Musings, Recipes, Just Thinking...

Tags: baking, kitchen, scone, scones

"Hope springs eternal in the human breast..." (A. Pope, An Essay on Man)

We never had any winter this year. Oh, we had a few below-zero days sometime back last December, but they were followed immediately by balmy days of 50 degrees. A few decent snows covered the ground, but melted within a few days: I never even got out my silk longjohns. The toboggan stayed tucked in the shed; ice skating would have looked like walking on water. No winter at all.

But here in early March, the breezes whisper, "Spring!" And I get all excited, even though we haven't earned spring: we didn't pay any winter dues. My daughter walks me around her yard, pointing out the spot for the pumpkins, the zucchini, and the new apple tree. I get excited about her yard, and then I think about mine.

When I get home, I'll buy the fencing material to properly foil the hungry deer. I'll start my seedlings in the basement early this year. I'll move those purple raspberry canes to their permanent position. Maybe I'll even get some lettuce and spinach seeds planted.

And anything I don't quite get to this spring I can probably...

Tags: garden, spring, weather

“Give thanks with a grateful heart…” So begins the song we sang at the community thanksgiving concert. I sang along with the crowd; it’s a song I know well, so I could sing it without paying too much attention. Yes, I am indeed thankful, and often give thanks to the Lord for His amazing goodness to me. And I try to give thanks often to others.

            But this morning, the day before Thanksgiving Day, the words are running through my head again. “Give thanks—with a grateful heart…” Well, with what other kind of heart would I give thanks?

            As I dumped ingredients for homemade bread into my mixing bowl, I considered that. And in all honesty, I must admit I have often said, “thank you” with a thoughtless heart, just because it was expected of me. I know I have also said “thank you” with an annoyed heart: I didn’t want that as a gift—now I’ll have to return it, or keep it around so they...

Tags: attitude, heart, thankfulness, thanks, thanksgiving

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

This recipe is adapted only slightly from the original, received from my dear sister Barb Cash and her friend Laura, in the summer of 2011.

3 C. flour

1 1/2 T. cinnamon

1/4 t. nutmeg

1 1/2 C. sugar

1 1/2 t. baking soda

1/2 t. baking powder

1/4 t. salt

1/3 C. flax meal

2 eggs

3/4 C. water

2 T. butter, melted

3/4 C. real chocolate chips

1 15 oz. can 100% pumpkin, or 2 c. fresh, cooked pumpkin or squash

        Preheat oven to 350°.  Line 12 muffin tins with paper, or spray with nonstick spray.

Mix flour, sugar, baking soda, spices, baking powder and salt. Mix eggs, water, pumpkin, and butter. Fold into dry mixture; stir in chocolate chips and pour into muffin pans.  Top with more sugar, chips and walnuts., if desired.                  

Bake for 20 minutes, or just until a toothpick inserted in center of muffin comes out...

Tags: cooking, muffins, pumpkin, recipe

It has been raining for days. Forty-five degrees--that sounds like an angle, not a temperature--and wet. As I sit in my kitchen, watching out the window for my son to arrive, the rain drips off the mimosa branches. Occasionally the branches dip and sway as a new shower tosses them with cold water. 

Inside, the coffee smells good. Snow apples sit in my apple-green bowl, and ripe fall peaches in the orange one. These days, I am a working woman, and love my job. But I revel in the scarce moments of sitting still in the kitchen, grounded back to domesticity by small things: the apples, the peaches, the warm golden oak of my grandma's kitchen table the fruits sit on.

Domesticity has changed its appearance a little since we ate at home almost every night. Supper tonight will bend to various schedules. The evening's venue will not be our kitchen, actually: in my husband's office, but for a rare treat, four of the original five of us will eat it together before church.

The thought of our family's bending tonight makes me smile: we can work this out.  And besides, it's raining and chilly out! That will make our time together extra warm...

Tags: family, rain, supper

Yesterday I put my watch on. All day long I knew what time it was. I have a very nice watch: a Bulova from the early eighties with an oval dial and hands that rotate from one number to the next. If it runs down, I wind it.

         Wearing a watch is not particularly noteworthy, though these days many people just use their cell phones. But I wear my watch every day, during the school year. When school was out in May, I took it off. Of course, we have at least one clock in every room of the house, the computer registers the hour, and I do have my own personal cell phone, so I realized that even without my watch, I would usually know what time it was.

         I still enjoyed the few times when someone would say, “What time is it?” and I could say, “I don’t have my watch on.”

         Yesterday I worked all day in the kitchen at our church’s young adults’ retreat, and reluctantly decided I might be glad to know easily what time it was. I wound the watch at 5 AM, and its gentle tick started right up as...

In the dark of the morning after the historic December blizzard, 2009, I received a message from a young friend on a family trip to New York city. "Just had a snowball fight with hundreds of people in Times Square! It doesn't get any better than this!" I smiled at that, knowing that was a memory she would cherish forever: very cool, very unique.

I shut the computer, laced up my boots, pulled on my mittens, and called to Penny. "Let's take our walk, Penn."  She leaped ahead of me into the still-sleepy duskiness of dawn. We tromped through fresh soft snow, breathing in the cold air, hearing around us the sounds of silence.

"I don't know," I said to Penny, who bounded toward me through the deep white stuff. "All in all, I think I'll choose a morning walk in Lucernemines over Times Square any day. It doesn't get any better than this."

Tags: dawn, snow, walk