The World is Brand New

I think I knew you

Before time began

I wonder if you were here 

Watching and waiting

For just the right time

Knowing us better than we know ourselves.

You didn't fill a hole

Of something missing

But created a space

Stretching and breathing

Possibility into plausibility

   Hope into happy tears

   Fear into courage.

The world is brand new.

Dearest little Hugo,

We brought you home just before midnight on Christmas. There are some things you need to know about us and the world, but the most important thing you need to know about Mama and Papa is that our lives revolve around food. We'll teach you these things, slowly but surely, as you grow. This is pure joy for us, and you are pure gift.

What you need to know about feasting:

There are no half measures allowed. If you cannot bring yourself to feast properly, content yourself with a slice of bread, butter, and some radishes. If you feel the impulse to be miserly when showing love, force yourself to go to the store, buy the most expensive bottle of wine you will consent to buy, a loaf of baguette, some salami, and call a friend who will sit with you patiently until you find yourself again. Even when we are at our most awful, we are not meant to be alone. 

Speaking of which, feasting is never done alone. It is what connects us to each other, to the world, to the sinner-saints who have gone before, and to the Creator, who laughs with joy as we trip over ourselves attempting to be good or do life right. We were made for joy, made to tell stories and laugh, and to savor moments in time that exists in the veiled middle space between the absolute knowledge of Now and the ephemeral awareness of the Eternal.

Now, for some apologies:

- We will hold you while we feast, which means we will spill food on you. We may not notice this at first if we do. You will probably get dirty in the kitchen. A lot.

- Our kitchen sometimes gets very warm (which you do not like any more than being very cold); it will be worth it in the end, but you may have to endure some heat in the waiting spaces (it's a good life lesson).

- You will likely someday tire of your Papa and I saying dinner is at 6:30 but forgetting ourselves in the moment, sipping our martinis as 6:30 slips toward 7:30 and 7:30 to 8:00. (Last night, dinner was supposed to be at 5 but began at 7; for having a 3-day old baby at home, I felt like this was still a victory, but it was a victory in the same way raising a child or making a delightful feast or doing anything that reveals love for something other than oneself is a victory).

- Sometimes, our food won't taste good. It comes with the territory of trying new things. Sometimes, trying new things leads to disaster; sometimes it leads to new levels of awareness of life. One never knows which until one tries; the only guaranteed way to fail is to refuse to try something new. It also leads to a small life guided by Fear, which is terrible at making decisions, at loving others more than oneself, at generosity, and most disappointingly, at recognizing the gift of life and creation.

Late on Christmas night, we welcomed you home the only way we know how: by saying a blessing over you in every room of the house and toasting you with scotch. Yesterday, we celebrated your coming also the only way we know how - with making a Christmas feast for our families. We ate roasted goose, mashed potatoes, gravy, sautéed green beans, freshly baked bread (with cultured butter... no half measures for feasting), champagne to toast, and a 100-point Pinot Noir to sip. Family took turns doing dishes, helping in the kitchen, and staring at you. When dinner was finally ready, we lit beeswax candles, turned down the lights, and raised our glasses in your honor in prayer, in thanksgiving, in blessing, in the fullness that we didn't know was possible until you came.

I pretty much only paid attention to you and to dessert. 

For dessert, I made Buche de Noel. I forgot to make Swiss merengue the first time (leading to blowing through 1 dozen eggs instead of 1/2 dozen). At one point, I needed to have my feet up, so I sat on a barstool with my poor swollen feet on another barstool, watching the mixer as I tossed in cubes of butter for the Swiss buttercream. Sadly, the heat in the kitchen was too intense for the buttercream, so I managed to curdle it as I was attempting to beat it in preparation for putting on to the cake and didn't have sufficient time to exercise patience for it to come back together (next year will be better!). Over dinner, we told stories (mostly about your Mama's siblings while they were growing up) and watched the beeswax candles melt as you slept peacefully in your crib and then in your Papa's arms.

Our lives are forever changed, and you deepen our roots: re-discovering the joy of the Feast, the promise of new life, and remind us that every day, to an extent, is a new life, each drop of water a reminder of who and Whose we are, each feast a foretaste of the life to come.

May you be blessed with love, with peace, with hope, and with hunger that teaches you to long for the Feast of all creation.

Love,
Mama and Papa

Pregnant (17 Weeks) Feasting: Roasted Kabocha Squash, Homemade Pasta, and Beurre Monté

So... a lot has happened since I last hung out here. As much as has happened, though, things stay the same. Except for the baby on the way part, I suppose... which means things that normally sound awesome to me almost all the time (garlic, coffee, salad, sourdough bread) don't sound good or, worse (garlic), cannot be kept in the house with my sensitive stomach. BUT there are still things to eat, still feasts to happen (with a few sips of Ben's wine instead of half the bottle), and still adventures to have.

Tonight, I am feeling particularly good. My first inclination when I am feeling well is not to get ahead on prelim prep (which I should be doing), but rather, to cook. Tonight's menu: Roasted Kabocha Squash with Homemade Tagliatelle and Beurre Blanc. Who says feasting can't happen on Wednesday? Pretty much nobody. If they do, you might want to consider new friends.

I love kabocha squash. It is sweet, has great texture (i.e. not stringy), and requires only simple seasoning to make it show off.

