There’s a Lebanese shop in my town that’s part restaurant and part grocery store, and it’s become a reliable option for lunch these days. If I’m out running errands, I like to stop in for a plate of hummus, warm pita, and a couple of the sides that look good that day, like fattoush salad or stuffed grape leaves.

More often than not, I take a walk through the aisles and pick out something to bring home, like salty feta cheese, tender dates, orange blossom water, or pine nuts. They also sell large containers of za’atar, the Middle Eastern spice mix that’s perfect for all sorts of things: meats, veggies, dips, even hard boiled eggs. The version I picked up recently was a red za’atar, made with thyme, sesame, aleppo pepper, sumac, and cumin.

Just a few days earlier I’d come across a post about za’atar on Cardamom & Tea, one of my favorite food blogs of late. Like many spice blends, this one has been subject to variations and interpretations over the years, but traditional versions always include wild thyme, which isn’t the same kind you’ll find in the U.S.

“Lots of folks (my family included) have learned to make do with the ingredients available in their new home after immigrating, and za’atar made from French thyme out of necessity is no less authentic than za’atar grown in the hills of the Levant. Authenticity comes form a place of love, memory, and honor, and not from authority.”

This reminder came on the heels of finishing a new collection of essays, Eat Joy: Stories & Comfort Food From 31 Celebrated Writers, (affiliate link) which I heartily recommend for yourself or as a gift. The book celebrates all the ways food brings joy, even when we’re in the midst of moves, relationships falling apart, loss, or feeling homesick, and how we piece things back together again.

In an essay titled “Leaves,” Diana Abu-Jaber recounts a story told by her grandmother, about the Palestinians fleeing from their villages in 1948. “They ate the herbs that grew in the fields—wild thyme and oregano. Za’atar. Just leaves.” Her aunt called this flight the hejira—part escape, part migration, part pilgrimage. As an adult, Abu-Jaber clings to this resonant word through life’s ups and downs, like times when she’s moved across country for new job or left two previous husbands.

On coming home through food, she writes:

“I prefer the solace of cooking, which can offer both freedom and comfort. Like my exiled auntie who prepared the dishes of her lost childhood, whenever I’ve gone on hejira, I’ve found myself back in spice markets and import stores and falafel stands … The spices bring back memory—the oldest, shining memories, that came long before any painful new mistakes and reversals.”

Cooking, it seems, can help us travel through time—back through our own memories and those of our ancestors. It’s an incredible thing to feel not only rooted in your own kitchen, but aware of those who came before you. I often think of my own grandmother when I’m stirring pancake batter in her old yellow Pyrex bowl, which I’ve inherited.

All this was in my mind as I walked into my neighborhood Lebanese cafe for a container of thick, strained yogurt. My heritage may hail from another region, but that’s the other beautiful thing about food: even cooking another country’s cuisine, it’s still possible to find ways to connect those flavors to your own unique stories, and appreciate our shared humanity.

Za’atar by Zayt

As you can see, this is more a method than a complicated recipe. So long as you have good ingredients, you can easily put this together for a light lunch, appetizer, or serve it alongside grilled meats. I added toasted pine nuts for a bit of crunch. And here is a note from the author:

“These days, many stores carry containers of lebeneh, but it’s very easy to make. Simply place a container of plain, full-fat yogurt into a lined coffee filter or several layers of paper towels inside a mesh strainer over a bowl. Overnight, the liquid will drain out. Discard. The remaining yogurt will have thickened into a creamy, mild dip.”

Ingredients
Big scoop of lebeneh
Drizzle or three of good olive oil (I used Fat Gold)
Small heap of za’atar
Fresh loaf of pita bread, cut into triangles

Instructions
Place the lebeneh in a bowl; make a trough. Sprinkle with za’atar. Dip in with pita or chopped-up crudités. Serves about two, depending on appetite.

Welcome to Cook the Book, an occasional series where I cook my way through books I love and explore how poetry surfaces in the kitchen. This post contains affiliate links, so if you click through and make a purchase, I’ll receive a small commission.

This blog post could very well be titled Instant Pot: A Love Story, because in the course of a year my adoration of this machine has grown by leaps and bounds. It wasn’t love at first sight though …

The first thing we should clear up about the Instant Pot is it will not make your dinner instantly. Yes, you can cook rice in about nine minutes, tortilla soup in about six minutes, and carrots in about three minutes, but here’s where the learning curve comes in: warming up. The process of allowing the Instant Pot to pressurize takes roughly 10 minutes, so you need to tack that on to whatever you’re making, as well as some release time on the back end.

Some recipes call for a manual release, which is when you press a magic button and all the steam comes whizzing out in about two minutes. Other recipes have you delay the release, and others don’t have you touch the release button at all, which can take up to 20 minutes. Also, some recipes call for using the sauté function first, so everything essentially happens in one pot. This is ideal for making cleanup easier, but adds cooking time.

But once you learn how it works, there’s a lot to love. When I first started using it, I followed the advice of Heidi Swanson who suggested trying one new recipe a week to keep from getting overwhelmed. Overall, using an Instant Pot significantly cuts cooking times, especially for dishes like braised meats and stock. In about an hour, you can have an enriching broth ready to freeze, and in about an hour and a half, garlicky pork, which would normally take three hours to braise in the oven.

My favorite thing about the Instant Pot is being able to walk away. Normally, I like tending to the pots. After all, when it comes to finding poetry in the kitchen, the actual process of cooking itself is where much of it is revealed—the chopping, the stirring, the listening, the staring off into the yard as you wash dishes.

But sometimes it’s nice to not have to worry about turning the flame up or down. The Instant Pot gives you some time back. Once everything is locked up inside and the appropriate buttons are pushed, you don’t have to think about anything until it’s time to plate your dinner. You can reallocate the time you’d normally spend puttering around the kitchen to other domestic or creative tasks. If you’d like, you can walk straight to the bookshelf and pull down a book of poetry, reading it while you wait.

I was scared of the not cooking at first, of tossing everything into a pot and trusting its precision, never having to come check on things, to stir, to taste as I go. In many ways, cooking with an Instant Pot is an act of trust. But there’s also a satisfying rush that washes over your body when you turn the lid and lift it open.

An Instant Pot will never replace my Dutch oven, its enamel, its heaviness, its history. But an Instant Pot does offer a gift many of us are in short supply of: time. We can leave the kitchen and tend to other parts of our lives. Sometimes I write or read, other days I vacuum or fold laundry. I’ll go upstairs and play with my son for a few minutes longer, or cook something in the morning so it’s ready for dinner in the evening. For giving the ability to walk away, I’m grateful.

Other recipes I enjoyed from this book:

• Steel Cut Oats: I make steel cut oats in the Instant Pot about once a week. The whole process takes about 30 minutes in total (so keep that in mind if it’s a school/work day) but it’s nice to have a warm breakfast option no matter the season.

• Tangerine Carrots With Ricotta, Chives, and Walnuts: These carrots cook in 3 minutes. Seriously. Such an easy side! I’ve also made it a meal by tossing the carrots with quinoa and baby kale for a salad situation.

• Garlicky Cuban Pork: I saw this recipe when it was printed in the New York Times and remember my mouth watering. This is one of those secret weapon recipes that’s so easy to make it’s almost laughable, but everyone clamors for more, tells you repeatedly how good it as, and asks for the recipe.

• Indian Butter Shrimp: The shrimp are marinated in yogurt and lime, and the tomato-based sauce is full of flavor thanks to ginger, lime, and a generous hunk of butter.

