It seems that advent has decided to make itself more poignant for me this year.
Advent is not something I was terribly aware of previous to working in a Catholic school and Cathedral.  I don't know if I could have told you all about the 'waiting' period before the arrival of the Messiah... the one waited for.  Well, these few years later I know all about those weeks before Christmas and the significance of waiting.  And waiting is exactly what the last while has been like for me.
Allow me to illustrate:
I'm waiting to finish working... which will be the 23rd of this month and in the meantime I'm hanging on to sanity and calm with the most tenuous of strings.

I have this pile of food sitting in bags waiting to turn into something munchy and yummy.  I'm waiting to have time to hover over the oven for the couple of hours that making chex mex demands.


This beautiful turnip is sitting on the counter.  It's waiting so patiently.  It looks at me so innocently and meekly.  It's not screaming for my attention but it desperately wants to be turned into something beautiful and braised with cabbage... my turnip is part of my advent celebration.


These ribbons are strewn around waiting to grace the tops of jars of gifts and tied around bags of nuts and munchies to give away.


These cookies managed to get baked because I was desperate and these are my favourite christmas tradition bar none... now these cookies are waiting to be eaten.


This star represents my hope that the internet connection which died on me last week and somehow magically restored itself this a.m. will remain connected.  I don't like waiting.  Now that the internet gods have decided that I've paid for my internet sins sufficiently I will be posting the 20 or so posts that have been brewing since last week... I guess that you could say that by waiting for my new posts I have been helping you better celebrate the season of advent too.

I'm not going to get all weird and mushy about December because of Christmas and all that.  I am going to get all weird and mushy about getting two weeks off though.  Dang - that can't come fast enough.  D is away in a very warm, dry, dusty part of the world drumming his hands off and learning to be the next croc-whisperer.  I am here in sun-less, wet, cold Toronto pulling myself out of the dumps.  Here are some of the things that have given and will give me purpose over the next two weeks:

1.  Me, Kid #1 and #2 got up embarrassingly early two days ago to take advantage of a Christmas tree drive hosted by one of our local tv stations.  You donate $10 to a local food bank and you get a Christmas tree.  The only catch... you have to get there early.  We were there by 6:45 a.m.  yeah... that's right.  But we got the damn tree people.

2.  Not sitting through another Christmas concert rehearsal for about 360 days is something that definitely brings a smile to my face.  I'm not going to elaborate beyond saying 4 down and 3 more to go.

3.  Learning that I don't have to sit all the way through a concert/show if I don't want to has been a most freeing discovery for me.  My BFF KT and I went to the Opera about a year and a half ago.  We had ludicrously expensive seats - if I had sneezed it might have thrown off the leads, at least they could've handed me a tissue.  Neither one of us are heavy opera fans so KT told me that if we had seen enough after a while and decided to go out for drinks instead then that was fine with her.  AND that's what we did.  We sat through an hour, got our fill and left... had a great evening with a couple of drinks and great conversation.  Now if a concert (especially the not too exciting ones) is going past the 1 1/2 hour mark I start to get antsy.  I almost feel claustrophobic - like I need to leave very soon, get out any way possible.

4.  I don't and never will understand why every single concert happening at Christmas must be obligated to perform only and exclusively Christmas music.


5.  I'm very much looking forward to making gifts this year.  Soon to come - homemade Chex Mex, homemade lemon curd and cookies and scones in a jar... what the hell let's throw some homemade crackers in there too.

6.  I've finally been able to start running again.  Plantar Fasciitis has had me down but not out for the last 6 weeks (!).  I've started small with 1 km and will gradually build myself back up to my regular routine.  I'm planning to run two half marathons next year.  In the meantime,  I'm still doing yoga like crazy, biking to work and rolling my foot over a little ball to encourage healing... it's finally working.


7.  I love that you all read this and wish I could send all of you some Chex Mex (well... if it doesn't totally bite) and Lemon curd.

