biting off more than I can chew

Do you grind your teeth at night? I’ve done it since I was very small—I ground my baby teeth completely flat. My mom could hear me creaking and gnashing as I slept, unaware. Even though I’ve worn my night-guard faithfully every night since I was fourteen (I can’t go to sleep without it), the grinding has caused serious damage over the years. Apparently, one’s enamel can only hold up so long to such abuse.

A few weeks ago I went in for my annual dental exam, and learned that in addition to the two crowns (complete with root canals) I already possess, I’m looking at getting four more in the next few years. My teeth are splintering from decades of grinding. Now I know why my dental floss keeps breaking—the sharp edges of cracked enamel are slicing right through it.

I came home and thought about this. A lot. This seemed like an important message.

Looking back, after I quit my office job three years ago, I devoted myself to a series of projects dear to my heart: the bakery, the farmers market, the CSA, and the Alaska farmers market non-profit. But I realize I bit off more than I could chew. Maybe because I can’t seem to digest these monstrous mouthfuls during my waking hours, my sleeping body chomps and gnashes away all night, trying to masticate them into manageable morsels.

Instead, I’m just reducing my molars to rubble.

So I’m working on more effective ways to chew and swallow my outsized mouthfuls, and I’m learning how to take smaller bites in future. I’m finding the joy in letting go of projects that will be fun for others to undertake, and I’m learning to say “no thank you” to extra obligations.

I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to STOP grinding my teeth; after all, I’m asleep when I do it. But I’m hopeful that by slowing down and simplifying my life as much as I can, I will reduce the pressure on myself, and in turn, on my molars.

I’ve been ruminating on this post for a while now (please forgive the dental puns—I promise this is the last), and was stumped for an accompanying recipe. But then I thought of the perfect solution: refreshing and delicious Watermelon Gin Fizzes! First, they require no chewing. And second, these drinks send a clear message: “RELAX! TAKE A BREAK! STOP WORRYING!” If you aren’t into alcohol, just skip the gin—these yummy drinks are wonderful either way. Just make sure you sit down and relax when you drink yours. Sip slowly and imagine melting into your chair.

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EAT WILD SALMON!

You probably already know that I sell my Rise & Shine Bakery bread at the South Anchorage Farmers’ Market during the summer. As the farmers’ market reporter, I also write the weekly email newsletter that gets posted on our website.

A couple of weeks ago two women from Trout Unlimited contacted me about holding an event to promote Bristol Bay salmon at our farmers’ market. The event, “Eat Wild!,” is to be held this Saturday, June 27, and is designed to build consumer demand for wild salmon. By building support for the fishery, they hope to help protect Southwest Alaska’s Bristol Bay watershed from the threat of large-scale mining. Trout Unlimited, partnering with our Arctic Choice Seafoods, will be giving away free samples of grilled Bristol Bay sockeye salmon along with recipes and information about Bristol Bay and the risks this fishery faces.

They asked me if I wanted to submit a recipe for their event—and I just happened to have a great recipe ready! At the market last weekend I picked up a glorious sockeye salmon filet so I could make it again and take a photo for you. YUM! I’m definitely planning to pick up another salmon filet this Saturday! You can feed yourself like a King (pun intended) and get yourself on the moral high ground—just by buying wild Alaskan salmon!

The event is from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Arctic Choice Seafood booth at the South Anchorage Farmers Market, at the Subway/Cellular One Sports Centre near the corner of Old Seward Highway and O’Malley Road. More information is available at www.whywild.org.

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Farmer Boy

I’m reading Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Farmer Boy to Meredith again. She’s only four years old (well, almost five) and this is the third time I’m reading it to her. You might assume this is because Meredith loves it so. You’d be right… but the more salient reason is because I love it so. Somehow I grew up without reading this book! I read all of the other Laura Ingalls Wilder books, starting with Little House in the Big Woods (which I think is my favorite, actually), but somehow missed this one, the story of Almanzo Wilder’s boyhood in upstate New York. When I read it to Meredith the first time, I was utterly captivated… and as with all books I love dearly, I felt quite bereft at the end. Luckily I have a willing audience for repeat readings, and having just finished it for the second time a couple of weeks ago, we started all over again at the beginning.

