, but I’m currently sitting at my desk. I would much rather be there than here. Oh well.




These shots are from the first night of 2012, with our friends Ben, Bonnie, and Sam. We had wanted to go crabbing and catch our New Year’s dinner ourselves, but Ben and Brandon wound up with food poisoning on New Year’s Eve, so we decided to scale back the plan. We bought the crabs instead. We cooked them and cleaned them and heaped them in a bowl, and then we covered the table with garbage bags and set out cutting boards, crab picks, and ice cream scoops-cum-crab mallets. That, plus couple of baguettes, and we had a feast.




And this afternoon, that’s where my head is.




Wherever yours is, I hope you’re well.

The best part of the job

I am supposed to be writing a manuscript, not baking rye crumble bars. No more rye crumble bars no more rye crumble bars no more rye crumble bars no more rye crumble bars no more rye crumble bars.




When I found out that I was pregnant, I asked my publisher to extend my deadline, which was supposed to be March 1. I wasn’t sure how ill I would feel, but I’d heard plenty of pregnant lady horror stories, and I thought it was best to plan for the worst. Happily, I wasn’t very ill, but I was very unproductive. I was very, very tired. One morning, when the alarm was going off and I showed no signs of movement, Brandon checked to make sure I was still breathing.

I am pleased to report that I am no longer that tired. I am less pleased to report that I will be living at my desk for several weeks to come. But I’m also sort of excited about it. After a year of feeling like I was mostly writing around the story, alternating between panic and elation and panic and elation and desperately needing a beer, I feel like I’m finally inside of it. I can see the story differently in here, and I’m finding a lot that I didn’t know about: details, ideas, explanations, a number of stupid jokes (which will hopefully improve before publication). This, to me, is the best part of the job: the way that the act of writing often shows me, for the first time, what was there all along. I could say a lot more about that, but all I really should say is THANK YOU, UNIVERSE, FOR SAVING ME, and then get back to work.




You, however, can bake some rye crumble bars. The recipe for these comes from Kim Boyce’s terrific Good to the Grain, and I stumbled upon it last week, at the end of a good day, while looking for a way to use up some rye flour I had bought. I’d bought the flour for a different recipe, a recipe that I wound up not liking, and I don’t know how things go in your house, but in mine, rye flour will not disappear of its own accord. So I got out Kim Boyce’s book, because it’s yet to fail me, and boom, the streak continues.

This recipe might look a little daunting, time-wise, because it consists of three parts: the shortbread crust, the crumble topping, and, in between, the jam. I didn’t have a lot of time to spend in the kitchen, so I took Boyce’s advice and made mine over the course of a couple of days, as the moments presented themselves, and stashed the components in the fridge until I was ready to assemble the whole thing. Basically, you make a quick shortbread dough from a mixture of rye flour and all-purpose, and then you press that evenly into a pan. (I did a notably crappy job of this, because I was rushing to make a phone date with my mother, and my pressed-out dough wound up looking less like a pastry crust and more like a gently rolling sand dune. But it came out fine.) You bake the crust until it’s firm, and then you spread jam - you slather jam, actually; you’re using quite a lot - over the crust. Then you top the jam with a crumble made from oats, both flours, two types of sugar, and melted butter, and you slide the pan back into the oven.

Judging by the ingredients, I knew that the bars would be tasty, but the result was even better than I could have expected. I tend to think of rye in the context of rye bread with caraway seeds, which have a strong, sour flavor; I forget how subtle and sweet the flour itself is. It’s nutty, almost malty. I like rye bread, but rye crumble bars have nothing to do with it. Anything with a shortbread base and a crumble topping is bound to taste good, unless you fill the space in between with wood putty, but it’s the sweet, toasty rye flour that makes this recipe, and the way the sweet, toasty rye flour tastes with butter. I filled my crumble bars with a homemade mirabelle plum jam that a friend sent us last spring, and while I doubt it gets any better than that, I’m also eager to try a batch with apricot jam, or maybe strawberry. But there’s work to do first.


Rye Crumble Bars with Jam
Adapted slightly from Good to the Grain, by Kim Boyce

For this recipe, I used Bob’s Red Mill dark rye flour. You can also buy light rye flour, in which some parts of the grain have been removed before milling, but Boyce suggests the dark type, which has a deeper, nuttier flavor, and I second her recommendation.

As for jam, choose any one you like, but make sure that it has a good level of brightness and acidity. That’ll help it hold up to the richness of the buttery crust. Also, if you come up a little short, don’t worry. I only had 1 ¼ cups, not 1 ½ cups, and it was no problem.