Let me just start by saying that just a couple of years ago I would not in a million years have even thought about this happening let alone thinking that it might taste good... good enough to get the squash and actually do it.  Never.
Things change.
Here we are two years later and me trying to get more in touch with food reality - as opposed to the fiction that we've managed to turn it into - means that for me I'm now not only considering putting squash in a dessert but actually really truly going and doing it.  Here's the kicker for me... it didn't just come with my food box this week - meaning that once it was included I had to find something to do with it and all - no, no... I ordered it... specifically to make pureed squash... specifically to try making these cupcakes.  I get a little confused if I think about it for too long.  Sometimes I get too proud of my awesome 'sustainable', 'seasonal' efforts... I want to pat myself on the back for being so damn amazing.  I just need to walk away from myself.
One of the reasons that this whole squash thing is a surprise to me is that I've never been a fan of the pumpkin pie.  I have these vague memories of trying my great Aunt Ina's pumpkin pie when I was a kid.  Here's a cool story:
Great Aunt Ina - who isn't just a vague memory but someone whom I remember very well - was the youngest of a family of four.  She had a brother very close to her in age (my great Grandad) and two sisters about eighteen (yup - for reals) years older.  The two older sisters basically brought up the younger two siblings.  Those two sisters ran the family farm and did crazy crap like make their own recipes and publish them and stuff.  I know, right.  So Aunt Ina inheirited her baking skills honestly.  She made this seriously sick candy popcorn every year for christmas.  Seriously.  She brought it in these huge bags - I could have easily skipped the whole meal just to gorge on that stuff.  That's just the beginning.  She was also pretty weird sometimes - like she always just stashed our gifts away in a trunk and didn't even take them out of the packaging... actually, maybe that's not so weird.  Anyway, I remember trying some of the pumpkin pie that she baked and thinking that it didn't totally suck but then I never ate it again.   I don't regret not eating pumpkin pie or anything because there is probably a whole lot of other crap that I can do with pumpkin that blows the pie thing outta the water - I just have to discover it.


Recently I saw a recipe for pumpkin cupcakes and it called for using shredded squash - so I don't even have to cook the stuff - I'm going to try that too... or I could use parsnips or something... oh yeah.  I got thinking about the idea of squash and spices and cream cheese icing and it just sounded appealing.  However, I've been kinda craving beets lately though so I'm seriously starting to doubt my ability to gauge what is truly 'a treat'.


Squash Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Icing
adapted from Canadian Living and Ina Garten
makes about 12 lg cupcakes

2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
dash or two of allspice
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup vegetable oil (or whatever oil you want so long as it's fairly tasteless)
2 lg eggs
1 cup squash puree

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
Line a muffin tin with 12 liners.
Combine the flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, allspice and sugar together in a bowl and set aside.
Combine the buttermilk, vegetable oil, eggs and squash puree in another bowl and whisk together until they're completely mixed.
Add the buttermilk mixture to the flour mixture.  Stir until combined and everything is wet.  Laddle into the lined muffin tins until each is at least 3/4's full.
Bake for about 25 minutes or until a cake tester comes out of the middle cupcakes without anything sticking to it.
Cool completely

Cream Cheese icing:

1 pkg (4 oz) cream cheese, softened and at room temperature
1 tbsp unsalted butter
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups icing sugar

Combine the cream cheese and the butter together just until blended and smooth.  Add in the vanilla and blend.
Add the icing sugar by a 1/2 cup at a time.  Mix well after each addition.  Add more only until it reaches the thickness that you like.
Dollop onto the top of each completely cooled cupcake.

I had this moment of complete panic.  It was followed very closely by another moment of utter resignation. Then I remembered that this is not me.
I'm not the person who freaks out at having the perfect gift... for everyone.  At making sure that every decorating details has been seen to.  At having a perfect meal on Christmas day.  I'm not that person.  There is nothing wrong with that person.  I like those people.  I even envy them a little... it's just that it's not me.  What prompted my short term meltdown was a food blog I was reading.  The blogger was listing her holiday to do's for gifts and cooking and baking and general jobs that needed to be done... it looked exhausting.  I was exhausted just reading it and then I had to reach for a paper bag to breath into because I think that I started to hyperventilate... and that's when all that crap went through my head and then I remembered... I'm not that person.
Good God - how completely and utterly freeing to remember that.  If I had to deal with my own expectations around gift buying/baking/cooking/decorating/card sending/etc as well as work (up to the 23rd no less)/survive concert season (the next two weekends are completely blacked out on my calendar)/be a single mom/refrain from becoming an alcoholic then I'm sure I would have to be committed by the 25th.
As it goes, we are getting a tree and we will decorate it.  There will be lights on it.  I might stick something up on my door.  I have sent one Christmas card (to the UK) and that will probably be it.
I will do some baking - I might participate in (but not host - ack) a cookie exchange where I have to make two batches of something.  For gift giving, I will be making:

Chex Mex
Lemon Curd
Cranberry scones in a jar
Oat Crackers

I will not be buying a lot of gifts.  At All.
I think that should just about cover it.  Any other cooking and/or baking I do will 100% be for my pleasure.  To be honest, the Chex Mex and Lemon Curd are for my pleasure too because I'll be keeping some of it to enjoy myself.
So I guess that my little breakdown accomplished something.  I've now completely and rationally thought through my own expectations and limitations around the christmas season.  If I exceed expectations then it's a bonus and if I don't then I don't really care.  I've listed publicly what I'm going to make and decorate and now I feel a lot better.  Thanks.