Since the Farmers Market is just starting up in earnest, it’s an especially good time to be reading this book. It’s the story of all the work 10-year-old Almanzo can already do, and what he aspires to do, on his father’s farm… milking the cows, feeding the stock, breaking his team of young calves to the yoke, helping cut ice for the ice house, collecting sap and boiling maple syrup, driving the plow horses to harrow the fields, planting the crops, shearing sheep, weeding the vegetables, picking berries, harvesting the crops, threshing the wheat, and hauling wood from the wood lot.

This vast amount of constantly changing and physically demanding work makes for very big appetites, and Almanzo’s mother is an amazing cook! (I add here, that in addition to all the cooking and baking for her family, she cheerfully does all the other work expected of a farm wife: spinning and knitting and weaving their sheeps’ wool into wonderfully warm and durable cloth, sewing all the family’s clothes and linens, doing the washing and cleaning, making soap, candles, and butter, storing the vegetables, and so on.) Anyway, every day, with the help of Almanzo’s two sisters, Almanzo’s mother puts three huge and fantastic meals on the table. These meals are often described in mouth-watering detail, and these sections are Meredith’s and my particular favorites.  Meredith will often say after an account of a particularly wonderful meal, “I wish I was Almanzo!” So do I! Here are a few of our favorite sections (and these aren’t even the Thanksgiving or Christmas dinners!).

Almanzo ate the sweet, mellow baked beans. He ate the bit of salt pork that melted like cream in his mouth. He ate mealy boiled potatoes, with brown ham-gravy. He ate the ham. He bit deep into velvety bread spread with sleek butter, and he ate the crisp golden crust. He demolished a tall heap of pale mashed turnips, and a hill of stewed yellow pumpkin. Then he sighed, and tucked his napkin deeper into the neckband of his red waist. And he ate plum preserves and strawberry jam, and grape jelly, and spiced watermelon-rind pickles. He felt very comfortable inside. Slowly he ate a large piece of pumpkin pie. [from “Winter Evening”]

[Almanzo and his older brother, Royal] worked so hard [packing ice with sawdust in the icehouse] that the exercise kept them warm, but long before noon Almanzo was hungrier than wolves. He couldn’t stop work long enough to run into the house for a doughnut. All of his middle was hollow, with a gnawing inside it.
He knelt on the ice, pushing sawdust into the cracks with his mittened hands, and pounding it down with a stick as fast as he could, and he asked Royal:
“What would you like best to eat?”
They talked about spareribs, and turkey with dressing, and baked beans, and crackling cornbread, and other good things. But Almanzo said that what he liked most in the world was fried apples’n’onions.
When, at last, they went in to dinner, there on the table was a big dish of them! Mother knew what he liked best, and she had cooked it for him.
Almanzo ate four large helpings of apples’n’onions fried together. He ate roast beef and brown gravy, and mashed potatoes and creamed carrots and boiled turnips, and countless slices of buttered bread with crab-apple jelly.
“It takes a good deal to feed a growing boy,” Mother said. And she put a thick slice of birds’-nest pudding on his bare plate, and handed him the pitcher of sweetened cream specked with nutmeg. Almanzo poured the heavy cream over the apples nested in the fluffy crust. The syrupy brown juice curled up around the edges of the cream. Almanzo took up his spoon and ate every bit. [from “Filling the Ice House”]

When Almanzo trudged into the kitchen next morning with two brimming milk-pails, Mother was making stacked pancakes because this was Sunday.
The big blue platter on the stove’s hearth was full of plump sausage cakes; Eliza Jane was cutting apples pies and Alice was dishing up oatmeal, as usual. But the little blue platter stood hot on the back of the stove, and ten stacks of pancakes rose in tall towers on it.
Ten pancakes cooked on the smoking griddle, and as fast as they were done, Mother added another cake to each stack and buttered it lavishly and covered it with maple sugar. Butter and sugar melted together and soaked the fluffy pancakes and dripped all down their crisp edges.
That was stacked pancakes. Almanzo liked them better than any other kind of pancakes.
Mother kept on frying them till the others had eaten their oatmeal. She could never make too many stacked pancakes. They all ate pile after pile of them… [from “Sunday”]

So… I tried to think of something that I make that is like Almanzo’s mother’s wonderful meals..  I surely don’t have a farm family to feed, and while I don’t make cornbread as often as Almanzo’s mother does (and she makes it so often she just tosses the ingredients together in a bowl, never needing to measure them), I do love it! I hope you enjoy it, too.