Black Beans With Green Chiles and Cumin

Barely adapted from Dinner In an Instant by Melissa Clark

I wanted to share this recipe because it’s one of the unsung heroes of the cookbook, I think. First of all, it comes without a picture, so it’s easy to flip the page without giving black beans much thought. But these are worth the pause. First, the versatility. A pot of these fragrant beans can transform your meals in many different ways—serve them alone, spooned over rice, or as a base for veggie tacos. I always freeze about half for later. The ingredients list looks long but everything is probably sitting in your pantry already (except the poblanos), so don’t let that deter you, either.

And this recipe essentially illustrates everything I’ve shared about the Instant Pot above. You start by using the sauté function (about 15 minutes), cook beans (unsoaked, hooray!) for 40 minutes, then let the pressure release naturally (up to 20 minutes). So you see, there’s nothing instant about these beans, but you get the benefit of not needing to remember to soak them, and only one pot to clean up. It’s a win in my book!

Ingredients

3 poblano chiles
2 serrano chiles (leave these out if your kids don’t do spicy)
5 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 large onion, diced
2 tablespoons finely chopped sage
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 pound dried black beans
1 tablespoon kosher salt, plus more as needed
1 medium-size ripe tomato, quartered
1 bunch fresh cilantro, stems and leaves separated
Monterey Jack cheese, for serving (optional)
Lime wedges, for serving

Instructions

Roast the poblano and serrano chiles over an open flame, or under your broiler, until their skins are blistered and charred, about 10 minutes. Transfer them to a bowl, cover with a plate, and let them sit until they are cool enough to handle. Rub the skins off with a paper towel, then seed and dice the chiles.

Using the sauté function, heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in the pressure cooker (I use the low setting). Stir in the onion and cook until golden, about 10 minutes. Stir in the sage, two-thirds of the minced garlic, and the chili powder and cumin; cook for 1 minute. Stir in the chopped poblanos, half the serranos, and the beans, salt, and 5 cups of water. Cover and cook on high pressure for 40 minutes. Allow the pressure to release naturally. If the beans aren’t cooked through, cook on high pressure for another 5 minutes, then manually release pressure.

While the beans are cooking, combine the tomato, cilantro stems, half the cilantro leaves, the remaining garlic, the remaining 3 tablespoons oil, and remaining serranos. Add a large pinch of salt. Blend until smooth.

When the beans finish cooking, stir in the tomato puree and let sit for 5 minutes. If the mix seems thin, simmer beans on the sauté setting for a few minutes until thickened up.

Transfer beans to bowls and serve topped with cheese (if using), remaining cilantro leaves, and lime wedges on the side.

Ever since I read a poem and realized I could make a recipe out of it—back in 2012—I also realized that when they’re used as a literary tool, ingredients go deep. They rustle up memories, make stories relatable, provide beautiful imagery, and stir our appetites. When poets use food masterfully, it tends to serve a purpose beyond our plate, and moves us into emotional territory that might not be comfortable at first, but essential nonetheless. This is that kind of a poem.

Betsy Sholl is a former professor of mine, and when I heard her new collection was coming out, I couldn’t wait to read it. Indeed, I’ve marked up and underlined many a poem inside House of Sparrows (affiliate link), including poems that have nothing to do with food (like finding an injured bat on the ground), but of course, we’re here in part for the food so I needed to find just the right poem to share. Have a read, and then we’ll talk about it.

Making Dinner I Think About Poverty

By Betsy Sholl

I mean the kind saints praise and scripture
calls blessed, the kind that inherits heaven
where maybe what’s left of us will be

more like a clear broth than the vegetables
and meat we chop up here, as the radio
blasts war, soup kitchen fills,

and down the block a crowd gathers
around two men yelling their different stories
at the cop as an ambulance wails off.

In its wake, I go back to cutting carrots
and beets, gazing into their concentric rings.
Everything with its secret heart,

Saint Francis says, where it’s better to be
prey than predator, better to step into
the net than be the one who rigs it.

Poverty, he says, a word so pure
it can’t be hyped. It sees into the dark
vessels of the heart, where the blessed know

what they lose, what sinks to the bottom,
enriches the stock—which we will ladle out
to those shuffling in with their empty bowls,

as if they follow the saint’s hard recipe,
the one that says: Put everything in the pot
and let fire take over.

From House of Sparrows by Betsy Sholl. Reprinted by permission of the University of Wisconsin Press. © 2019 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System. All rights reserved.

I do this too, think about things like poverty and genocide and what have you, while I’m making dinner or taking a walk, or while I can’t sleep at night. It seems there’s a discussion of two poverty’s: one of choice, that the saints and scriptures speak of, and one of circumstance, that the nightly news and nonprofits speak of. There’s also a tension on the part of the speaker, almost asking, Where do I fit?

How might I take where I am right now, my privilege and empathy, and translate it? I’m not sure the poem answers the question, or that it’s supposed to. These questions are large and looming, and can’t be answered after a handful of lines or a handful of months.

What I also thought about while reading this poem is cooking as both distraction and resistance. Cooking can both separate us from the hard things we see and hear of (“I go back to cutting carrots…”) keeping us cocooned around our own tables, in our own homes. But as activist and chef Julia Turshen says, “It’s important to take care of yourself so you can better take care of the world.”

I used to approach these posts with resoluteness, to offer a concrete interpretation, a sense of finality. But today I’m more inclined to pause and let the ideas circle over my mind and my heart for a while. And rather than wait to share this with you until that process is over (because who knows how long that might be), I’m offering it now, considered yet still incomplete. After all, that’s a truer reflection of how we operate as human beings, and maybe some of you will join the conversation in the comments, too.

A final thought: I love the end—“put everything in the pot/ and let fire take over.” It’s both a call to accept life’s challenges and also to hope that against all odds, we might be able to leave everything behind we don’t need and start again.

Golden Beet Soup With Chive-Spiked Crème Fraîche

This soup comes from the Eat This Poem cookbook, and was one of the first recipes I developed when working on the manuscript. One of the things I love about it is beets—an often polarizing vegetable—are made approachable by using the golden variety, which has a milder, though still earthy taste. Paired with the sweetness of butternut squash, a little splash of acid from apple cider vinegar, than swirled with crème fraîche that’s been liberally dotted with chopped chives, it’s a soup I hope you’ll love as much as I do. If it’s warm when you’re reading this, serve it chilled!

Ingredients

4 to 6 golden beets, scrubbed, tops and ends removed
1 small butternut squash, halved lengthwise and seeds removed
Extra virgin olive oil
1 small onion, roughly chopped
1 garlic clove, roughly chopped
3 to 4 cups vegetable stock
Salt
Zest of 1 lemon
Freshly cracked pepper
2 tablespoons minced chives
¼ cup crème fraîche

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Wrap beets individually in foil and place on a sheet pan. Add a drizzle of oil to the butternut squash, then place them cut-side down on a second sheet pan. Place both pans in the oven, cooking the beets for 1 hour, and the squash for 30 minutes to 45 minutes, or until tender. Once cool, peel beets gently with your fingers; skins should come away easily. Quarter the beets and place them in a medium bowl. Scoop out the flesh of the squash and place it in the same bowl with the beets.

Warm 2 tablespoons of oil over medium heat in a small skillet. Add onion and garlic, and cook for about 5 minutes, or until soft. Scrape into a high speed blender, then add the reserved beets and squash, 1 teaspoon salt, and 2 cups of the stock. Blend on high for several minutes, until silky, adding more stock as needed. Pour into a small stockpot, taste to see if you need a bit more salt, and add the lemon zest. Keep soup warm while you make the crème fraîche.

Stir the chives into the crème fraîche and season with salt and pepper. Spoon a dollop into each bowl before serving.