Shortbread crust:
65 grams (½ cup) dark rye flour
120 grams (1 cup) all-purpose flour
50 grams (1/3 cup) dark brown sugar
½ tsp. kosher salt
113 grams (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Crumble:
100 grams (1 cup) rolled oats
32 grams (3 Tbsp.) dark brown sugar
52 grams (¼ cup plus 2 Tbsp.) dark rye flour
30 grams (¼ cup) all-purpose flour
38 grams (3 Tbsp.) sugar
1 tsp. kosher salt
85 grams (6 Tbsp.) unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly

To assemble:
350 ml (1 ½ cups) jam, preserves, or fruit butter

Set a rack in the middle of the oven, and preheat to 275°F. Rub a 9-inch springform pan with butter, or grease with cooking spray.

To make the shortbread crust, combine the flours, sugar, and salt in a large bowl, and whisk to mix well. Add the melted butter and vanilla extract, and stir until thoroughly combined. (I found the mixture a little dry at first, so I put my hand in and squeezed and massaged a bit to bring the dough together.) Using your hands, press the dough evenly into the bottom of the prepared pan. Put the pan in the freezer for 30 minutes, while you make the crumble. [Or, if you’re doing this step ahead of time, wrap the pan in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge or freezer. If it’s in the fridge, just remember to transfer it to the freezer for 30 minutes before baking.]

To make the crumble, put all of the crumble ingredients except the melted butter into the bowl of a food processor, and pulse until the oats are partially ground, about 5 or 10 seconds. Pour the mixture into a bowl. Add the melted butter and stir with your hands, squeezing the mixture as you stir to create small crumbly bits. Set aside. [Or, if you’re doing this step ahead of time, wrap the bowl in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge. Take it out about 30 minutes before using, and if needed, use a fork to break up any giant clumps that have hardened.]

Bake the frozen shortbread until pale brown and firm when touched, about 50 to 55 minutes. Remove from the oven, and raise the oven temperature to 350°F.

To assemble the bars, spread the jam over the shortbread crust, and then top with the crumble, evenly sprinkling it over the surface and squeezing bits of it together to create irregular nubs. Bake for 50 to 55 minutes, or until golden brown on top, rotating the pan halfway through for even baking.

When the pan is cool enough to handle but still warm, run a sharp knife around the edge of the pan to loosen any jam that may have stuck. Remove the ring. Completely (or mostly, anyway) cool the bars on the pan base before cutting into wedges.

Note: These bars are best when eaten in fairly short order. After three days or so, the flavors taste less clear.

Yield: Boyce says 10 wedges, but these bars are rich, so I’d say more than that. Maybe 12 to 16 wedges, depending on the size you choose.

This is important

You people. YOU PEOPLE.

I’m still blinking in disbelief at the kindness you’ve shared with me and Brandon and Tiny Person Under My Shirt. I hate secrets, and this secret, no matter how well intentioned, surprised me with how heavy it felt, how unwieldy it was to carry around. It’s been a relief to to share it with you, and an unexpected thrill to have it met with such encouragement and excitement. I should have gotten pregnant a long time ago, just for the morale boost! Thank you for that.

In return, I give you a waffle.




Initially, I planned to give you some orange buns, and then I planned to give you these seeded breadsticks that my mom used to make, and then I considered a rye cake with muscovado sugar and apples. But I’ve been having what I think you could safely call a month of totally mediocre cooking. Totally mediocre baking, I mean. (Totally mediocre ability to complete a thought, also.) Actually, I was starting to think that there must be some old wives’ tale about pregnant women baking with yeast, something akin to the one that says that menstruating women can’t make mayonnaise. (Note: despite the contents of the previous sentence, this is not going to turn into a blog about the female reproductive system. I don’t always know what this blog is about, but I feel confident ruling that out.) Then, this past Monday, I made a batch of yeasted buckwheat waffles, and boom, the streak was broken. Marion Cunningham is, now and forever, the solution to every problem.




Marion Cunningham’s yeasted waffle recipe is a tried-and-true for me, and I first wrote about it, in exuberant terms, close to two years ago. Her waffle is perfect. It’s crisp and crunchy on the outside, but inside, the crumb is tender, speckled with tiny air holes, and slightly, pleasingly damp (if I can use that word without causing you to think instantly of basements and mildew and the pair of jeans that you took out of the dryer and put on while they were still warm and only realized weren’t actually dry once you had your shoes on.) There’s a decent amount of butter in the batter, and between that and the yeast, you wind up with a lot of flavor - rich and lightly sweet, but also deep somehow, a little interesting. I knew all of that couple of years ago, but what I didn’t know until recently is how adaptable these waffles are, how readily they would welcome other flours and flavors.




