Hot Earthy Mama

It's almost been a whole month since I posted! I can't believe it. I've barely known what to write about - mostly I've been chasing down the boy and going on pointless job interviews. The biggest news at our little house is that he's eating! He's eating real food and oh my GOD he is eating all the freaking time! I can't keep up. I need a bigger food processor - because, of course, jarred baby food isn't good enough for my little squiggles. Oh, no. He's got to be pumped full of food from mama's hands alone (or boob... Sorry.)

That and I've started baking. I don't really know where that comes from except that if you ever read my other blog you might be familiar with my plight of the piece of crap stove at our last home. It was pretty much the worst oven this side of colonial Williamsburg. Seriously, not only was the temperature widely inaccurate, but it vacillated between tepid to scorching hot without so much as a tap on the temperature gauge. It sucked the big one and the entire time I lived there I ate take out and char-grilled food whenever possible.

Now, I'm here. And I love it! The oven is not only functional, but gas. I can control the temperature. Like whenever I want. If I put the knob on 325 - voila! 325 it becomes and STAYS! It's like a whole new world. I've been twirling around the house in harem pants while petting my pretend pet tiger Raja. And singing. Which both Matt and the baby really appreciate.

So, the baking. It started with brownies, specifically brownie mixes because I doubted my skill and patience. I learned that Ghiradelli makes the absolute best mix, plus they don't have any of the dreaded partially-hydrogenated soybean oil - aka (da - da - duuuummm) TRANS FATS! Scared ya, didn't I? In a pinch, with the evil fats, the Target Market Pantry dark chocolate ones are about second best. They're even better if you add about a tablespoon of Ancho chile powder. It doesn't really make them spicy per se, but they do pump up the cocoa flavor.

Next, I moved on to cakes. I tried my hand at the Nuetella pound cake in the recent issue of Lund's and Byerly's Real Food. Mine wasn't quite as pretty as theirs, but boy was it tasty! That very evening, because mastering cake wasn't enough for one day - we had friends coming over and I decided to master pizza, too! What could be so difficult? Following a recipe that I picked up in the very last Gourmet magazine (sob!) I pulled out my mandolin and sliced yellow potatoes that I then soaked in cold water. A leek got a similar treatment. I stretched out my pizza dough onto a cookie sheet and drizzled it with some tasty and cheap olive oil that I picked up at Trader Joe's. I layered up the potatoes, rosemary, leek and a generous amount of salt and pepper. Everything turned out amazingly well. Thank goodness they were good friends we had over, because the gracious hostess in me took the night off and I absolutely gushed about my many obvious talents and had the added bonus of getting to explain to my musician friend that a mandolin, in this case, was not something he'd seen recently.

So, of course, since everything had been going so well, I geared up for the most exciting holiday for a big eater like me - Thanksgiving! Woo hoo. I picked up two birds from my favorite meat purveyors, Bar 5 Farm and then headed over to my mother in laws. I tenderly massaged my recently happy birds. Love. I poured oodles of love and a little of vegetable oil onto them. I generously dusted them with seasonings like so much pixie dust and held my happy thoughts near to my heart. I could fly! Or maybe I was high from snorting too much Sel de Cuisine.

You can see where this is going, right? Hopes - high. Confidence - way too high. Total failure, right? WRONG! The baking goddess streak continues! Check this action out:

Can you believe it? BOTH of the birds were perfect.

Not that the both made it to the table unscathed:

Either there's imminent disaster, or I'm really on to something here. Even the home made dressing I made was perfect and I've never even made it before. I mean, I used whole grain bread! Healthy! It should have been terrible.

In the past twenty four hours I've made homemade baby food of apples, bananas and pears. Well, pear. We didn't know if he would like it yet. Plus, my own monster cookies. Oatmeal, chocolate chips, peanut butter and both brown and white sugar. Heaven. HEAVEN!

Next, I'm going to attempt bread, although it terrifies me. Something about the yeast is intimidating. Little, belching organisms scare me. Except for my child, of course. Maybe I shouldn't have shoveled those bananas into his bird mouth quite so quickly.

(Next time, I promise. I'll control the excessive exclamation points. Really.)