Welcome to Cook the Book, an occasional series where I cook my way through books I love and explore how poetry surfaces in the kitchen. This post contains affiliate links, so if you click through and make a purchase, I’ll receive a small commission.

Since this is a new series, I’ll explain how I landed here. When I started EatThisPoem.com in 2012, it was very structured: here’s a poem, here’s some commentary, here’s a recipe to go with it. I still love the format and will be blogging like this sporadically, but I’ve also felt compelled to talk about food and poetry other ways. Specifically, through the lens of whole cookbooks.

This longing was brought on by a recent dry spell in the kitchen. Our cross-country move has opened up space for me to rekindle my love of cooking, and I’ve been getting back into a ritual I sorely missed: reading cookbooks cover to cover, and cooking from them peacefully and quietly.

During the busy promotional months for Eat This Poem in 2017, I zeroed in on one of the cookbook’s key messages: Eat This Poem might be filled with recipes, but it’s narrative is also a call to mindfulness. To that end, there’s a lot of poetry to be found in the kitchen. Paying attention to the small things, like pot stirring or vegetable cutting, is an opportunity to listen in, to meditate briefly, and to both practice the art of releasing control while also being in charge of an outcome, like a recipe. It’s a beautiful thing when we’re able to pay attention, which admittedly isn’t always, but I like to think of this space and the book I wrote as an encouraging call to action on that front. That’s a long way of explaining we’ll be talking about the intersection of poetry and cooking, sometimes without a poem directly involved.

When I was writing my second book throughout 2018—a meditation on the writer’s life—cooking was usually an afterthought. I still planned our meals every week, but didn’t spend a lot of time dog-earing magazine pages or pulling cookbooks from the shelf. I relied on instinct and simplicity, and a small group of recipes I could make over and over with slight variations, and within about thirty minutes after getting home from work.

I was in a season of having to choose one essential activity over another, and writing won out for about nine months. I’ve crossed to the other side now, but when I reflect on that period, red lentil curry immediately comes to mind.

In Julia Turshen’s comforting cookbook, Small Victories, she urges us to embrace the little wins cooking a meal can offer. During a time when that’s about all I could manage, her voice was a welcome one. The recipe for red lentil curry is perhaps the most cooked recipe in the entire collection. In fact, when reaching for the book, it practically opens to page 136 as if on cue, knowing exactly what I’m looking for. Over the years I’ve tried (and loved) many other recipes: pickled onions, chilaquiles with roasted tomato salsa, turkey and ricotta meatballs, a berry cobbler I made with only strawberries even though Julia said not to because strawberries are too watery, and a chopped chickpea salad.

But for a long stretch, curry was all that counted. It was reliable, always worked, required nothing but pantry ingredients and a few fresh additions like ginger and onion, and even went so far as to think about clean-up, advocating for filling up the coconut can with water rather than using a measuring cup.

At first, the small victory was simply that I made dinner. Eventually, I memorized the recipe, and didn’t need to consult the page while I worked. But I often found I wanted the book open, because by then it felt a bit like an old friend. I liked the companionship of seeing a picture of the lentils and double checking that I needed 1 teaspoon of cumin, then rummaging through the cupboard to pull out the rice and other spices.

It was difficult to take my own advice and see the poetry in cooking when life felt so full and draining. I wasn’t always stirring the curry, lost in thought, or looking up from the stove counting my blessings. I was simply filling our bowls so we could eat before getting ready for bed and doing it all over again. But the longer I made this recipe, and the more it lodged itself into my brain, the more I moved through the kitchen with an ease. I already knew the outcome. Instead of having to think about measurements, I could think about the day, let loose anything I needed to release, and find contentment in knowing that although it’s the same recipe we’ve had week over week, it’s still something from scratch, and that enjoying a humble dish of red lentils truly is a small victory.

Curried Red Lentils With Coconut Milk

This is a very flexible recipe, especially if you have extra vegetables wilting in the crisper drawer. I often add chopped carrots to the pot, or a handful of spinach.

Recipe ever so slightly adapted from Small Victories: Recipes, Advice + Hundreds of Ideas for Home-Cooking Triumphs by Julia Turshen

Ingredients
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger
2 garlic cloves
¼ of an onion, minced
½ teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground turmeric
1 cup split red lentils, rinsed
1 can full-fat coconut milk, shaken
Sea salt
For serving: Cooked basmati rice, chopped cilantro, plain yogurt, and chopped peanuts

Instructions
Warm the olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the ginger, garlic, onion, coriander, cumin, and turmeric and cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are softened and the spices are fragrant, about 10 minutes. Add the lentils, coconut milk, and 2 teaspoons salt. Fill the empty coconut can with water and add that to the saucepan. Stir the pot, then bring the curry to a boil. Reduce heat to low and let the lentils simmer, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 20 minutes. Season to taste with additional salt, if needed.

Serve over hot rice and top with chopped cilantro, a dollop of yogurt, and a sprinkle of chopped peanuts.

Something happened. Well, a lot of things, and today I’m going to tell you about them. I’ve been wanting to get back here for a while, always hoping I’d stumble across the words one day and find just the right recipe and poetry pairings to share. I wanted to return to how things used to be. But I can’t go on pretending that will happen. Oh, I’ll be back here alright, but there’s no sense in ignoring that eight months have gone by since my last blog post, and we can just jump right back in without explanation. Some people might be able to work that way, but it’s harder for me. As it turns out, I’ve been writing quite a lot lately, just not here.

After Eat This Poem was published in 2017, I spent about six months promoting the book. I was traveling to events, giving bookstore readings, doing interviews, writing guest posts, and blogging, all in an effort to share the news about this wonderful little project I’d put so much time and effort into. By the end of the year, I was tired, and I was also starting to think about my second book. From June to October—while I was on book tour for Eat This Poem—I was quietly working on a new proposal, and my agent was pitching it to publishers. In December of that year, I had a contract and was poised to do this all over again.

The book isn’t about food. It’s about the writer’s life. Specifically, how to go about making space to create when you also have a job and a family. It’s basically everything I’ve learned in the last fifteen years since graduating from college, packaged up in digestible and relatable stories and lessons and insights. It’s about ushering in creative seasons, and using them to frame how you work.

But along the way, I lost my appetite. Because I was writing a book about writing, and also working full-time, and also mothering a toddler, food was one of the first things to go. Don’t get me wrong, we still ate well. Years of cooking and recipe development weren’t all for nothing—I could walk in the door at 5:30 p.m. and have dinner on the table thirty minutes later. I still meal planned, and we always had a full fridge. But sometimes we just ate avocado toast for dinner. Or popcorn. And my appetite for newness had disappeared. It was a defense mechanism, really. In the midst of writing another book, which took up the majority of what little extra time I had in a week, I didn’t have the capacity to read cookbooks cover to cover, or follow new recipes on a Tuesday night, or brainstorm new blog posts for this space, or read my beloved food magazines.

For about nine months we subsisted on a simple rotation of recipes I could make in my sleep: rice and beans, quick curry and rice, all kinds of pasta, and big salads. Sometimes on a weekend, there would be more. We’d walk to the farmers’ market and I’d suddenly be overcome with a deep craving for eggplant or peppers, or come home with a giant watermelon and make agua fresca. Sometimes there would be flashes of inspiration, reminders of the cook I used to be. But those moments were rare. I missed it here, but I had my sights on finishing something and needed to set those feelings aside temporarily.

Not that it was always an easy road, though. One day I was so frustrated about not having time to make bread, I almost cried about it. So I included the story in my new book because, well, it’s a book about writing a book, and that was my truth. In that moment I had to choose writing over baking bread and literally could not fit both into my weekend without sacrificing my health or my sanity. It’s just the season I was living in.