If you haven’t already read Farmer Boy I hope you’ll check it out; it’s inspiring and heart-warming and wonderful. And then I hope you’ll take the time to visit a farmers market in your neighborhood! I’ll bet the wonderfully fresh produce will inspire you to cook and eat wonderful meals with your loved ones!

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Camping on Memorial Day

Many weeks ago we made a plan with Margo and her husband Andy to go camping together on Memorial Day weekend. They planned to go to Eklutna, and we were excited to join them, especially since our four-year-old daughters are great friends. The two girls together are as self-entertaining as you could hope, and Margo and I regularly exploit this phenomenon.

Anyway, Eklutna is a beautiful spot, not very far from Anchorage, with huge Lake Eklutna ringed with steep, snow-capped mountains, and lots of trails for hiking and biking. The weather lately has been glorious, and we hoped for nice weather for the weekend. We brought bikes for the kids and for the grownups, the canoe, and hiking and running gear. We figured that if we left on Friday morning, we’d have plenty of time to get a campsite.

We figured wrong, though. Every campsite was occupied, and we were crushed! We’d been looking forward to this little adventure for so long, and didn’t just want to go home! We guessed that if we tried another campground farther north, like Nancy Lakes, it would also be completely full.

We didn’t know what to do! Even as I was feeling terribly disappointed, I was thinking about the fact that I was in this predicament not just as a potential camper, but also as a parent. I had to keep it together and try and stay positive—at least on the outside. When Meredith was asking me “what are we going to do, Mom?” I didn’t know what we were going to do, but I desperately wanted to think of SOMETHING to do! I had blown it not just for myself, but for her, as well! She and I had made homemade graham crackers for s’mores, and an apple pie. We’d cooked and prepared and packed all our stuff for the whole long weekend…

But we had to stay at Eklutna for the day at least, until Andy could finish his work day and drive up to meet us in the afternoon. So Dan went for a bike ride, I went for a run, and Margo graciously stayed with the girls while they sped around the campground on their bikes.

I needn’t have worried… when Andy arrived, he had a great idea! We could drive north toward Talkeetna and stay on Margo’s sister’s cabin property! We couldn’t get into the cabin, but we didn’t need to! We had a great time camping in the woods alongside their driveway, sunning ourselves on the dock on the little lake next to their cabin, roasting marshmallows in a firepit that the menfolk constructed, and biking on the beautiful new paved trail along the road to Talkeetna, admiring the views of Denali.

One of the meals we ate was this succulent and hearty salad. OK, so it’s not exactly typical camping food—but it was a car-camping trip, after all!

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our big wild ride

Several days ago Dan and I had the opportunity to take our tandem bicycle for a ride without pulling Meredith in the bike trailer. As you might guess, these occasions are relatively infrequent, and although we love the opportunity to get out as a family, Meredith at almost-five-years-old is getting not only weighty, but also not as excited about spending time in the bike trailer. I can’t blame her—she has her own bike now, and would rather bike than ride!

So, with several hours to spend on our own, we popped the tandem on the truck rack and headed for Indian, ten or so miles south of Anchorage, where the bike trail along Turnagain Arm begins. (Yes, we could bike to the trailhead, but then we wouldn’t have as much energy or time to enjoy the trail!) It was a beautiful sunny day, cool and crisp at 10 in the morning, and we were having a wonderful ride. In case you don’t live here in Alaska, you’re biking along a steep-sided arm of Cook Inlet, with glorious steep mountains on each side, snow-capped and streaming with waterfalls.

We’ve been tandem biking together since 1996, and we love it—you never have to hurry, you never have to wait, and you can chat as you bike. And after the first few weeks of learning to bike together back before we were married, we don’t fight on the bike anymore. There is a saying about tandem biking: “wherever your relationship is going, it’ll get there faster on a tandem.” I think the same applies for canoeing together.