As a side note.  My Bestie KT has lent me her camera while D is in Burkina Faso with mine.  All these pics are because of her (you can send your thanks so me and I'll forward it along) so I decided to make her some bread as payment for the rental.  Since molasses and oatmeal are two of her favourite things in the whole world (after Mr G, her beautiful Kitties and ME of course) then I figured that this bread would be perfect for her.  XOXO  It turned out really weird looking but I think that's because of the loaf pan that I used - it was too small.


Oatmeal Molasses Snacking Bread adapted from Technicolour Kitchen
makes one large loaf

2 1/4 tsp (1 pkg) active dry yeast
3 tbsp molasses (I use unsulphured)
2 cups warm water
2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 cups bread flour or all purpose (I used all purpose)
1 cups rolled oats
1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted and set aside
1 1/2 tsp salt

Combine the yeast, molasses and warm water together.  Mix and set aside for about 5 minutes - enough time for the yeast to bloom on top of the mixture.
Combine the flours (both), salt and the oats.  Add the yeast mixture to the flour mixture.  Add the melted butter to everything and mix until all is well combined.  Cover with a clean cloth and set side for about 30 minutes.
Turn the flour out to a lightly floured surface and knead for about 7 minutes or so (add flour if needed but no more than about a 1/4 cup).
Place the kneaded dough in a lightly buttered bowl (stainless steal is what I use), cover with a clean cloth (the same one maybe) and let it rise in a draft-free place for about 1 hour.
Once the dough has risen, remove from the bowl and knead just until you can form it into a loaf/rectangle shape.  Place in a large, buttered loaf pan.  Cover again with a clean cloth and let rise until doubled - about 1 hr.
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
Bake the bread for about 40 minutes or until the bottom sounds hollow when you knock on it (that's so weird but it works).
Cool and slice or share or give as a gift or make yourself some toast right then and there.

Save the sighs.  It was good and I bet you wish you were here to have some too.  Actually, I wish that you were here right now.
Here's why...

D and I have a good relationship.  We've been together for a lot of years and we're happy to have had them.  yeah, there've been downs.  That's normal.  Times when we've wanted to throw in the towel, forget it all happened, shake hands and walk away... but we didn't.  Having weathered enough crap between the two of us and with life in general we can both honestly confess our good fortune at spending this time together.
Tomorrow is D's birthday.  It's not a big one - no big landmarks, 'Oh jeez, I can't believe you're that old' or 'You know, I always thought that by the time I got this old that I would be on my way out' or anything like that.  It's just a birthday.
What's making this birthday a little extra special and/or odd is that D will be on a plane.  He's going to Burkina Faso for about 18 days give or take.  I'm not so sure that being on a plane is like being at a restaurant on your birthday.  I'm kinda skeptical that the air host's (or whatever you call them) will be convening by D's seat to sing him a birthday song and present him with a cupcake and candle.  So I'm making sure that we send him off with something before his birthday.  It's only the night before so at least it's close.  I'm gonna make him something slightly more up his alley once he's back and can enjoy it for a couple of days.  For now this simple chocolate cake with simple chocolate icing is just the thing.  That's all the upside.
The downside is that I'm all alone with two kids for the next 18 days give or take and concert season is just kicking off for this household and birthday month has descended and work continues right up to the 23rd and then it's this big holiday that everyone kinda freaks out about.  I'm not feeling sorry for myself but I'll definitely miss him.


I guess that this cake is both a birthday and a goodbye thing... a little send off.
On a side note: I'm not going to bitch for long about this but this whole 'dark-by-4:15-p.m.-thing' is getting a bit old for me.  I'm pretty dang tired of making something when I come home from work and by the time I'm ready for pictures it's too dark to get a decent shot.  I'll be damned if I'm going to set up a light-box and get into all that.  I must keep telling myself that in another 6 - 8 weeks things will already feel a little different 'cause we're almost at the solstice, right?  For now please excuse the crappy shots and try to enjoy the spirit of the evening with us.