So I kept writing and writing and writing. Eventually there were a few paragraphs and a few chapters and an entire messy manuscript to clean up. Then there was a book. It was turned in, copy edited, marked up, polished, read again and again, and turned in once more. There is no going back. It’s out of my hand and will soon be in yours.

I now have space where there wasn’t before. There’s a new table, new light, new ingredients, new hungers.

Oh, and we moved. Not across town, but across the country. I’m no longer a resident of Los Angeles, but have left my home state and settled outside Raleigh, North Carolina. This was a big change and we arrived in our empty new house a few weeks before Christmas last year, enjoyed our first snow (two days after moving in), and spent the winter unpacking, becoming familiar, settling, creating new routines, and getting comfortable. It was cold and invigorating and also hard. But we’re glad we’re here.

This move, this life, was something we started thinking about almost four years ago. We weren’t imagining a particular place, but a feeling and a way of life we were after. Turns out, North Carolina offered it to us. Now that it’s spring, I’m feeling an itch to welcome the new. I’m finally able to turn my attention to things I’ve missed, like food and poetry, and figure out how to make my way back.

I’m deeply grateful for the space to do this. Not only the mental space, but the physical change of scenery that’s been opening up new creativity stores for me. (Case and point: I’ve started writing poetry again!) I don’t have a plan for Eat This Poem, nothing formal at least. (I also have a new online home in Wild Words, about seasonal creative living, if you’re inclined in that direction.) My hope is to inch my way over, sharing some poetry, some thoughts, some recipes, all from a new vantage point.

That’s about it for now. If you’re new, I’m glad you’re here. And if you’re a long-time reader, I’m glad you’re still here. If I’ve learned anything in the past year, it’s the importance of embracing the season you’re in. That’s always my wish for you and for me.

The problem with Italian cookbooks is they make me pine for Italy. (See my infatuation with Rome from two summers ago.) July marked fourteen years since I've been back, so when I began reading page after page about tomatoes and chestnuts and garlic in Guilia Scarpaleggia's From the Markets of Tuscany, my heart simply burst before I was even halfway through. The antidote, of course, is heading into the kitchen. 

Giulia and I first became acquainted through blogging. (She even wrote a dreamy Literary City Guide to Florence.) Her Tuscan blog, Juls' Kitchen, is a favorite of mine, and when I learned her latest cookbook was set to be published in English this spring, I promised to be first in line. The cookbook is organized by market, which any traveler will tell you is probably one of the best ways to explore a new town. Giulia traversed Tuscany meeting vendors, sampling local specialties, and then took that inspiration straight to her Tuscany kitchen to bring the flavors home.  

"To every generation, the market is the beating heart of the town, pulsing with chitchat, friendly shouting and bargaining, and the aroma of roast chicken, croquettes, and porchetta ...

Traveling around Tuscany for over a year to visit its weekly, large indoor and smaller organic markets was a learning experience, one that helped me to better know and love this region I call home—my place in the world. While I was lost in small talk with local producers, buying everything from honey and local cheeses to pork fat sausages and fragrant peaches, my partner Tommaso would follow me with camera in hand, capturing what was unique about every market and how each differed in character and changed with the seasons."

Letter from Town: The Almond Tree

By D. H. Lawrence

You promised to send me some violets. Did you forget?  
  White ones and blue ones from under the orchard hedge?  
  Sweet dark purple, and white ones mixed for a pledge  
Of our early love that hardly has opened yet.   

Here there’s an almond tree—you have never seen        
  Such a one in the north—it flowers on the street, and I stand  
  Every day by the fence to look up for the flowers that expand  
At rest in the blue, and wonder at what they mean.   

Under the almond tree, the happy lands  
  Provence, Japan, and Italy repose,  
  And passing feet are chatter and clapping of those  
Who play around us, country girls clapping their hands.   

You, my love, the foremost, in a flowered gown,  
  All your unbearable tenderness, you with the laughter  
  Startled upon your eyes now so wide with hereafter,   
You with loose hands of abandonment hanging down.

This poem is in the public domain.

Thanks to a dusty copy of the Norton Anthology of Poetry, D.H. Lawrence was one of the first poets I ever learned about. So you can imagine my delight when searching for poems that celebrated almonds, in any small way, I came across these lines of verse that begin by revealing "early love that hardly has opened yet." When we move to the almond tree, there's tranquility under its branches throughout Provence, Japan, and Italy (perfect for the recipe to follow). For a moment we're transported, resting somewhere in the shade.

By the end of the poem, there's a play on "a flowered gown" which could either be the poet's beloved, or the almond tree, with all its "unbearable tenderness" and "loose hands of abandonment hanging down." Something has changed. We're not privy to the details, whether the relationship has stalled, affection has wained, or the almond tree simply stops bearing nuts year after year. I suppose the only place of refuge is back under the almond tree that "flowers on the street," and the daily ritual of going to the fence, looking for flowers, wondering what they mean. Sometimes we must sit with our questions, and resolutions take their own time to reveal, both in life and in the poems we read to enhance our days.

Almond & Chocolate Biscotti

Makes 20 to 24 cookies

This recipe is lightly adapted from the pages of From the Markets of Tuscany by Giulia Scarpaleggia. Inside the cookbook, there's an entire page dedicated to the history of biscotti. Read it and you'll learn the word biscotto means "baked twice" in Italian, and that they came about in response to conservation—they'll stay fresh in a closed tin for up to two weeks. There are also notes on Antonio Mattei, who opened his first biscotti factory in 1858, in Prato, northwest of Florence, and although the bakery is owned by another family now, you can still visit there to taste these sweet little cookies.

Giulia's basic recipe is for almond biscotti, and she shares four variations to try. I combined two of the suggestions to make a dark chocolate and almond version I was so happy with it made me wonder why I hadn't been making biscotti part of my holiday baking routine for the past few years (they'll make perfect edible gifts this season!).

(Note: While typing up this recipe, I realized I accidentally used baking soda instead of baking powder, but the recipe still turned out wonderfully!) 

Ingredients:
3 eggs
1 cup sugar, plus 2 tablespoons
2 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
Pinch of salt
Zest of 1 orange
1/2 cup almonds, coarsely chopped
3 ounces dark chocolate, coarsely chopped

Instructions:
Heat oven to 480°F. Add 2 eggs plus 1 yolk to the bowl of a stand mixer. (Save remaining egg white to use later.) Add sugar to the stand mixer and beat with the eggs until light and frothy, about 1 minute. Soft flour, baking powder, and salt over the mixer, then add the orange zest and mix on low speed until dough comes together. Add almonds and dark chocolate and fold in with a spatula.

Line a baking sheet with a silpat and separate the dough into two sections. Using a small icing spatula, spread dough into logs, about 12-inches long and 3-inches wide. I tried doing this by hand at first and the spatula really makes it easier, especially since the dough is a bit sticky. Beat egg white with a fork until frothy, then brush it over the dough. Slide the baking sheet into the oven, reduce heat to 350°F, and bake for 20 minutes. (Starting with high heat will help keep the dough from spreading too much.)

When the first bake is done, the biscotti should be golden on the outside but still tender inside. Let cool 5 minutes, then transfer logs to a cutting board and slide into 1-inch pieces. Arrange biscotti back on the baking sheet and bake for 15 minutes, or until golden. Let cool completely on a rack before enjoying dunked in your coffee (or plain!).

In Santa Barbara they're called sundowners—hot, aggressive winds that kick up after the sun goes down and make the coastal landscape feel like a dry, inland desert. At dinner Friday night, in a restaurant without air conditioning, I sweated through my linen dress while sipping white wine and eating grilled salmon, peach and burrata salad, and baked Alaska. 