I have a sweet tooth, and it’s only gotten larger in the past couple of months. I have alternately addressed this problem with Graeter’s ice cream - now available in Seattle! At Fred Meyer! And some QFCs, I hear! - Cadbury Mini Eggs, a few donuts, and, in moments of restraint and sanity, a teacup of plain yogurt with jam or honey stirred in. In the interest of exercising some degree of control over how much sugar and other ridiculous nonsense I ingest, I’ve been increasingly trying to make my sweets at home, and to make them with a variety of flours, not just the usual white. I’ve been doing my favorite banana bread (the one in my first book) with a third or half whole wheat flour, which gives a nice, nutty flavor, and I’ve been playing around with pancakes and waffles, too. None of it is rocket science or wheel-reinventing; it’s the kind of tinkering that I think we all do sometimes, to feel better about the way we eat. But when I made a buckwheat version of Marion Cunningham’s classic overnight yeasted waffle, I knew I had to tell you about it.

I have long believed that buckwheat plus maple syrup is a union that cannot be improved upon, but I am now prepared to go on record as saying that buckwheat plus maple syrup plus yeast plus a waffle iron is even better. The outside of a yeasted buckwheat waffle, where it crisps against the iron, gets toasty and almost caramelized. It’s a little savory, and when the maple syrup comes along, it feels especially welcome, especially right. You could put the maple syrup on top of the waffle, the usual way, but I like to put it in a puddle on the side of the plate instead, and then pick up the waffle with my hand - this is very important - and drag it and sort of smash it through the syrup, and then take a bite, and then drag it again, and take another bite, and so on. You probably will get syrup on your hand. You will not be sorry.


Yeasted Buckwheat Waffles
Adapted from Marion Cunningham's The Breakfast Book

This batter requires an overnight rest, so keep that in mind when you decide to make it! Most of the work is done the night before, and that requires some planning, but you’ll be amply rewarded in the morning.

This recipe uses active dry yeast, which should not be confused with instant (also sold as “rapid rise”) yeast. And as for the warm water and warm milk, they need not be very warm. Tepid is fine. In any case, it’s better to err on the cool side than the hot side. The most recent time I made this recipe, I actually didn't warm the milk at all, and it was absolutely okay. The only thing to watch out for with cold milk, though, is that it could re-solidify the melted butter. So if you happen not to warm your milk, for whatever reason, just do as I did: briefly mix together the milk, salt, sugar, and flours, and then stir in the melted butter bit by bit. This way, the cold milk and melted butter don’t run straight into each other and make trouble.

I use one-third buckwheat flour here, and that seems just about right. A word of caution: I wouldn’t use too much buckwheat flour in this recipe, because buckwheat flour is gluten-free, and you need a certain amount of gluten for structure. I’m sure there are other recipes, though, for making gluten-free buckwheat waffles, should you wish to.

Most waffle recipes work in any kind of waffle maker, but I think this one was made ideally for use on a standard (not Belgian) waffle maker. Mine is Belgian-style, and the batter is a bit too thin to really fill it properly. It’s not a biggie, though. The finished waffles just look prettier on one side than the other.

120 ml (½ cup) warm water
7 grams (1 package; 2 ¼ tsp.) active dry yeast
475 ml (2 cups) whole milk, warmed
113 grams (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
1 tsp. kosher salt
1 tsp. sugar
170 grams (1 1/3 cups) all-purpose flour
85 grams (2/3 cup) buckwheat flour
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
¼ tsp. baking soda

Pour the water into a large mixing bowl. (The batter will rise to double its volume, so keep that in mind when you choose the bowl.) Sprinkle the yeast over the water, and let stand to dissolve, about 5 minutes. Then add the milk, butter, salt, sugar, and flours, and stir well, until smooth. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and let it stand overnight at room temperature.

When you're ready to cook the waffles, preheat a waffle maker. Follow your waffle maker’s instruction manual for this, but you’ll probably want to heat it on whichever setting is approximately medium-high. My waffle maker has a heat dial that runs from 1 to 7, and I turn it to 5. My waffle maker is nonstick, so I don’t grease it, and Marion Cunningham doesn’t call for greasing it, either.

Just before cooking the waffles, add the eggs and baking soda to the yeasted batter, and stir to mix well. The batter will be very thin. Pour an appropriate amount of batter into your hot waffle maker: this amount will vary from machine to machine, and you should plan to use your first waffle as a test specimen, which you get the treat of eating while you cook the rest. Cook until golden and crisp.

Yield: I wind up with 12 Belgian waffles, but yield depends on the size and configuration of your waffle iron

September 4

Hi.

I’ve never made an announcement like this before, and it feels very awkward and shouty to do it through a computer screen, so please be nice and pretend that we’re sitting in your living room. I’ll give you a minute to get settled.

