Tuesday, November 16, 2010

goings-on in the kitchen

The other morning I had the honor of hearing Melissa Block of NPR make a grammatical mistake. "Medal of honors" instead of the correct "medals of honor." Caught you, Melissa. Classic mistake. This has no bearing whatsoever upon my post, but you have to revel in the small things, right?

This week we're focusing on Hannukah food for the next press release for the Joy. The principle problem is that none of us are Jewish. We love Jewish food, but when you put a bunch of non-Jews in the kitchen with their presumptions about Jewish food, you end up with things like pastrami and borscht. This is Hannukah, though, so we knew better than to make a bunch of deli food. So far, however, we have made rugelach and kugel, and there are jelly doughnuts on the way to the fryer. Do you have any idea how hard it is to photograph kugel? It's like photographing chicken livers and trying to make them look sexy.

In my personal kitchen, I have a sourdough starter going. For some reason, I always have a great deal of trouble with this. I follow the directions, I measure the quantities by weight and not volume, I keep the thing warm...I feel like I'm taking care of a very needy baby, and yet it never seems quite right. It bubbles and rises and then it deflates, produces a brownish, brackish liquid, and smells like cheese on the verge of liquefying. I'm keeping it going just to see what happens. Who knows, maybe the starter is in its teenage phase when it just won't do what you want no matter what. If it makes it to the mid twenties perhaps I can actually make bread with it.

The jelly doughnuts are calling. I'll write again soon if I'm not too bloated.

2 comments:

Cynthia S. said...

Ha! mid-twenties... something to look forward to, Meg! The needy baby description is right on. In fact, the extended metaphor of baby, teen, etc. is quite apt.

hi, from sid

Anonymous said...

Love the description of sourdough too!
And this post makes me miss the challah you made for last year's Hannukah party at Ron's.
-Camille