Preparation

The fog hangs heavily over the mighty Hudson River.  It’s grey and damp and I can’t help but love it.  There is just enough visibility to see the bank across the water, mostly dark and bare with a few remaining splashes of leaves.  Fall has come. 

There is a sweet smell in the air this morning, almost spring-like and fresh.  I’m not sure if that’s the musty fragrance of leaves mingling with the rain or not, but I like it.  Driving down to the train station in the morning is still a pageantry of color, but mostly in yellows and browns at this point…the red leaves have all but given up, making way for their less showy cousins.  By the time Thanksgiving rolls around all that will be left are the evergreens and a bunch of naked tress standing around waiting to be dressed up with holiday snow.  It’s all very soothing to my overloaded and slightly addled and crazed brain.

Normally at this time of year I’m focused solely on Thanksgiving.  I’m still doing my “heavy” food magazine research this year as usual, but with the impending happy distraction of a baby on the way and all that it means.  I’ve scoured Bon Appetit, Saveur, Martha Stewart Living and Everyday Food…all my usual suspects to plan the Thanksgiving meal of my dreams.  I’ve managed to settle on two stuffing recipes out of the ten I would like to make, and now all I have to do is find the time to cook the food.

I like the planning.  Sometimes I think the planning is more fun than the actuality.  When all the dishes are still just in my mind, they are perfect.  No dry birds or stuffing, no overly sweetened or tart cranberry sauce, only the air of something wonderful on the horizon promised to me by hours of watching old, Thanksgiving themed Martha Stewart DVDs.  Every year I watch her holiday collection.  Yes, it’s the same year after year, but it’s become part of the tradition I enjoy and a healthy activity which seems to fit with my “nesting fever”.

All I can really think about at this point is the fact that we will have a newborn in less than two months.  We met the birthmother this past week, and the meeting confirmed the reality of it all and sent me into high gear on the baby front.  There are so many things to do to prepare:  books to read, items to buy, friends with babies to visit (and get advice) and getting the nursery ready (which I’m really loving). 

Preparing to have a little girl in the house is such a different mindset for me.  My experience as a child and adult are all boy themed for the most part.  Buying lots of colorful items like pink curtains and butterfly drawer handles were never in the cards before.  A whole new world of shopping possibilities is opening up and I’m having a hard time not letting it get out of hand.  My version of having a girl currently comes with lots of frills and stuffed animals…something she may love or hate, but I guess for right now it’s about what my inner child (and inner diva) would like to have in my room if I were she.  There is definitely some pink in there, but also some nice greens and whites as well.  The theme:  ladybug garden.

It’s feeling slightly spring-y inside the nursery, but I’m content with the fall feeling outside (and in every other room of our house).  The mums are wrapping up their splendor and are quietly fading away.  I’ve been gathering the last of the brown hydrangeas and bittersweet for fall arrangements around the house and trying to get things ready for next week’s holiday cook-a-thon.  We really aren’t having many people over this year, but I still like to cook as if we were…the leftovers are the best part.

I become inspired when it turns cold out.  I’m always fairly inspired, but when the temperature begins to drop below freezing on a more regular basis it makes me want to keep the oven hot.  Though I am finding less and less downtime with my new job and baby preparations, I’m still trying to keep up with my weekly baking.  I find it’s the one thing that keeps me anchored and sane.  A friend of mine recently asked, “if you could be doing anything nice for yourself right now, what would it be?”  My immediate response was baking.

For some, I know baking is a heavy, complicated and overwhelming scientific challenge they don’t want to go near.  I’m not sure how baking got such a bad wrap in the non-foodie community, but it certainly still seems to.  Maybe it’s the time it seems to take to make something truly delicious and worth presenting, but I declare that to be a misnomer.   There are so many good desserts out there, which require less than an hour of your time, even less than a half hour on certain occasions, and I’m here to rectify this situation for the time challenged.  Behold, the Pumpkin Doughnut Muffin.

I had been eyeing these bad boys since the November 2010 Everyday Food came in the mail.  They visually reminded me of large doughnut holes because they are rolled in cinnamon and sugar…the very same concoction my mom uses to put on cinnamon toast.  It’s been a long time since I’ve made muffins and I forget just how simple it is to do.   The great thing about these is you probably already have everything you need in your pantry or refrigerator.

I don’t know about you, but this is the point in the month of November where I start stocking up on all the non-perishable items I’m going to need to get the Thanksgiving meal on the table, and one of those cupboard staples is canned pumpkin.  When I was buying ingredients for Halloween’s pumpkin cake I picked up an extra can.  Many people keep a few on hand for their pies and breads during Thanksgiving week, and right now most every store is starting their sales.  Why not pick up two or four…just in case you have an impulsive weeknight moment and thirty minutes to spare.  That’s all it takes to whip up a quick batch of these flavorful, spicy muffins.