We quickly got to talking about all the meals we've shared in this dining room, and I couldn't help share how special it felt to return, book in hand, to a place that helped shaped me as a writer. I was in town for Wine & Words, a new series at Riverbench Winery. They invited me to read a few poems from the cookbook, and even served up a few dishes to pair with the reading, not to mention the selection of lovely wines being poured. 

There's no doubt about it: Returning to Santa Barbara always feels like coming home. It doesn't matter that I haven't lived there in more than a decade, it's a place that will always have my heart, and always welcome me back with open arms.

If you're looking for a more in-depth tour, head to the Literary City Guide. For today's post, I'll be focusing on what we did during the weekend. 

A few places to go:

Dune Coffee Roasters. Formerly The French Press, this outpost is one of my favorite stops. Great seating, a little off the beaten path (a few blocks east of bustling State Street), plus options for coffee and tea lovers alike. Get lost in a book while sitting on the patio, or do what we usually do—swing by on the way out of town for hot drinks and a bran muffin. 

Butterfly Beach. Our favorite beach in town, it sits just outside the famed Four Seasons Biltmore in Montecito. We got engaged on this sand, and always love to visit for a stroll and a view of the waterfront.

bouchon. We've been eating at this restaurant for the past 12 years. (And no, it's not affiliated with Thomas Keller's version.) The patio and dining room are always cozy, and the farmers' market-inspired menu serves up dishes that use French techniques with relaxed, wine country inspiration. 

Jeannine's Bakery. We always have at least one breakfast here. There's an upper State Street location, but we like the Montecito restaurant best. (It's also walking distance from Butterfly Beach, if you're so inclined.) The lattes are extra large, and the menu varied enough to please everyone's morning cravings. 

Santa Barbara Public Market. From ice cream to Thai food, this little market has it all. The beer garden is loud if a game is on, but there are plenty of options for everyone, and it's a great spot to wrangle the kids if you're traveling with little ones. 

Back in January I shared the photo of a gold letterpressed drawing of two pears on Instagram. They were sketched by Cat Grishaver, the illustrator and designer who took the words I wrote and turned them into a living, breathing book. This permanent piece of art is one of the ways I've chosen to mark this sweet milestone because, as predicted, publishing a book is indeed a season. It's worth relishing and devoting ourselves to, but then, like autumn leaves turning from green to crimson, they fall to piles.

But let's stop time for just a day and talk about how exactly one year ago, my first book was published! Eat This Poem: A Literary Feast of Recipes Inspired by Poetry was born on March 21, 2017. It's one! Should we throw a party? Maybe. But I'm usually pretty reflective on my birthdays (evidence here), so I thought I'd reminisce about some of the lessons I've learned this past year. 

6 Lessons From a Book's First Year

01 | Prepare for a low-key publication day

Before a book comes out (and especially in the final stretch) it feels like nothing else can possibly be as important. There's a lot to do on the marketing front. I was drafting guest posts, pitching stories to websites, creating Instagram images for National Poetry Month, and making travel arrangements for places like Seattle, Michigan, and Brooklyn.

When the 21st arrived it was sort of ... quiet. It makes sense now because even if lots of people pre-order your book, it might not arrive until later in the day, and they won't be able to read it until the weekend, say. A lot of the fun fanfare when you actually see your book in the world comes a few days later after packages are delivered. 

That Tuesday morning I went to work like usual, but refreshed my Amazon page most of the day to check the rankings. I may have stopped for donuts in the morning. I may have received a gorgeous bouquet of flowers from my publisher. But it wasn't the kind of day that felt like a parade. Instead, it felt very heart-centered. I just wanted to journal and take in the moment, especially since it had been five years in the making. 

02 | The emotional roller coaster is open for rides

Emotions run high. They're mostly good ones, but days can really bring highs and lows. There's the adrenaline rush of the first couple of weeks of publication and seeing all your efforts happening in the form of social media posts and reviews popping up on Amazon. Then you go to sleep and wake up feeling totally exhausted. This continues for months.

03 | 'Tis the season

As I mentioned, publication is merely a season on the long writer's path. This wasn't a lesson I needed to learn because I anticipated it wholeheartedly, however, when you're in it, you have to do everything you can to embrace the experience and help your book catch flight. Then you have to put your head down and start writing again.

04 | Keep talking

One of the fears I had (and I've heard this refrain from other writers) is that people will get tired of hearing about your book. Maybe some of them will (especially if they follow you everywhere), but studies have shown that people need to hear about something at least seven times before they buy, so there's no shame in telling people about the book you wrote, as long as it's not all day, every day. 

05 | Ask, ask, and ask again

Getting Amazon reviews is hard. Even if you have a team of people who fully committed to helping you spread the word, it'll still be hard to get them to write reviews. This isn't true for everyone, but I found myself having to remind various groups of people more than once, and I was afraid of sounding like a broken record or a desperate first-time author (see above). I eventually hit the 50 reviews I'd hoped for, but it took months, not days. 

06 | Your parents = your marketing team

My dad has bought and given away a lot of my books. So many, that Amazon flagged his account and didn't let him post the 5-star review he drafted. Never underestimate their reach.

What's next

I'm still blogging here, and have a few Eat This Poem events planned for later this year. But the big news to share is I'm writing another book! You can read a bit more about it here, but come 2019, I'll be doing this all over again. And no, it's not a cookbook! It's a book about embracing the ever-changing creative seasons. It's everything I've been living, preaching, and guiding fellow writers through over the past few years, and I'm so excited for you to read it. It's called Wild Words: Routines, Rituals, and Rhythms for Braving the Writer's Path, and I'm deep into the first draft right now.

So, over to you. If you've published a book of your own, did anything surprise you about the process? I'd love to hear! 

Every book has two stories. There's the book itself—the physical thing you hold featuring a table of contents, recipe headnotes, stories, and instructions. But this book, a cookbook, is not just made up of the title, subtitle, and description on the back cover. Those are the fancy parts and finished pieces, and the the culmination of a dream.

I'm always interested in the second story, the one that might never be told publicly, and it's often a tale of transformation—what the author learns along the way, or what transpires in her life or circumstances that change her in the course of writing the book. (Because as we all know, books are not made in days or weeks, but in months and years.) 

Books are teachers for both those who read them and those who write them. And books are personal. As my friends and fellow bloggers have continued to publish books over the years, I'm astonished each and every time as I flip through the pages at how them it is. It shouldn't come as much of a surprise, really, since each perspective is unique and we've grown to recognize blog voices for so long, but I just love sinking deep into their words and appreciating what went into making a heavy, sturdy, life-enriching book.

So, here's an example of a book with two stories.

Story #1: Pretty Simple Cooking is here! It's the beautiful new cookbook from husband and wife duo Sonja and Alex Overhiser, creators of the A Couple Cooks blog and podcast. There are enticing photos for every dish, plus tons of veggie-forward recipes. I've been meal planning from it for weeks, and the youngest member of our family is already a big fan of the strawberry chia jam (recipe below!) and vegan corn chowder. 

Story #2: The other side of this book is how its creation served as a healer. Alex and Sonja have been open about their adoption process, and as it turns out, their baby was born the same month their manuscript was due. Writing the book helped them cope with the stress of waiting and hoping, and I remember when Sonja texted me that there was a baby and she was in the room when he was born, I immediately started crying and sending her happy tear emojis, I also told her weeks later on the phone that this was how it was always supposed to happen. That they could turn in this book and immediately turn their attention to spending time with their new baby.

So with that, here's another baby. A corn baby!