The thing is, I’ve been working on my manuscript, yes, yes, but I’ve also been working on something else. That something else has made it difficult, actually, to work on my manuscript, because it’s made me want to lie on the couch instead, eating peanut butter sandwiches and fantasizing about donuts. I know it doesn’t look like much, but it’s there, under my shirt. I’ll give you a hint. It’s a baby.




I’m 13 weeks along, and if all goes according to plan, we will meet this baby sometime around September 4. That means that we will likely be a family of three Virgos. Pray for us.

Wanting to be parents is a recent development for us. I’ve never been into babies, though I can already tell that my own baby will be a very different story. But what I’m most excited about is getting to know the person that we made. I’m excited about introducing this person to chocolate malts, and pizza, and Bruce Springsteen. I’m excited to read When the Sky Is Like Lace with this person, the way my dad read it with me. I’m excited about getting to know Brandon as a parent. I’m excited about getting to know myself as a parent. I’m ready, and I’m not at all ready, but more than anything, I just feel lucky to get to have this experience.

For the past couple of months, whenever I’ve been out and about, driving or sitting at a stoplight, I catch myself staring at people on the street, and sometimes even at their pets, thinking, "Hey, that guy with the facial tattoo was once a baby! That nice-looking older gentleman has a mother, and she gave birth to him! That dog was once an embryo! That woman in the pant suit used to be inside another woman’s uterus!" Pregnancy has turned me into Jack Handey, and I’ve hardly even started yet.

Here we go.

Dear World,

I am writing to you, once again, from my friend Ben’s dining room.




When I was here last August, writing my brains out, I had a hunch that a return visit might be helpful before my manuscript deadline. Turns out, that was correct.




In Ohio, there are no Brandons to distract me, no Delanceys to worry about, no Jacks or Alices to bark suddenly at absolutely nothing and, boom, scare the organs out of my body.




In Ohio, there is just a Ben and his nearly empty house, and a twin bed under the eaves with my name on it, next to a window onto which the previous tenant’s child stuck two butterfly decals. My first day in town turned out to be his first day off in a month, so we celebrated with a lunch excursion into Cleveland, to Balaton. We were seated by a nicely dressed older gentleman who watched over the place from a table in the corner. Between tasks, he ate slices of red apple out of a bowl. An elderly lady with dyed black hair and polyester pants came in shortly after we did, and the gentleman seated her at the next table over. They exchanged greetings in Hungarian, and he helped her out of her coat. Then he brought her a glass of red wine, filled perilously to the rim, and a cup of bean and dumpling soup. She was so quiet and careful, deftly angling her spoon to slice the raft of smoked sausage that floated on top, and watching her, we decided to order two cups of the same. So we ate that, and then we shared a plate of cabbage rolls stuffed with beef and pork and rice (on a bed of sauerkraut!), a small order of schnitzel with more dumplings (in gravy!), and a slice of chestnut torte, and never before, in the history of Cleveland, were there two more contented people. Then we drove home, and now: I WORK.




While I do that:

- Ira Glass gives props to Radiolab! This came out last fall, but I recently reread it, and I love what Glass has to say about storytelling, journalism, and sound. (Also highly recommended: the recent This American Life show on immigration.)

- Each time I get in the car and turn on the radio, this is what I hope to hear. Or this. The transformation is now complete: I am a middle-aged man.

- This is on the to-make list. Someday.

- A favorite old post from my friend Sarah’s blog.

- I can’t stop drinking Rachel’s ginger beer. Ideally in a tall glass, with plenty of ice and a straw. Rachel used to work with us at Delancey, so I am biased, but still, really, don’t miss it.

- My fondness for Stevie Nicks is well documented on this site, and several months ago, one of you kindly wrote to share this video of Stevie singing a demo version of "Wild Heart." Have I linked to it before? Yes? Well, I’m doing it again. It's goosebump material.

- Kate Christensen's blog. Beautiful, beautiful writing. (Via Winnie.)

- Brandon’s grandfather is a whiz at The Pig Song. I hope Brandon learns to sing it someday.

- I used to ride horses as a kid, and the performance of the US equestrian team in the 1984 Olympics was a powerful inspiration to me. I remember being at a show once where Joe Fargis was a judge, or something, and I was sufficiently awestruck that you would have thought he was Michael Jackson. I stopped riding fifteen years ago, and honestly, I don't think about it much, but I recently stumbled upon a video of that Olympic performance, and as I sat there watching Fargis and Touch of Class, I caught myself tearing up. I’m an old sap, no question, but there’s something to it: two athletes at the top of their game, one horse and one human, both doing what they clearly love to do.

- Jess’s Teddie’s apple cake. I’d like a slice today.

Talk to you soon.