They are fragrant and not overly sweet, but what really makes them fabulous is the sugar coating.  Once they come out of the oven, you let them sit and cool off for a few moments before generously painting their outsides with melted butter and then rolling them in the cinnamon sugar.  Heaven.  The butter magically seals in the muffin’s natural moisture while giving the outside an almost spongy and crystalline crust.  These would be perfect for a brunch or breakfast on Thanksgiving morning if you are having a crowd staying over at your house.  I guarantee there won’t be any left come lunchtime.

In a time sensitive world it's important to have things on hand for when the baking bug strikes.  Maybe you get a sudden urge to bake at midnight (like I sometimes do) and it’s good to be ready for whatever you might be inspired by.  Right now I’m obviously inspired by the color of the leaves and all the changes taking place outside.  Last week we took a drive to Hershey, Pennsylvania, near where our birthmother lives.  The drive was absolutely spectacular and made me not only want to bake, but continually stop the car to take photographs (which I didn’t do or Brian might have killed me).

Pennsylvania is such a beautiful state, full of mountains and winding streams, red barns and stone houses dotting the landscape.   At this time of year all of it’s covered in a shower of golden and amber colored leaves gently falling down.  The mountains in the distance fade away from earthy brown slopes to a soft violet and powdery blue.   As we drove further into the state the more I began to notice the red barns painted with beautiful symbols and designs.  I found out these are called the Dutch Hex, a talismanic and once thought of protective device carried over to our country by European immigrants.  Though they are mostly for show these days or as a nod to past tradition, I was intrigued by their intricacy and it seemed as if they were leading us on toward our goal like a treasure map.

Certainly I wasn’t the only person able to see these signs, but it felt like it.  Catching a glimpse of the symbols through the trees had a feeling of uncovering a hidden code, solving a puzzle that would lead us to the location of our baby.  All we had to do was follow the 6-sided glyphs.  It’s a strange thing meeting the person who is giving you their child to raise, a child still cooking in the oven so to speak and to have a discussion about this process in both a personal and semi-businesslike manner, very strange indeed.  There are so many things I found myself wanting to talk about, but due to the sensitivity of it all (both emotional and legal) it was best to try and laugh, make small talk, get to know her and make her feel comfortable about the choice she was making to give her child to Brian and I. 

I think the lunch we had with our birthmother was more nerve-racking than all the  first dates I’ve ever had combined, but luckily our social worker was there as a coach and mediator, and I have to say I don’t think things could have gone any better.  By the time we left I was exhausted and ready to get home and unwind in my kitchen, my sanctuary.  The drive home was just as pretty, still full of those same symbolic barns and streams, but I felt different, more alive somehow and more lost to the bigness of the world.  A new life is coming into our house and we have only 2 months to get ready!!! 

This overwhelming feeling would probably explain all the groceries I bought this week (though I admit I was also trying to score enough points to get a "free" turkey).  I want nothing more than to cook, to make the house cozy and to stay there with the warm smells of fresh baked goodies and hot cider, comforting side-dishes and friends and family within arms reach.  For me, Thanksgiving can’t come quickly enough and I couldn’t be more thankful than I am right now.  To help get you inspired (if you’re not there already), I whipped up a batch of mulled apple cider with cranberries that was both spicy, tart, sweet and hit that spot only a hot cider on a cold day can reach.  The recipe is as follows: 

Marty’s Hot Mulled Cider

2 teaspoons allspice

1 1/2 teaspoons cloves

4 cinnamon sticks

7 cups apple cider

1 lemon, sliced thin

1 1/2 tablespoon honey

1 cup of cranberries

1 tablespoon of mulling spice (it has dried orange peel and anise)

Place all the ingredients in a large pot and bring to a boil.  Turn down the heat, cover and simmer for 5 minutes.  Pour through a strainer and serve with cinnamon sticks.  It’s so easy, not making it should be a crime.

To continue my preparation for the impending holiday and to feed my manic need to bake and calm down I decided to try out a couple of my own recipes based loosely on some others I had read about.  One is for the most delicious cranberry tartlets you’ve ever had, and the other is for a multi-citrus tart, which is quite similar to lemon bars but served in a yummy pate brisee crust.

The tartlet idea came from the November 2010 Martha Stewart Living.  In the “good things” section is an idea for what to do with your leftover cranberry sauce and piecrust dough (if you have any left) after the Thanksgiving meal is over.  The magazine describes using a mini-muffin pan, filling it with small squares of dough and about a teaspoon and a half each with cranberry sauce.  I can’t wait to try these things out until after the holiday because how would I ever pass on if it worked?  Well, let me say it did indeed!  In the process of testing the idea out I decided to try my hand at making my own cranberry sauce.  If you are looking for a new way to spice up this colorful side I’m recommending rosemary.  The recipe is as follows: 

Marty’s Rosemary Cranberry Sauce Tartlets

Zest and juice of 1 orange

1 1/2 tablespoons fresh rosemary removed from stem

1/4-cup dark brown sugar

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1/2-cup cranberry/pomegranate juice

2 1/2 cups fresh cranberries

1/2 recipe of pate brisee

Combine the sugars and rosemary in a food processor, pulse until you have a finely ground rosemary sugar.  Place the sugar and all remaining ingredients in a large saucepan and cook over medium heat until the sugar has dissolved, the cranberries have popped and the juices have begun to thicken (about 5 minutes).  Let the sauce cool to room temperature.

