Reflections on a (Baking) Season

Winter Cardinal  via strawberryluna

The children were nustled all snug in their beds/

While visions of sugarplums danced in their heads

To this day, I do not know what the hell sugarplums are. (Oh wait, I just googled them; those look delicious.) Nonetheless, that line in "The Night Before Christmas" has always brought warmth to me. I can't tell you how many nights I fall into an exhausted sleep while images of lattice pie crust and biscuits and crumble topping and cinnamon-sugar sprinkles float in and out of my mind. Last night's reflections got me thinking that this season is unique in that way. 

Never before have I been able to so freely express myself with food. I feel like I'm now able to translate my passion into something concrete - more concrete than poetry or music or feelings shared after a few cocktails - and it feels so liberating. I feel like I have something that is all my own. When I want to promote it, I promote it. When I feel burned out, I let myself reflect and create without judgment. Then I just come back with better stuff.

But, this year, the holiday season has just about chased me down. It feels like I've been stuck in a race with someone just a step faster than me, running on sand to try to keep up. Then I fall asleep and recharge, wake up, do yoga for 90 minutes, drink lots of coffee, work non-stop all day at the publishing company, drive home, and bake until I can't bake anymore. And I kind of love it. 

I enjoy sharing what the holidays have always meant to me: my mother's cooking, long stories shared over long meals, and spending time with my family, who I simultaneously see too often and not enough (what a contradiction). This year, the holidays also mean variations on the traditional baking my mother has always executed so well. Instead, I'm making  the southern food that comes from my family's heart and transforming it into something oh so San Francisco. Some examples: salt-honey pecan pie, persimmon custard tarts, salted dark chocolate almond toffee, ginger-nutmeg southern tea cakes, sweet potato cupcakes, and heavy cream on top of all of the above. 

I may not have the time to relish every second of this season, but I'm basking in the warmth through the food I'm making for others, through the samples I save for myself, and through the endless flow of new ideas that dance through my head as I fall asleep at night, exhausted, ready to start all over again in the morning.

My Very Own Virtual Home

After weeks - no, let's be real, months - of procastination and worrying, I have finally gotten my South by San Francisco Facebook page up and running. It is modest yet. But I have big plans: deals, videos, better photos, polls, all that good stuff.

If you haven't, please "like" the page. There is much more to come, as small as it may seem right now.

Go to the page at: Facebook.com/southbysanfrancisco

And that's because, if this holiday season has taught me anything, it is that I am ready for the next step. I thrive on the energy and planning and the love and care that go into each of my orders, especially when things get hectic. So I am taking several large gulps of air, sighing, and closing my eyes as I jump off the deep end. No, no, I'm more like wading into the mid-deep end, feeling my way around there, and then possibly doggie paddling towards the deep end. I'm taking calculated risks here, people. And I am calculating the exponential deliciousness of pie as we hit the bottom of winter and make our way back towards spring sometime soon. Just like the Greeks did at some point. Or something.

Sorry for the dumb joke. Like the page!

Hello, Fall

It's November, and it's finally starting to feel like autumn here in San Francisco. That is, the mornings are a bit foggy but the sun is shining by mid-afternoon. Still, there's a bite in the air at night that is crisper than it was in the summer, cleaner somehow.

Here's a small glimpse into my kitchen and life this fall, and all that I am grateful for as I embark on several new baking projects and adventures in the coming weeks.

The view from my kitchen in the evening as the fog rolls in. I look out over this as I mix together some cookie dough by hand.

Some of the loot and a shopping list from my birthday in October. I got a whole Sur La Table gift basket. 

And my friend Marie handmade me this adorable apron.

Some of my favorite cookbooks that I keep on hand at all times: White Lily's classic, The Lady & Sons Savannah Country Cookbook, Southern Cooking by Nathalie Dupree, a vintage pie cookbook or two from the 60s, and Ken Haedrich's Pie (I don't know if a better pie cookbook exists)

Things have slowed down a bit over here. I do apologize.

I've been traveling the last two weeks and will continue this weekend when I take off to Yosemite. Here is a little snapshot of what I've been doing.

Taking in the sights in Eugene, OR

Crushing on hipster boys who raise pigs

Vintage shopping inside of trucks in Portland on Alberta St.

Relaxing and smelling flowers in Portland, OR

Taste-testing Oregon microbrews

Eating fresh fruit in parks just because I can

And smiling. I've been doing lots of smiling.