I love homemade pasta. It is satisfying dough to make, and really doesn't require that much time considering the quality of the final product.

I love beurre monté. It is a simple sauce that is great for dishes that need only a little bit of richness to tip from "good" to "perfection."

I love wine. Though it's not part of my feasting right now, I already look forward to the nights that the baby magically decides to go to sleep at a decent hour, making dinner with Ben, and sharing a bottle of wine while the candles burn down, laughing about how horrible the next day will be because the baby will inevitably wake up earlier than we want him/her to the next day. It is not the practicality of the feast that draws me to it, but rather, its impracticality. Dreams of re-discovering myself and Ben in this new venture, of what is the same and what is changed, brings me joy. Joy need not mean that it is easy, smooth, convenient, or even happy. Joy comes in the moments of foolishness in which we forget ourselves for a moment and stop wishing to be someplace else and sit where we are, overcome by the gift that is life. We dream of teaching our child how to cook, how to tell the difference between marjoram and oregano, how to practice the feast in ways that will change as s/he grows. I think we will grow with him/her, becoming in ways that we hadn't imagined becoming, undoubtedly stretched and pulled, but raising a glass to that which is and that which is to come.

Roasted Kabocha Squash
Preheat oven to 400.
Kabocha Squash
Olive Oil
Salt
Pepper
Cut squash in half. Scoop out seeds (I rinsed and saved mine; I am hoping to plant them for a fall harvest; you can also clean them off, let them dry, and then season them as you would pumpkin seeds and roast them in the oven until golden brown).
Rub the inside of the squash with olive oil and sprinkle salt and grind pepper into cavity.
Roast cavity-side down until a fork easily pierces the outside flesh (it should feel similarly to a cooked sweet potato when done).

Homemade Egg Pasta
2 1/2 c. flour
2 eggs + 1 yolk (I reserve the leftover whites in a container in the refrigerator for future use... I am trying to learn how to make French macarons, so I have blown through quite a few egg whites; I have not yet been successful).

Place flour in bottom of mixer or on a wooden table. Make a well in the center of the flour. Break eggs into the well. If using a mixer, using the dough attachment, mix the dough slowly for a few minutes until incorporated and then increase the speed to medium until the dough looks smooth, elastic, and uniform. If making by hand, using a fork, whisk the egg yolks; once mixed, make slightly bigger circles to incorporate flour slowly (SLOWLY), pushing the flour up toward the eggs with your hand at various intervals to keep the egg from escaping the well. Once incorporated, knead the dough for 3-5 minutes or until it is smooth, elastic, and uniform. Let rest 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, roll the dough:

We are lucky to have an attachment for our mixer that rolls pasta. This takes considerably longer using other means. I would recommend finding a hand roller, as it will help make uniform pasta. I do not trust myself to roll the dough by hand; it is very difficult to make it thin enough and uniform enough to have a good end product. Gradually roll the dough. If using a Kitchen Aid or other dough-rolling attachment, start with the roller at the widest setting. Flatten dough to make it pass through the roller more easily. Run the dough through the roller at least twice on each setting. If the dough starts looking like cellulite (you'll know if you see it), it needs a little more flour. Dust (and I mean DUST - too much flour will mess with the texture) the dough before you put it through again. Proceed, running the dough through each setting twice until it is the desired thickness (I stop at Kitchen Aid setting 6; though this would not pass at Italian restaurants where they actually make their own pasta, it is a good balance between thin and workable). Sprinkle each side lightly with flour. Fold the dough in half a few times, cut into 1/4-1/2 inch strips. Unfold the dough and let it sit for a moment. Cut noodles to the desired length. (We never use the cutting attachment for our Kitchen Aid; it rarely cuts through the pasta, leading to frustration and fits of cursing. If you want to try them, email me, and I will send you mine.) Put the pasta in the freezer to dry for at least 30 minutes (freezers have more uniform moisture than outside environments, making it a bit easier to anticipate how quickly the pasta will dry). You can save leftover pasta, uncooked, in freezer bags.

Beurre Monté (don't make until right before serving: see below; it's #4 in the lineup)

2-3T Water, heated in pan
4T Butter, cut into little squares (I quarter the butter and then "slice" the quarters).
Salt, to taste.
Pepper, to taste.

Heat the water until bubbles form around the outside of the sauté pan. Once the bubbles have formed, start whisking and gradually add the butter, chunk by chunk. The idea is to emulsify the butter and water, forming a thick sauce. This requires patience, but once you've learned to do it, you will have in your arsenal a versatile and delicious sauce. I don't know that there is a remedy for when the butter fails to emulsify except for swearing and trying again. This is (part of) the reason why Ben and I buy butter 2lbs at a time.

To serve: 1) set very salty water to boil (it should taste like the sea); 2) peel the squash or scoop it out of its skin (peeling makes for a more attractive finished product, especially if you can't scoop out the whole squash in one go). 3) Cut the squash into 1/2 inch squares (alternatively, leave the squash halved and put the pasta in the cavity). 4) Make the beurre blanc; 5) Drop pasta into boiling water (it cooks for considerably less time than dried pasta; be sure to check it regularly, tasting it to see if it has achieved the right texture. It should be firm and a little chewy, but it should not get stuck in your teeth). Gently toss the pasta with the squash. Plate the pasta and squash; pour a little beurre blanc over the top.

Don't forget the wine!
Or the candles!
Or the company!