Chocolate Mud Cake adapted from Delicious Magazine (UK)
makes 1 9 inch round cake
(I'll try to give accurate equivalents here but it's not exact)

250g (1 cup) unsalted butter, cubed
200g dark chocolate, chopped
1 tbsp espresso powder
100 ml milk
250g (about 2 cups or just a little less) self raising flour (you can make your own)
40g (a little less than a half cup) dark cocoa
250g (about 1 cup) sugar
4 lg eggs beaten
1 tsp vanilla
150 ml sour cream

Icing:

1 1/2 cups icing sugar
3/4 cup dark cocoa
1 tsp espresso powder
3 tbsp unsalted butter
1/2 cup (give to take) cream

Grease and flour a 9 inch round springform pan
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
Melt the butter, chocolate, espresso powder and milk together in a double boiler and then set aside.  Cool for about 15 minutes.
Sift the flour, dark cocoa and sugar together.
Add the chocolate mixture to the flour mixture.
Add the beaten eggs, vanilla and sour cream and mix well.
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth out.
Bake for about 65 - 70 minutes or until a cake tester comes out with just wet crumbs on it.
Cool completely in the pan.

Icing:

Sift together the icing sugar and cocoa powder.
Add in the espresso powder.
Add the butter and enough cream to mix it together.  Continue adding cream until the icing gets to the thickness and consistency that you like.
Continue mixing out all the lumps.
Smooth over completely cooled cake.

Every once in a while it happens that we have nothing to do.  Like absolutely nothing.  We don't have to leave the house for an entire day.  I say this like it's something wonderful, magical, special... and it kinda is.
Usually there is something to be done.  Someone to be dropped off and/or picked up.  Something to be gotten.  An appointment to get to.  Work.  School.  You know... stuff.  This day... nothing.  What's more, we got up kinda early and by the time 2pm rolled around it already felt like the day was an eternity.  Yoga, laundry, bathrooms cleaned, beds made... you know, it was all done.  Weird.
On a day like that what do you do?  You cook if you're me.
On a rainy, long dark of winter day what do you cook?  Beef stew with biscuits of course.


You need a day for that kind of food.  It has to sit for a long time over a low heat and just 'be'.  That will make the stew sing.  It's not a quick thing.  It's a very very slow thing or it won't be the same.  So you need to have the patience to make it at lunch in order to eat it for supper.  But it's so worth it.  So gratifying.
Well everything that you've just read was exactly my situation just a couple of days ago.
It was beautiful.  It felt like the longest day ever.
We watched a movie because... we had so much time to watch.
We had a complete lunch AND supper.
After my last rant post I'm going to sit back and let things settle a little bit, so there's no controversy this time.  No pressing opinions that I'm going nuts sitting on and have to blather about.  No crazy goings on that are dominating my thoughts.  Nothing.   Today.
Just a beautiful, quiet, LOOOOOONG day... and stew.


Beef Stew with Biscuits adapted from Canadian Living
serves4 - 6

1 lb stewing beef
1 leek sliced thin up to the darker green part
1 large celery stalk, diced
2 lg carrots, coarsely chopped
2 small turnips, coarsely cubed
1 1/2 cups mushrooms, halved
2 lg cloves of garlic, minced
3 tbsp Worcestershire
1 tbsp Soy Sauce
4 tbsp ketchup
2 beef bouillon cubes
3/4 cup water or red wine
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 lg tbsp brown sugar
1 lg tbsp each, chives, oregano, thyme, basil, parsley

Blue Cheese Biscuits

2 1/4 cups flour
4 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, COLD and cubed
1/2 cup plain yogurt or sour cream
1/2 cup milk (or just enough to get the right consistency) or buttermilk
1/2 cup blue cheese
1/2 cup parmesan

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
Butter and 9 inch square baking pan.
Combine the flour, baking powder and salt together in a bowl.  Mix together.
Cut in the cubed butter into the flour mixture using a pastry cutter or two knives.  Cut together until it forms a crumbly texture.
Add in the yogurt or sour cream and mix.
Add just enough milk to form a dough ball.
Add in the cheeses and mix.
Place onto a lightly floured surface and knead just a couple of minutes - until it forms a smooth, silky dough ball.  Roll out to about 1 1/2 inches thick (thicker if you would like) and cut into about 12 biscuits (round or square or whatever shape you want).  Place each biscuit in the buttered pan.
Sprinkle the top with a little extra parmesan if you would like.
Bake for about 30 - 35 minutes or until the biscuits are nicely browned on the top and they're not gooey on the inside.
Serve with the beef stew.