Meanwhile, my baking has had to be put on the backburner while I figure out the following:

• Do I apply to grad school in English lit?
• If so, I have to do the following:
• Call my professors and have them update my letters of recommendation; fly to L.A. to see one of them for a brand new letter
• Write my statement of intent, which apparently requires six months of work. This is news to me.
• Edit a paper for submission. 
• Possibly re-take my general GRE.
• Take the GRE subject test
• Everything else.
• Do I take classes toward a business degree?
• This means staying at my current job for a really long time.
• Do I continue tutoring?
• Do I move home in October to save for school and Paris?
• Planning the pie speakeasy, which should be my big comeback event.

In between all this, I am running, doing yoga, and staring at pictures of pie for inspiration. I should let you know, however, that I have gone back to the dark side and returned to veganism. That does not mean my pies and sweets will be vegan. It just means I have to stop eating them (though taste-testing is okay). I'm lactose intolerant, and it's time I listened to my body and did what was right for it.

Happy baking, everyone! I'll be back in the swing of things in no time.

My Weekend in Food (L.A. Edition)

Last weekend, I decided to drive down to Los Angeles to visit the one-and-only Ambs. We always have a blast when we're together, and eating delicious food punctuates all of our other activities (talking, thrift shopping, laying by the pool, going out, falling asleep on bathroom floors). Here's a little sampling of some of the food and drinks I love(d) from Los Angeles. Because even though LA has all kinds of shortcomings in my mind, refreshments are not one of them. LA knows how to make me a burrito, pour me a latte, and serve me cocktail after cocktail. I'll take it. 

Kow Soi "Northern Thai Curry Noodles" from Bulan Thai in Silverlake

Watermelon Vodka Tonics (my recipe) made with fresh watermelon, watermelon juice, tonic water, and chilled vodka.

Perfect iced latte from Intelligentsia at Sunset Junction

Ambs and I at Urth Cafe near downtown

Earl Grey Tea Boba with Almond Milk from Urth

The menu at Silverlake Juice and Tea. I highly recommend the Vegan Almond Creme and the Cacao Me Crazy if you've got a sweet tooth like me

Ambs with her smoothie from Silverlake Juice and Tea

Chicken Korma Burrito (I know, right!?) from Cowboys and Turbans. This Indian-Mexican fusion restaurant blew me away with its beautiful patio, great service, and unforgettable food.

The giant veggie samosa at Cowboys and Turbans. I could eat this for a whole meal.

Now I'm back to running and eating grapes for breakfast. I need to work on balance in my life, I think. Or I'll just keep indulging in these decadent things. Yeah, maybe I'll stick with the latter.

Dreaming in Chocolate

Doesn't this kind of look like clouds? And sleep?

I have started to have recurring dreams of making pie crust and stirring chocolate cake batter.

In the dreams, I am like Sisyphus, sentenced to push that boulder up the mountain indefinitely. Only I've been given the task of making cake after cake after cake.

You would think that this would be a stressful dream, and sometimes it is. Sometimes I wake up in a cold sweat, worried that I've fallen asleep with the oven on or that I will never amount to anything. But the repetitive stirring and the tasting of the dough, these are things that soothe me to sleep. Sometimes before I even drift off, I see chocolate melting in a double boiler and I get visions of making tarts and cookies and pies, and all of this helps me fall asleep much faster than counting sheep ever has. It also reassures me that I am doing something right. Even if I can't quit my day job, I am still spending time doing something I clearly love. When I studied literature, and, even now, when I read a good poem, certain lines and phrases oftentimes repeat themselves over and over in my head. Sometimes I repeat them myself to fall asleep:

"Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
Until the last syllable of recorded time..."

"Bedewed with pleasures"

"Whereat, in either hand, the hastening angel caught
Our lingering parents, and to the eastern gate,
led them direct and down the cliff as fast,
to the subjected plain, then disappeared.
They, looking back, all the eastern side beheld
Of Paradise, so late their happy home..."

You know if you can do anything in your dreams - speak another language or recite a poem, let's say - you must know that thing so well that you can do it subconsciously. I'll comfort myself with that at least. Because I'd also just like to have a long, dreamless sleep so I can wake up early and make some cinnamon buns before work.

Flour and Sugar,
Carrie Melissa

Photo via Recipe Girl