All I want is a buttermilk biscuit with honey

Confession: Mike and I have been doing a food detox for the last couple weeks. No carbs, no sugar (or sugar substitutes), no dairy, no legumes, no ingredients you don't recognize. Only fresh fruit, veggies, and meat. It's both torturous and simple. The torture comes when I douse Jude's steaming whole-wheat buttermilk biscuit in honey or slather peanut butter on his perfectly toasted bread and then smear on a huge dollop of home-made peach jam. (He looks at me like: "Mom, geez, just give me the dang sandwich...and back up a few inches while you're at it.) I almost get close enough to snort it. As if it would do any good in my nasal cavity. (Pull it together).......I love how it has forced me to realize how many carbs and sugar I would normally eat, as I am passing up chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganache frosting and Halloween candy and pizza and and and. And. I also love how it has forced me to be a little more inventive in the kitchen. Prior to this cleanse, I had not made my own almond milk. And I am enamored with almond milk from scratch. I blend the almonds up with a few dates and then steep the milk with a vanilla bean. I would guzzle it by the gallon. And Mike and I made some ice cream last night by steeping coconut cream with a vanilla bean (vanilla beans have changed my life) and then blending it with some dates (running it through the ice cream maker) and THEN topping it with roasted almonds and raisins. It may be that it was tasty because our brains have been deprived and desperate for a sugar fix. It's possible. But I'm willing to embrace that. On the savory side, I made some rockin' cauliflower "mashed potatoes" with roasted garlic and macadamia nuts. And gravy without flour. And a pork loin covered in prosciutto and stuffed with kale, shitake mushrooms, and apples on a bed of roasted apples. And I like making dressing for salads out of cashews. And I like poached eggs. And avocado with just a little sprinkling of sea salt. And I guess Halloween candy isn't really worth it (although I'm sure the chocolate cake with ganache was...). The point is. I'm glad I know I have a little self-control and that I can be a little inventive in the kitchen. And so help me, I better be sleeping better, bubbling with energy, and have the skin of a baby's bum by the end of this thing. Confession over. Time to go nibble on a picture of a buttermilk biscuit with honey.

I may or may not have bought *another* bushel of peaches today to make into fruit leather. $12 at the local fruit stand. I may or may not already have 14 pint jars of peach jam and 26 quarts of bottled peaches, summer's sweetness preserved for winter's grey. I like to think of eating them in an igloo. The peachy hues set off by the blue ice. The jealous penguins looking on, flapping with envy. My grandmother showed me how to scald and peel and bottle and steam while she whirled around the kitchen, an effective storm of pulling order out of chaos. After she pulled the bottles from the heat, the sun streamed through the glass jars to reveal golden orbs of soft flesh. Such beauty. When I open each bottle this winter, I will think of her, apron tied daintly around her waist, peach after peach moving through her able hands, her laugh filling the steaming kitchen, a communion of sweetness.

A fridge of one's own

After my trip to the market yesterday, I couldn't bear the thought of putting the neatly stacked cartons of blackberries and svelte triumvirate of darkling eggplants into our fridge. Nor the frilly lettuce nor the dark, leathery avocados. No, not with the momento mori still life, "Ode to the demise of a very bland fruit salad" (among other fecund items) bursting into life (death?) on the back shelf. So, with grocery sacks strewn throughout our living room, I pulled every last item from our fridge (the bread heels in long, plastic bags, the half-eaten lime, the ketchup bottle), knelt on the cold tile floor and scrubbed. Like a pregnant Cinderella. I ripped drawer after drawer after shelf and drenched the entire kitchen with my enthusiastic and deadly use of the sink sprayer and suds (hours after, Mike found water hanging from some far cabinet corner and looked at me with arched brow). Now, having finished, having categorized and placed everything back in at right angles, I can't stop staring. All day I peek in to see the glow, to see the quiet, crimson strawberries and long green cucumbers sitting silently in their cool palace.

Molten Chocolate Cake

My friends, this cake is not messing around...I've made it twice now and it has rocked my world both times. Add some fresh strawberries and vanilla bean ice cream on top and you will melt with the gooey chocolate insides.

The Politics of the Plate

Just came across this astonishing article in Gourmet. I should have known my winter rubies came at a price.

Ruby Romas in the Dead of Winter

Last night on the way home from work, I stopped by the grocery store and bought 23.61 lbs. of Roma tomatoes. Six stuffed produce bags full of beautiful, fist-sized, ruby romas in the dead of winter. The plastic bags stretched and squeaked as I carried them around. Shoppers passing me as I felt for firmness, bruises and blights made odd comments about my apparent love for tomatoes. "Somebody clearly loooovves salsa." No, stranger. Marinara. And I can make lots of it for 50 cents a pound.

Last night Mike and I de-seeded and diced for hours, our hands slick with juice. Our house filled with the smell of sauteing tomatoes, garlic, and basil (my basil plant had a very sad and sudden demise this week...it's still too fresh to talk about...). And we only got half-way through. A huge silver bowl of winter jewels awaits us tonight. We're keeping our unexpected bounty for when winter's white blanket thickens over our small warmth. Summer's gold hidden up winter's fleecy sleeve.