The Corn Baby

by Mark Wunderlich

They brought it. It was brought
from the field, the last sheaf, the last bundle

the latest and most final armful. Up up
over the head, hold it, hold it high, it held

the gazer’s gaze, it held hope, did hold it.
Through the stubble of September, on shoulders

aloft, hardly anything, it weighed, like a sparrow,
it was said, something winged, hollow, though

pulsing, freed from the field
where it flailed in wind, where it waited, wanted

to be found and bound with cord. It had
limbs, it had legs. And hands. It had fingers.

Fingers and a face peering from the stalks,
shuttered in the grain, closed, though just a kernel

a shut corm. They brought him and autumn
rushed in, tossed its cape of starlings,

tattered the frost-spackled field.

—From Poetry (March 2009)

In these lines we meet corn personified—a yellow baby of kernels, all bundled up in a warm green husk. "It held hope," is my favorite line for how grounding it is, and I can so clearly see the morning light and this little ear of corn that transforms into a baby with limbs and legs and fingers.  

Reading the poem quickly, then reading it again, made me feel a bit breathless, and I couldn't stop thinking about the baby. THE baby. The baby that arrived while Sonja and Alex were writing this book, and who actually became part of their story. I love the first story, because this cookbook is such a refreshing approach to being in the kitchen and learning to love the process of cooking. But I also love the second story, and everything that transpired to bring both babies into the world.

Cornbread Pancakes With Strawberry Chia Jam

Headnote is mine: I have a son who loves loves pancakes. I make them almost every weekend, and I'm always looking for new combos to freshen up breakfast. My favorite thing about this version is using masa harina, because I happened to have a bag in the fridge leftover from a short-lived homemade tortilla phase. (I still love making tortillas, but I just haven't reached for my press in a little bit.) This is the perfect way to get extra mileage out of an ingredient. 

1 cup masa harina
1⁄2 cup all-purpose, whole wheat,
or gluten-free flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1⁄2 teaspoon kosher salt
2 large eggs
3 tablespoons neutral oil
(grapeseed or vegetable)
2 tablespoons honey or pure maple syrup
1⁄2 cup plain Greek yogurt
1 cup 2% milk
Maple syrup, for serving (optional)
Strawberry Lime Chia Jam (see below)

Instructions
Preheat the oven to 200°F. In a medium bowl, stir together the masa harina, flour, baking soda, and kosher salt. In another bowl, whisk together the eggs, oil, honey or maple syrup, Greek yogurt, and milk. Pour the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, then stir gently to combine until the batter comes together and is pourable but slightly lumpy.

Heat a large nonstick griddle or skillet over medium-low heat, then brush with butter or oil. Scoop a scant 1⁄3 cup of batter onto the griddle and repeat to make 4 pancakes. Cook for several minutes until a few of the bubbles that appear on the surface have burst and the bottoms are golden brown, adjusting the heat as necessary. Flip carefully, then cook for another minute or so until golden brown on the other side.

Place the cooked pancakes on a baking sheet in the oven to keep warm. Add a splash of milk to the remaining batter to loosen it. Then repeat for the remaining pancakes, adjusting the heat as necessary since the griddle can become very hot. Serve warm with maple syrup, roasted almond butter, and Strawberry Lime Chia Jam.

Strawberry-Lime Chia Jam

Headnote is mine: I used fresh berries (a benefit of California farmers' markets), and had about 14 oz, so just shy of 1 pound. Since it was a bit less than the recommendation, I reduced the maple syrup to 4 tablespoons. 

2 cups frozen strawberries*
2 tablespoons lime juice
plus zest (1 large lime)
6 tablespoons pure maple syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 tablespoons chia seeds

In a 10-inch skillet, add the strawberries, lime juice, and 2 tablespoons water. Simmer over medium heat for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. About halfway through the simmering time, begin to break down the berries by smashing them with a fork into a chunky but uniform texture. Once the berries are broken down, stir in the maple syrup, vanilla, chia seeds, and lime zest until combined, about 30 seconds. Turn off the heat. Let the skillet sit about 5 to 7 minutes until the chia seeds thicken the jam. Transfer to a 16-ounce canning jar and refrigerate; the texture will set even further when chilled.

Notes
Storage: Stores refrigerated for up to 2 weeks (chia jam is not shelf stable).

*One pound of fresh strawberries can be substituted for frozen, which cuts the simmering time to around half. However, we prefer using frozen berries for jams and saving fresh ones for eating.

Excerpted from A Couple Cooks | Pretty Simple Cooking: 100 Delicious Vegetarian Recipes to Make You Fall in Love with Real Food by Sonja Overhiser and Alex Overhiser. Copyright © 2018. Available from Da Capo Lifelong Books, an imprint of Perseus Books, LLC, a subsidiary of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

Citrus has always been a gift of winter—colorful, tart, sweet, bursting globes to brighten cold, dark days. I'm partial to Meyer lemons when I can find them because they're more sweet than tart, and beg to be baked with, and while reading a new poetry collection from Judith Waller Carroll, I was transported to the kitchen more than once.  

Many of her poems explore our internal lives and coming to terms with change, like becoming an empty nester, aging, and pausing to remember something so small but meaningful as a daughter's first smile. Read "Lemon Bread" and you'll see what I mean. 

Lemon Bread

by Judith Waller Carroll

We are straddling the gap
between winter and spring.
Wind through bare branches,
a sky more gray than blue.

Perhaps deliciously happy
is not in my makeup,
the way I opt for savory over sweet,
shun sugar for spice.

Still, there are moments, like now,
watching you in the kitchen
as you squeeze the plump lemons
over the hot, fragrant loaf.

The sun has come out
on the blossoming dogwoods,
the first new leaves
on the hydrangea's stiff stalks.

“Lemon Bread” is reprinted with permission from Judith Waller Carroll’s book What You Saw and Still Remember (Main Street Rag, 2017).

Isn't so much of life "straddling the gap" between one thing or another? If it's not winter and spring, it's summer and fall. There are life transitions like getting married, sending your kids to college, or moving from one state to the next. I related to much of the sentiment about "deliciously happy" not being my default, always keeping some emotional distance to serve as a guard around my heart. But as the poem describes, there are moments of sheer joy, when you can't help but embrace the "blossoming dogwoods" or "the first new leaves."

Of course, I was glad to read about a blissful moment in the kitchen, lemons being squeezed over a "hot, fragrant loaf." In honor of choosing savory over sweet, I decided on a lemon cake dotted with rosemary. It strikes just the right note to embrace changing seasons and complimentary flavors that might seem opposed at first glance, but like our emotional worlds, always prove they can coexist. 

Meyer Lemon, Yogurt, and Rosemary Cake

This loaf cake is moistened with yogurt and hits those sweet notes with Meyer lemons and savory notes with woody rosemary. It's perfect for an afternoon treat alongside a cup of tea.

For the cake
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons meyer lemon juice
Zest of 1 meyer lemon
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 cup plain yogurt (not Greek)
3 eggs
1 1/2 cup all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon fresh rosemary, finely chopped

For the glaze
1 cup powdered sugar
2 to 3 tablespoons meyer lemon juice
Chopped rosemary (optional)

Preheat oven to 350° and line a loaf pan with parchment or mist with cooking spray.

Cream butter and sugar in a stand mixer until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add lemon juice, zest, vanilla and mix until just combined. Add yogurt, then eggs, one at a time, until mixed. Finally, add the dry ingredients—flour, baking soda, salt, and rosemary. Scrape down the bowl if needed, and stir until everything is smooth and well combined. 

Bake 45 to 50 minutes, until golden. Cool in pan for 10 minutes, then invert to remove and cool completely on a rack. 

Make the glaze by sifting powdered sugar into a medium bowl. Whisk in lemon juice, adding more as needed, until thick but pourable. Drizzle over cake and add rosemary sprigs, if using. Let glaze set before slicing.

