Home, Making

Once again, we draw to the close of another California summer. Unlike last year at this time, we’re not moving – yet – but that’s coming. Boxes are half-packed, projects are wrapping up, priorities are shifting, and we’re hopeful about future endeavors. We’re about to hit the road again — and , yes – we’ve been saving toward to a trip to Scotland sometime this autumn. It doesn’t hurt to have something waiting in the wings, to anticipate. Without these things, life tends to be just a little … flat, somehow.

On D’s end of the world, projects have really changed. We’d made a commitment to actually move in the location of one of his work-sites, but felt we’d be better served by waiting for a different project to come along. Finger crossed, we’ll know something more today! It’s been strange for D. to have been on two projects already this year, but he’s hopeful that longer-term positions – with fewer corporate politics – are on the horizon.

Meanwhile, T., who started a novel to give herself a break from revising a different one, has finally finished the replacement novel… and, right now, likes it better. Her agent is both amused and ambivalent. “Okay, then, give me that one,” is his response. Meanwhile, during the polishing of various pages, the beginnings of three other novels have sprouted in her head… so many ideas, so little time, and so much pouting when it comes time for revisions. Typical, typical.

It has been a beautiful summer. Aside from the spike during the first week of July – which we spent in Baltimore, trying to breathe water – the weather has been a lovely thing. The nippy nighttime lows in the 40’s/10’s and the days in the balmy 70’s-80’s/high 10’s-20’s, has made the days roll past pleasantly. We’ve made sure to keep our California Residency Kits nice and updated by both mucking about in the dirt a little bit – our Garden Away From Home has produced tomatoes, lovely cucumbers, and a watermelon is getting to the proper size at last – and tie-dyeing a few things, as one does when one lives here. ☺ (T. was born in San Francisco. Some things just come with the territory.)

We have had fun exploring a new form of dyeing which includes ice. Very correct for summer, indeed! We took soda-ash treated fabric and crumpled the damp fabric on stacked racks in the sink. We piled on crushed ice onto the top layer until the fabric was entirely covered, and then sprinkled powdered dye in various spatterings all over it. It’s not exactly tie-dye, it’s a bit more random, especially with the effect of the dilution/dripping from the melting ice from one layer to the next. The combination of splotches, drips, and the sharper colors from the dye concentrate remind us of Monet’s blurry impressionistic pointillism. We’re looking forward to finding better surfaces and doing a big project like a set of sheets. (The porcelain sink really did not love us for mucking about in it, but oh, well. Onward!)

In the midst of our happy, there is a bit of sad giving us some perspective. T’s kid sister is stuck in the hospital this week with a failing kidney. This latest bump on the road to failure, while imminent for a long, long time, coincided with the first week of her senior year in high school, which is just a big, fat crock of crap. Usually a girl with a penumbra of attitude and energy that extends three feet in any direction, now she’s drained and exhausted — and suddenly looks pretty small, which is a hard dose of reality to her family and friends. We continue to keep our fingers crossed that bed rest and massive antibiotics will let her pull out just one more year of use out of her gimpy kidneys, so she can wave goodbye to high school in style.

While others cheer the return of school rooms or favorite TV shows, for us, autumn is about the house being cool enough to bake! We eyed Smitten Kitchen’s almond crisped peaches, but never managed to make them, as the peaches – so huge and lovely from the Dixon Fruit Market – have simply never lasted long enough in this house! That’s a recipe to come back to, however.

In early March, there was a round of medical visits which gave us some expected – but unwelcome – news – heredity strikes again. Our families on both sides tend toward diabetes, and though we’re largely healthy, our internal organs had been showing some signs of wear. In an effort to prepare for what the doctor’s prognosis of the inevitable, we’ve changed some of our dietary habits for good. What’s been missing from our diets for the last six months? Conspicuous consumption of carbohydrates.

…not fats. Some people are surprised by that, but we were not… we’ve had an inkling all along that it wasn’t the butter or the eggs but the sugar that was going to ding us in the end. It makes us a little grumpy to be right…:sigh:.

As everyone knows, changing any dietary habit is really difficult – but tinkering with one of the building blocks of the food group seemed, at first, pretty dire. The name of this blog, way back in – sheesh, 2004? – was “Wish I Were Baking.” It wasn’t “Wish I Were Steaming Kale,” although that’s a fairly awesome name if you’re not obsessed with getting the perfect rise from a loaf of artisan bread. There was a lot of mental adjustment that had to take place, we knew, if any changes were going to be successful. If you look at a required change in your life as a tragedy… you can forget about it happening. We firmly elected to still find things to enjoy.