As we were coasting down a steep hill not far from the end of the trail in Girdwood, Dan (captaining, in the front position) suddenly slammed on the brakes. I was stoking (pedaling in the rear position), so couldn’t see what was ahead on the trail—I just hung on and tried not to drive my chin into his back. But then we slowed down and I could peer over Dan’s shoulder—and there was a very large lynx, trotting down the side of the bike trail! She (he?) heard us then, turned around to look at us, and then bounded up onto the side of the trail and into the trees. Gorgeous!

We rode into Girdwood, turned around, and on the way back, we were of course admiring the views up the mountain and across the Arm… and there was a woman on a mountain bike stopped, looking straight up the side of the mountain. We of course looked up—and there were four bears, far above us on the hillside, rolling and sliding and playing in a snowfield! They were so far away there was no worry, but we were close enough to watch them play.

WHAT A DAY!! We are so lucky to live in Alaska!

When we got home, we ate this wonderful salad for lunch on the deck. YUM!

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Chef Dan

One of the things that I’ve been letting go of lately is my self-imposed obligation to make a really fabulous dinner every night. I mean, I always want to make something yummy and healthy, but lately I’ve been doing less browsing in my cookbooks, and resorting more often to old favorites—usually SIMPLE old favorites. As this has happened, Dan has suddenly become more interested in cooking again. Since Meredith was born, and our time got tighter, he’s been more likely to focus on things other than cooking in his less frequent moments of free time. Now, maybe because I’m not menu-planning for every day of the week, there is more space for him to cook? Or maybe it’s because Meredith is almost five years old, and there is more time in his day? At any rate, it’s wonderful.

He’s got this great new theme going on, too. In the past, he would generally choose relatively exotic recipes that would involve a trip to the grocery store (or several grocery stores) to get the ingredients. His latest thing is to find something in the pantry or freezer that has been hanging around for a while, and find something to do with it. Oh joy of joys!

A couple of weeks ago he made a dish of white beans (from the freezer) on garlic-scrubbed toast, topped with sardines (from the pantry) and a drizzle scallions sautéed in olive oil (the scallions had been languishing in the ‘fridge). This week he got the idea to use up a big can of hominy, and ended up making this great vegetarian posole! He used up a tub of cooked kidney beans from the freezer, as well as a bunch of carrots and celery.

I’m not sure what he’ll decide to cook next. Will it be the buckwheat groats I bought several years ago for a reason I don’t remember? Or maybe that box of whole wheat couscous from the Pleistocene Era? (It can’t go bad, can it?) What about that celery root in the vegetable drawer that has held up remarkably well for the last several weeks? Go, Sweetie, GO! Am I well-married, or what? 

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Bliss Yoga with Margo

So I’ve been writing to you lately about how I’ve been trying to take care of myself… by saying “no thank you,” and letting go of some obligations. We closed the bakery for a holiday in February, and after unsuccessfully trying to start a practice of sitting still and meditating to try and calm myself, I decided that committing to a daily practice of some relaxing yoga might be a better alternative. My goodness, it’s hard to sit still!

I’d been doing a little yoga now and then for the past couple of years with my friend Margo. She is an amazing teacher, and her lessons focus more on relaxation and body alignment than other classes I’ve taken. Rather than getting a workout from her lessons, I’d get an amazing sense of calm. My body would feel more aligned and healthy afterwards, like I’d just given myself a massage. But I wasn’t good about keeping up a regular practice—my life felt too busy and frantic, and I just couldn’t add one more thing.

But by February, with all the things I’d been juggling, this wasn’t an option. I needed something to help me relax and find some balance in my life! So I called Margo and asked her if I could take weekly lessons, and committed to doing my own daily practice during the week.  Luckily, she was willing! Our lessons are different than any yoga I’ve ever done. Most of them begin with shavasana, relaxation pose, lying down with my knees draped over a tall stack of blankets so my back slowly melts into the floor. After I’ve completely melted away the tension of the day, we begin doing stretches and poses that are designed to release tightness that I’ve inevitably created by running, biking, or cross-country skiing. Margo’s yoga is not about getting exercise, but rather, to relax from the exercise that I do at other times. And it’s about the mental relaxation, too.

Each week Margo prepares a little handout of our lesson to put in my yoga notebook, with the week’s sequence illustrated by little stick figures so I can remember the poses when I get home. That way I can use any of my lessons in my daily practice, depending on what I feel like doing. And Margo always says, if I don’t have time to do anything else, just do a 15 minute shavasana. (That’s her yoga recipe for busy moms.)