In Jane Hirshfield's poem "Tree," there are two things that can usher in calmness during uncertain times: "this clutter of soup pots and books—" It's one of the poems I was adamant about including in the cookbook, and I paired her words with, among other things, a pot of white beans because sometimes it's the most utterly simple yet magical thing you can cook.

Once they're tender, I like to do as Rachel Roddy suggests in My Kitchen in Rome, which is to combine some whole beans with others that have been reduced to a purée. It results in a not-quite-soup situation that's still thick enough to hold its own but loose enough to gather with a spoon or a swipe of bread. We made it lunch a couple of weeks ago, after coming back from the beach.

The final thing I added was a generous drizzle of olive oil, the kind you might reserve for special occasions—Ok, I drenched them—but I've had a change of heart on the matter, and believe these little indulgences should be every day occurrences as often as possible. 

I'm very enthusiastic about this particular tin because it came to me from northern California last month I only found out about it because it's made by Robin Sloan, who I spoke with on on a panel in Michigan. Naturally, I had Googled him beforehand and asked about this olive oil situation when we met. He and his girlfriend were in the middle of the first harvest, and this bottle is from the very first pressing of these olives, ever. 

In the tasting notes (yes, olive oil can and should come with tasting notes), there are instructions for slurping and mentions of artichoke and how well the oil might pair with roasted vegetables. Then there's the very wise recommendation to use it with abandon. Because it's unfiltered, it's even more likely to spoil sooner, so it's not something to keep in the back shelf for a rainy day, which reminds me of a section in Dani Shapiro's memoir Hourglass, when she recalls a bottle of oil brought back from her honeymoon in France. 

"We waited for a special occasion to open the olive oil. No occasion seemed quite special enough. After all, we had the bottles home with us in our carry-on. You could do this back then. Finally, preparing dinner for friends one evening, we opened one. Of course, it had gone rancid."

The moral of the story, of course, is to use it and enjoy it. Don't wait. Make a pot of beans. Drizzle them with wonderful oil. Eat a plate alone, or with friends, it doesn't matter. In "Ode to Oil" Pablo Neruda writes:

Oil,
hidden and most important
ingredient of the stew,
base for partridges,
celestial key to mayonnaise...

Oil,
with our voice,
our chorus,
with intimate
powerful smoothness
you sing...

It is indeed an "abundant treasure." In recent weeks I've rubbed some into kale leaves, swirled it on soup. And of course, the beans, where so much poetry resides, and where a plate feeds you mightily, body and soul.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, I woke up in my parent's house. It was a few weeks before my sophomore year of college started, and I'd spent the summer lifeguarding before moving back to campus. I was tan, well rested, and excited to see my boyfriend again.

I remember my mom coming into my room, then words like "New York" and "terrorism" and "planes" hitting my ears. I moved to the couch, curled up with a blanket, and listened to everything Peter Jennings had to say. He was wearing a light blue shirt, I remember. His eyes looked tired but warm, and he was occasionally on the brink of tears, like us all. He didn't leave the desk for twenty-four hours, maybe more. I didn't leave the couch very often, either. There was nothing else to do in those first few hours except wait and watch.

5 World Trade Center

By James Penha

Home in Indonesia we watched by night
plane after plane crash into the towers and the towers
come crashing down and I thought in the crash
of recollections in the hours that followed
of the sweet servers at a Krispy Kreme beneath
the Plaza we visited every year at least once
on our trips to my New York hometown.
The company declared the store destroyed
though workers and customers escaped unharmed
and pictures surfaced later
showing trays of donuts waiting still to be told
where to go while a rag and spray bottle
of cleaning solution lay on a table under
a profound film of dust no one wiped away.

Penha, James. "5 World Trade Center." Copyright © 2017 by James Penha. First published
in The Book of Donuts (Terrapin Books). Reprinted by permission of Terrapin Books.

The best poems, I find, are usually about two things. Of course there are the urgent, present details being shared on the page. But underneath the surface, there's often much more. Reading these lines thrust me sixteen years back in time, and like the donuts and the spray bottle, left me perhaps a little frozen remembering the bright, unsuspecting Tuesday morning.

Let's begin with the donuts. On the morning of 9/11, a New York native watches the events unfold halfway around the world, from his home in Indonesia. In darkness, a memory appears, and he recalls a Krispy Kreme shop, the one he always visited during annual trips to the city. Before this moment, you might not have imagined a donut being capable of eliciting such an emotional response. It's only flour and sugar, after all. 

But below the donuts, the poem seeks to make sense of tragedy (a theme this year, no?). The details we remember might seem trivial, but in a poet's hands, they become relatable. How many donuts have we eaten in our lifetime already? I've certainly had my share, and now I may never eat another without remembering these words or the image of dusty confections, trays of them, never delivered, utterly symbolic of the lives of men and women who perished, lives never fully lived. 

Apple Cider Donuts

Recipe adapted from Bon Appetit; Makes about 8 donuts, plus 12-16 donut holes

The original recipe makes 18 donuts, but I really don’t need that many at home, so I made a smaller batch. Also, it’s good to know in advance that these are a bit of a project. Don’t expect to wake up Wednesday morning and make donuts (well, unless you do everything in advance.) There are about 20-30 minutes when the cider needs to reduce on the stove, and the dough needs to chill for 3 hours before frying. 

Some ingredient notes: Apple cider is recommended, but I totally forgot to check at my farmers’ market and ended up grabbing a bottle of juice from the store. Oh, apple butter is a nice addition here, I used the Eden Foods brand.

1 3-inch cinnamon stick
1 1/2 cups apple cider or juice
1/4 cup apple butter
1/4 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/8 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
2 teaspoons cinnamon, divided
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
2 tablespoons (packed) light brown sugar
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar, divided
1 egg
Vegetable or canola oil, for frying (about 4 cups)

Bring cinnamon stick and cider to a boil in a small saucepan over medium-high heat. Cook until thick, syrupy, and reduced to about 2 tablespoons. Discard cinnamon stick, then scrape into a medium bowl and whisk in apple butter, buttermilk, and vanilla until smooth.

While the cider reduces, whisk baking powder, salt, baking soda, nutmeg, flour, and 1 teaspoon cinnamon in a medium bowl. In a stand mixer, beat butter, brown sugar, and 2 tablespoons granulated sugar until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Add egg, beating well. Reduce mixer speed to low and add dry ingredients in two additions, alternating with liquid ingredients. The dough will be very soft and sticky.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and dust generously with flour (at least 1/4 cup). Dust hands and top of dough with more flour, then gently pat dough to 3/4-inch thick. Dust with more flour and cover with plastic wrap; refrigerate 3 hours.

Whisk remaining 1/2 cup granulated sugar and 1 teaspoon cinnamon in a small bowl. 

Working on baking sheet, punch out as many rounds as you can using a 3-inch cutter, then punch out the center with a smaller cutter. Gather donut scraps and gently re-roll without overworking the dough. 

Set a wire rack on a rimmed baking sheet. Pour oil into a 4-quart dutch oven and heat to 350°. Working in batches, fry donuts until deep golden brown, about 3 minutes per side. Fry donut holes until deep golden brown, about 2 minutes per side. Transfer to the rack, then toss in cinnamon sugar before serving.

In 2017 I traveled to Seattle, Brooklyn, Indianapolis, and a few spots around Southern California, and it was always an incredible treat to introduce Eat This Poem to new readers. But now I'm getting ready to hunker down for the holidays and spend the rest of the year at home. My very last stop was in Northern Michigan, specifically Harbor Springs and the surrounding area, where I spoke on two panels at the Harbor Springs Festival of the Book. I had a little time to explore while I was in town, and here are my favorite finds.