With that attitude in hand, we’ve been relieved to discover that it’s not been very hard. (Faced with the choice of your liver and pancreas imploding in flames, or drinking unsweetened iced tea instead of soda, what choice would you make?) Not only that, we’re enjoying the challenge. Cooks and bakers have had hundreds and thousands of years to perfect baking with traditional ingredients – flours, sugars, etc. – but there’s a lot less out there about tasty, healthy low-carb ingredients. (Please note the preface “tasty” before “healthy.” There’s enough out there that does not include either of those two things, trust us.) We’ve been waiting eagerly for the days to cool a bit, before launching ourselves into baking again. We’ve made a few experimental forays – which we haven’t photographed.

We call those things that don’t get on camera “Learning Experiences.” There were The Waffles of Brickyness, when Axel was visiting, which were the heaviest things we’d ever eaten. We learned from that, of course; namely that coconut flour is ALL FIBER and must be used sparingly and with some gluten powder, for goodness sakes. Most recently, the Pear Tart of Awful was a completely unnecessary disaster – fresh pears, lemon zest, vanilla, almond flour… and a sneaky quarter teaspoon of xanthan gum some bright light decided to include. What is xanthan gum for? Not homemade pear tarts, T.. Next time, we’ll stick to adding it to the one recipe we bought it for. Ugh. A shame, when we’d even made it vegan and everything… :sigh: Time to repeat the Test Kitchen Mantra: We cook, we fail, we move on.

Of course, we can’t go on and on about the amusing failures without discussing the successes. The slightly crumbly pigs-in-blankets – we hadn’t quite learned how almond flour worked, but those were tasty, even if they didn’t quite stay together. And, Lemon tea cakes, anyone? Yes, please. Tender and fragrant and a perfect combination of citrus and sweet. Very tasty, and quick, which was fun. A “throw-it-together” banana bread also turned out well, which just proves that you can make banana bread anytime, anywhere, out of pretty much anything. We are pleased with the lift the quick breads have – a really nice crumb, so we’re encouraged to keep trying! Up next will be a made-over recipe for the date slice we loved so well in Scotland – aka a date bar. A short almond crust, chopped pecans, and dates… yum. We’re also eying a lemon poundcake made with coconut and almond flour – dense, moist, and citrussy heaven. And, once they’re almost foolproof, recipes to follow.

Not every dish can have the natural sweetness of dates or bananas – sometimes, you just need rich, bitter chocolate. Our experiments with sweeteners in that vein have been mixed. There are tons of sugar substitutes – sugar alcohols – on the market – but only a very few which do not cause gastric distress in the amounts used in baking. However, we’ve had success in mixing a little bit of this, and a little bit of that – a blend of stevia and erythritol, the sugar substitute popular in Japanese cuisine, has seemed to work well thus far. Interestingly, erythritol isn’t all that sweet – it’s about 70% as sweet as sugar. However! With the addition of vanilla, one can trick the brain into thinking it’s eating something much sweeter. (We got this tip from a recent issue of Nature.) All these experiments and recipe makeovers are a work in progress, and the amount of small successes we’ve had has encouraged us to try bigger things… like that pear tart. :shudder: Well, we’re not fans of the idea of a “test kitchen” for nothing…

Our best “discovery” has been almond flour – it is lovely and nutty – completely gluten free, and very low in carbohydrate. A couple tablespoons of vital wheat gluten helps it lift in quick breads or biscuits, and a little lemon zest gives it interest – it seems to need a little citrus punch to keep it from being too nutty/sweet – but we’ve not managed to figure out how to use it for yeast breads – and that’s okay. Perfection probably shouldn’t be messed with, so we’re looking forward to turning out the perfect, crusty loaf of sourdough rye – and learning to sprout our own grain – and just eating our daily bread sparingly, with gratitude.

Truly: with gratitude. We’re down a few pounds, and feeling healthy. We have options. We have optimism, creativity and stamina, and a lot of garbage bags. We’re going to be just fine.

Nothing but blue skies ahead – and full ovens, soon. Happy autumn.