Welcome to my Rant.  There is a recipe at the end of the tunnel.  I promise.
Thanksgiving weekend has just passed in the US.  It's an awesome 4 day weekend for them.  It's a lovely time.  Unless you are shopping.  It's been big news here in Canada.  The whole black friday fiasco.  The whole issue of whether having big savings shopping days where people get themselves whipped into a frenzy is a wise thing to do.  We participated too, we Canadians.  It's rumoured that Canadians spent a breezy 5 billion dollars in the U.S. last year on black friday weekend.
A friend was posting a few things on FB about the whole thing.  It was mostly video's from youtube  - you know... the pepper spray, the running frenzy, the yelling, the mobs.  What I found interesting was the response to these video's.  Declarations of disgust.  What have we become.  It wasn't like this before.  The angst.  The hand ringing.  The revulsion.  One person responded that the U.S.  is becoming like a third world country.
That one broke me entirely.
I wanted to respond so badly but FB seems like this forum for saying whatever you want in a complete vacuum and I just can't bring myself to engage.  (I'd rather do it here - like that makes any sense)
If I had responded then I would have said things like this: The idea that 'third world' countries behave like animals is one that I find even more repulsive and repugnant than pepper spraying a crowd in order to grab an Xbox.  If only people in so called third world countries had the luxury of behaving like that for such trivialities.  They're too busy making the damn Xbox. Then there is the whole side of this story that has been created by the last 30 years of hyper-consumerism in the West.  How desperate does someone have to feel to use pepper spray to get an Xbox?
Why am I not hearing anything about how heartbreaking it is that a holiday is completely overshadowed by bargain basement shopping?  Why am I not hearing about how this situation is inevitable when 50% of New Yorkers have a household income of $30,000 or less and 1% of New Yorkers have an average income (almost exclusively listed as being from the 'financial industry' or 'financial innovation') of 3.7 million?  (from 'Grow Together or Pull Apart?: Income Concentration Trends in New York' December 2010, Fiscal Policy Institute - Manhattan based Non-Profit group).  Why am I not hearing about the need to reign in the advertising industry?  Why are we more repulsed by the idea of people clamouring to get a bargain than we are by the reasons that are behind the clamour?  It makes me feel sad, frustrated and for sure not very thankful.


As an addendum, I recently watched an interview with Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr about deeper understanding and unification between the classes in the U.S.  When asked what his advice would be to young Americans he said:  VOTE - register and vote.  Then he added that he would also tell them to stay in school and READ.  We have a choice.  At least I want to believe that we have a choice.  I need to believe it.


My rant had nothing to do with what I thought was a damn good dish and pretty easy because it doesn't have to be baked.  It's kinda like my own KD with good crap in it.  Kid #2 ate it and that's sayin' something.  If you want yet another idea for squash that won't kill you to make or look completely disgusting to those not used to eating such pleasures then this is a great place to start.


Roasted Butternut squash Mac N Cheese  adapted from Good Food Magazine
serves about 6

1/2 medium butternut (or other) squash - about 2 cups - cubed
 - tossed in oil of choice, salted and roasted on a baking sheet at 350 degrees F for 25 - 30 minutes -
1 small cauliflower or choufleur or broccoli - broken into smallish pieces
2 1/2 cups dry pasta (I used penne)

Cheese Sauce

6 tbsp butter
6 tbsp (or so) flour
3 3/4 cup warmed milk
1 tbsp Worcestershire Sauce
dash of soy sauce
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp dijon mustard (or dry mustard powder - NOT yellow mustard)
2 cups cheese (I used a mix of old cheddar and parmesan - pick your poison just make sure it melts reasonably well)

1.  Bring a large pot of water to a boil.  Add in the pasta and simmer for about 5 minutes less than it needs to be al dente.  Add the cauliflower/choufleur to the simmering water 5 minutes before the pasta is ready.  Once ready, drain and set aside.
2.  In another heavy bottomed pot melt the butter over med/low heat.  Once melted add in the flour and mix together until they form a paste.  Very gradually add in the warm milk, stirring constantly.  Continue stirring and once the sauce begins to thicken then add in the Worcestershire, Soy, salt, dijon and cheese (and a little something hot if you please).  Check the tastes and make sure that it's to your liking.
3.  In a large bowl mix together the pasta cauliflower and roasted squash and mix it up together.  Pour the sauce over top and mix just until the sauce is distributed throughout.
SERVE