I have to say that doing a weekly private yoga lesson with Margo, and then a little bit from the yoga notebook we’ve created each day (even if it is just the relaxation part) has made a huge difference to my body AND my mind. I’m not walking around all stiff and sore and stove-up from running and biking—instead, my back is relaxed and feels strong and healthy! And the relaxation every day has made a big difference to my mental space, too. I’m more prepared to meet the challenges of the day, whether I’m baking hundreds of loaves of bread, dealing with a missing CSA vegetable box, or comforting a hungry and tired Meredith at the end of a long, busy day… I have more resilience and calm with which to handle it. Thank you, Margo!

If this kind of yoga sounds like your cup of tea, Margo is teaching some small ten-week classes this summer in her little yoga studio in her house. Each class is limited to six participants, so you get a really wonderful and intimate experience. If you live in the Anchorage area, you can still sign up—she has a few spaces left for the classes starting at the end of May.

Bliss Yoga with Margo Sorum
Cost: $130 for 10 classes (classes are limited to 6 participants)
Tuesdays, 4:00-5:15pm from May 26 to August 4 (No class June 23)
Thursdays, 4:00-5:15pm from May 26 to August 4 (No class June 25)

Please email or call Margo for more information, or to register for her class: or 907-947-2030.

Since this blog is all about wonderful things I’ve learned from Margo, I figured I’d include a great recipe she’s shared with me! It’s a new way to make toasted cheese sandwiches! And are they ever blissfull!

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Mother’s Day Part II

I wrote already about my mom and her clam spaghetti recipe, and now I’m going to write about my mother-in-law, Karen! She lives in Maryland, but is very accommodating about making the long journey to visit us (and Meredith) frequently.

Last winter I got an email from Carol Lambert that she wanted to make a painting of our Rise & Shine Bakery fruited almond bread. I was thrilled, since I already loved her beautiful paintings of Farmers Market produce from the summertime. I couldn’t wait to see what the painting would look like! Turned out that I didn’t even have to wait until it was completed to see it, since Carol was working on it as a demonstration at Charlie’s Club 25 Cafe Gallery last winter! (I already described that outing in my pomegranate post.)

So, a couple of weeks after the fruited almond bread painting was supposed to have been finished, I emailed Carol and asked if the painting was for sale. She wrote back “Sorry, it’s already been sold!” and I was surprised that it has sold so quickly, a bit disappointed, but also happy for her that it had been sold. “Oh, that’s great,” I said, “I’m just glad it went to a good home!” I did wonder, though… was it one of our bread customers? And if so, funny that they didn’t mention it to us.

So a few months went by, and Dan’s and my wedding anniversary was approaching (it’s on the Spring Equinox—March 21st). Karen had arranged for Meredith (who is four years old) to take us out for dinner to Sack’s Café for our anniversary—perhaps not the most romantic anniversary celebration, but certainly a fun one, since Meredith loves to eat, and we all love the food at Sack’s. Meredith was even in charge of calling to make the reservations (Karen had forewarned the staff at Sack’s, so it all went very smoothly). The only thing Meredith was concerned about was that she couldn’t drive us to the restaurant. Her grandmother assured us that her daddy could drive, but that Meredith could take care of everything else.

We arrived right on time, festively dressed and ready for a great meal. The hostess tried to get Meredith to come with her (I thought for crayons and the kids’ placemat) but Meredith was a bit too shy, so we all sat down and enjoyed a wonderful dinner. Right before dinner, the waitress showed up with a HUGE flat package, wrapped in colorful jungle-themed paper. It looked like a puzzle, but it was way too heavy. And it didn’t rattle. What on earth?

We opened it up… and would you believe, it was the painting of our fruited almond bread! Karen had bought the painting all those months ago, and had conspired with Carol, the artist, about wrapping it, writing a card, and dropping it off at Sack’s. Not to mention prepping the folks at Sack’s to deliver it to us! We were so thrilled, surprised, and grateful! What an amazing and wonderful, thoughtful and beautiful gift!