While the sauce is cooling, roll out half a recipe of pate brisee dough to about 1/8 inch thick.  Depending on your choice of baking vessel, you can use either round cookie cutters or (in this case) a red wine glass to get the right sized round of dough to fill the pans.  Butter the tins (I was using mostly brioche molds) before adding the dough so that the tarts come out easier after baking.  Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Fill the shells with a heaping tablespoon of cranberry sauce, lightly brush the edge of the crust with an egg wash (one egg and a tablespoon of cream), and finally top with sanding sugar.  Place the tarts in the freezer for a half hour before baking. 

Bake for 20 to 25 minutes depending on the size of your tarts.

To use my friend Izabella’s description, eating it is like “walking through a forest”.  I liked that!!!  The sauce does take on a bit of a woodsy flavor from the rosemary sugar, and is not too tart or too sweet…Goldilocks would be happy.  Nestled in the buttery pate brisee crust, the tartlets end up somewhere near sublime.  I chose not to use the mini-muffin pan (though I’m sure it would have been a lot quicker) because I discovered all the small tart/brioche molds hanging out in the back of my pantry. 

Because I was making this from scratch, I had a full recipe of dough and cranberry sauce…thus more to go around than Martha Stewart called for.  I was able to make 16 small tarts with enough crust left over for a larger nine-inch tart…thus why I ended up making a citrus tart as well.  I hadn’t planned on making an additional tart, but I really hadn’t planned on making all the fancy-ish small tarts either…and so it goes.  I was in a bit of a panic because I had enough dough to feel guilty about throwing it out.  I needed a quick tart recipe with ingredients I already had in the house and was somehow still seasonally appropriate, of course. 

Happily, it is citrus season once more…I mean that’s why we see so many platters of clementines and oranges used as decoration, right?  Well, I had a spare lemon, a spare orange and a couple of limes laying around the house as well as all the standard baking fare like eggs, flour and sugar, so there wasn’t an excuse to be had for not whipping up a quick, delicious filling.  This time I based my recipe on the Barefoot Contessa’s lemon bar filling.  I made several adjustments to quantities of ingredients, but retained a lot of what I think makes the lemon bar recipe so good:  mainly the zest.

I used the zest of all four fruits plus the juice along with eggs, flour and sugar to make a frothy filling for the lonely tart crust.   The recipe is as follows: 

Marty’s Quick Citrus Tart  (Makes enough filling for two 9-10 inch tarts)

1 full recipe of pate brisee

Zest and juice of 1 orange, 1 lemon, 2 limes

3/4-cup flour

2 cups sugar

5 eggs

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.  Roll out the two rounds of dough into 1/8 inch thick.  Place the dough into 2 nine or ten-inch tart rings (or pie dishes) on a parchment lined baking sheet and place in the freezer for twenty minutes.  Dock the dough (poke holes in the bottom) with a fork and bake for about fifteen minutes, or until golden.  Let the crusts cool to room temperature.  Reduce the oven temperature to 375 degrees.

While the crusts cool, combine all the remaining ingredients in a bowl, thoroughly whisking them together.  Fill the cooled crusts and bake for 20 to 25 minutes until the top begins to brown and the filling is set (no longer jiggling).  Top with confectioner’s sugar if desired and serve.

If you are a fan of oranges, lemons and limes I think you’ll be over the moon with this one.  It’s also a recipe you can use if you are in a time crunch but still want to take something wonderful and seemingly complex to your friend’s and family potluck celebration.   The key here is to make the pate brisee dough in advance.  If you make a few batches of dough and refrigerate or freeze them (depending on how long before you’ll be rolling out and baking) you’ll be as prepared as any baking boy or girl scout.

Though I won’t get to be with my family in Missouri this year for the holidays, I’m content knowing Brian and I are creating a nuclear one of our own.  My holidays in New York have always been filled with “sewn” together families of friends and friend’s relatives.  All are welcome and we generally have a great time (as long as nothing burns or no one drinks too much, or a combination of the two).  I love nothing more than the chilly November air being held at bay by clove and cinnamon heated air pouring out of our cozy oven like a shield.  Though it’s not time quite yet, I’m looking forward to setting an extra place at the table for a young lady I’m yet to meet in person, a young lady who I know will change my life and my relaxing baking time forever.  I’m not even afraid of her getting flour all over the kitchen.  In fact, I happily welcome it.  It’s just who I am.