Even though there’s a four-hour time difference, we called Karen as soon as we got home—not caring if we woke up her up to tell her how surprised we were, how we loved the painting, and how much fun we had at dinner. Luckily she was still awake!

Thank you, Karen! Every time I look up at the painting on the living room wall I smile and think of you! Happy Mother’s Day to you, Karen—and to all you other mothers out there!

Mother’s Day

This time of year I always think a lot about my mom, not just because it’s Mother’s Day, but because it’s springtime, and time to be planting seeds and getting the garden ready. My mom was an amazing vegetable gardener, and this time of year you could usually find her in the greenhouse. I remember the smell of the greenhouse—the rich smell of the dark earth in the big raised beds on each side. In the spring there was usually a faint scent of fish fertilizer, and later in the season, my nose would be filled with the rich aroma of tomato plants. My mom would spend hours each day after teaching school, planting seeds and transplanting little seedlings into bigger pots. She would talk to her little babies, encouraging them to thrive. Later, when school was out, she would spend much of her free time in the garden: weeding, watering, and harvesting, and chatting with the chickens in the yard next to the garden.

On Mother’s Day, though, the focus was on flowers, not on vegetables. Every year we’d get up and make breakfast for her (although she never liked to eat it in bed). After presenting her with our gifts, we’d hop in the car for a tour of the plant nurseries in town. Mid-May in Anchorage is still fairly cool, and it was so pleasant to browse through the huge, humid and fragrantly warm greenhouses, admiring the beautiful varieties of annual flowers and hanging baskets. My brother and I were always allowed to pick out a couple of six-packs of annuals to plant in our own little flower gardens. Even though our little flower patches would get rather weedy toward the end of the summer (we were sick of working in the vegetable garden by that time, too), each spring brought new excitement for our little gardens. Ben usually picked impatiens of some kind—the neon pink or orange varieties, and would then plant lots of nasturtiums from seed. My mom loved when I picked allysum, those mounds of tiny white flowers that smell much more beautiful than they look. We thought it was neat that their name was like mine, and I would usually get some pansies to plant along with them. Of course my mom would always plant lots of flowers from seed, too—cosmos and snapdragons, lobelia and marigolds to fill hanging baskets and planter boxes. And when she would inevitably have many more seedlings to transplant than she could possibly use, she could never throw them away, but distributed them to her friends and neighbors.

While I don’t plant many annuals (and Dan is in charge of our small vegetable garden), I do love my perennial garden. Some of the flowers are already beginning to show some buds!  I’ll write more about that later, though. For now, I’m wishing you and your mothers a very Happy Mother’s Day!

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My rhubarb is up!

Rhubarb, that harbinger of spring… or for those of us living in Alaska, of summer! We’re thrilled to see it poking up out of the ground! I know, these little crinkled leaves don’t look like much, but once they get going, the stalks really shoot up! Since not very many types of fruit grow in Alaska (and strawberries and raspberries are still a long way off), we’re happy for any fruit-like substance that can eke out an existence in our backyards.

We’re even more excited than usual, because of the unusually warm and sunny weather we’ve had these last several days. Everyone I know has gone stark-raving mad, capering about in the sunshine and soaking up the rays as much as ever they can. I think we’ve gotten more sun this past week than most of us got in all of last year’s cold and rainy summer. Oh, does it feel good!

But rhubarb popping up in the garden does come with a certain sobering responsibility. Suddenly, I remember that I have several bags of sliced rhubarb in the freezer from last summer. And if I don’t use it up now, before the next crop comes in, I’ll be even more overwhelmed with rhubarb than usual. My rhubarb plants are divisions of my mom’s, planted over thirty years ago. I have no idea where they came from, but they are wonderful, with fat, tender, cherry-red stalks that produce all summer long (if I make sure to break off the flower stalks as they come up). If I’m not diligent about cooking and eating rhubarb and processing it to freeze, the plants are likely to overwhelm the entire front of my house.

So! We’ve been eating rhubarb crisp, apple-rhubarb crisp, rhubarb coffee cake, and rhubarb-apple pie. Here’s my recipe for rhubarb crisp, in case you still have some in your freezer from last year… and a variation with apples that I like even better. But if your house is in danger from being overtaken by a rhubarb plant, I recommend the former recipe. It uses more rhubarb.

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