HARBOR SPRINGS

Between the Covers. The local bookstore, complete with a small children's section in back.

Small Batch Bakery. I walked out with a giant chocolate cookie sprinkled with sea salt. Enough said.

American Spoon. This is the place for locally made jam. The tasting bar is a nice touch, so you can sample before you buy.

Pond Hill Farm. A few miles outside of town, this spot is fun for both kids and adults. The downstairs has a cute little shop, and the cafe is upstairs. Everyone told me to get the Parmesan-crusted grilled cheese and the spicy kale slaw with peanut sauce. You can also wander around and enjoy the views of vegetables.

The Depot. This converted train station is the fanciest restaurant in town, and it's also members only. I was lucky enough to be a guest my last night, and the local walleye with creamy risotto didn't disappoint. (Bonus: We ate inside the Hemingway Room, because he often came to town. You can also find his statues around the area.)

PETOSKEY

Dripworks Coffee. I ordered a turmeric tea latte and spent three hours here one afternoon. There are cozy booths (with outlets) and a great drink menu, for both tea and coffee lovers.

McLean & Eakin. Another charming bookstore, perfect for picking up a new read for the plane ride home.

Palette Bistro. I ate here for both lunch and brunch. It's simple, Mediterranean-inspired fare with a great view of the lake.

Three very important things happened in October 2015.

First, I signed with a literary agency. A few days later, I was offered a book contract, and in between those two milestones, I gave birth to my son. Suddenly, I had a newborn in my arms and a deadline for my manuscript.

The timing couldn’t have been better. I’d spent the past two years writing, so the book was finished … I just needed to test the recipes in home kitchens. Being on maternity leave until February 2016 meant I was in the fortunate position of not having to think about work, and dedicated all my remaining energy to embracing the final stretch of my cookbook journey which involved some generous volunteers, and a spreadsheet or two.

Whenever my son slept, I was in the kitchen making last minute tweaks, emailing testers, or following up on non-disclosure agreements. Six weeks later, each of my 75 recipes had been tested at least twice—sometimes three or four times—by home cooks.

Recipe testing is a big undertaking for any cookbook author, but the entire thing can be managed fairly seamlessly (and even within a brief window of time) if you’re organized and have systems in place to support you.

In this post, I’m sharing what worked for me, including the five distinct recipe testing phases that emerged over the course of two months when recipe testing became my main priority (well, after taking care of the baby, of course).

Phase 1: Prep

Before reaching out to testers and assigning recipes, start by preparing your spreadsheets, documents, and emails so everything is ready to go.

1. Create a recipe tracking spreadsheet. List your recipe titles in one column, and title subsequent columns “Tester 1, “Tester 2,” and so on. Next to each name, add a date column (to mark when you sent them materials) and an 'X' column (to mark when they submitted feedback). You’ll begin filling this in once you start the outreach process.

2. Design a recipe testing signup form on your website. Be sure to include any dietary considerations, or special equipment needs. Knowing someone is gluten-free, or loves baking, for example, will save you a lot of back and forth when you’re assigning recipes. (Here's mine if you'd like to take a look.)

3. Write an email template. Draft the emails you’ll send to your testers. This can be a copy and paste template you can customize for each person. (See below for what to include!)

4. Prepare a non-disclosure agreement. NDA’s help protect you and your recipes. It shows your testers you mean business, prevents them from posting photos and videos of the testing process online, or sharing the recipe with others.

Phase 2: Outreach

This is your “shout it from the rooftops” phase when you get to tell everyone about the opportunity. You can either keep it within your mailing list (like I did) or use social media to increase your reach.

If you’re reaching out to a wider pool than just close friends and family, you’ll want to create a landing page on your website with all the details (see #2 above), and create a form to capture all the information you need to distribute recipes efficiently. (Here’s mine.)

The form is really important if you want to save yourself some time. By asking a few strategic questions, you can save yourself from emailing back and forth with people, and help stick to your timeline.

The questions will vary slightly depending on the type of recipes in your book, but in general, you’ll want to get a sense of any allergies/dietary preferences, and if they have any essential equipment. Otherwise you might send a bundt cake recipe to a tester, only to find out a week later they don’t actually have a bundt pan.

Outreach Tips

• Set a closing date for signing up, and stick to it

• Explain exactly what you need from testers, what your timeline is, and the benefits of helping you test recipes

• Request that people only apply if they’re able to commit to the deadline

• Ask how many recipes they’re willing to make (1, 2, 3+)

• Gather any dietary restrictions

• Ask if they’re willing to make something more elaborate (like a triple layer cake or curry paste)

• Ask if they have special equipment (like a food mill, pizza stone, or stand mixer)

Phase 3: Assignments

Once you have your testers, it’s time to start making assignments. Start with anyone who listed dietary restrictions or was enthusiastic about trying something more difficult. Try to be mindful about ingredients. If you’re assigning two or more recipes, see if some of the ingredients can overlap so a tester doesn’t have to buy buy too many things.

You already have your email template, so it’s time to start sending them out. I created a new PDF for each recipe and saved it as “TESTER NAME_NAME OF BOOK RECIPES” to make it easy to find. This also personalizes the experience even more.

And just to be safe, assign the deadline for a week or two before you really need the feedback. Most people will be prompt, but there are always stragglers.

After all the emails go out, you can take a short breather as testing gets underway. Expect a few questions to come in (I can’t find dried blueberries! Can I use something else?), and respond as quickly as you can.

What to put in each email:

• Customized template with recipe names, instructions, and important dates

• Attached recipes

• Attached feedback form

• Attached NDA agreement

Phase 4: Feedback

As responses start pouring in, save feedback forms in a folder. I tried to read through the notes as soon as I received them and made any straightforward changes, like adding a bit more detail in a direction. Also, update your spreadsheet accordingly!

If you get mixed feedback from two testers, send it to a third, or even a fourth, before deciding how to proceed. Some of the feedback will force you to make a judgement call. Everyone’s palate is a little bit different, so just because someone didn’t absolutely love your chicken pot pie or the method you used, doesn’t mean it’s a bad recipe. With multiple testers, it’s easier to discern which issue is a personal preference, and which may be an fault with how the recipe was written.

At the very end, you might have a handful of recipes that need to be retested (I had about 10), so I put out a call for “last minute testing” asking for anyone who could turn it around within a few days, and also listed the recipes I needed help with so people could choose what sounded good to them.

Phase 5: Final Touches

These details aren’t essential, but they do add an extra special touch to the experience! After the process was over, I emailed everyone with notes for how to add this experience to their resume.

Here's what I said:

Hi testers!
Just a quick little note to say thank you again for testing recipes for Eat This Poem. I turned in my manuscript on time today, and couldn’t have done it without your help. Recipe testing requires you to be detail oriented, follow instructions, and provide concise feedback—skills worth adding to your resume, I think! 

Here’s some language to copy and paste to your LinkedIn profile, if you’d like to use it.

Recipe Tester, Eat This Poem Cookbook (February 2016). Followed detailed recipe instructions as written and provided feedback on results including taste, recipe clarity, and baking times.

I also sent handwritten thank you notes to every single tester. (Just check their NDA form for addresses, or make a spreadsheet ahead of time so you’re ready to go.)

In general, I found organization (thank you, Google Sheets) and gratitude went a long way. As with everything that’s volunteer-based, be prepared for drop offs. Most of my testers were up for the task and very responsive, but a few I never heard from again, even after sending recipes their way. Others let me know closer to the deadline that they just didn’t have the capacity to do it.

Life happens. Be gracious, but quick to pass along the recipes to someone else so you can meet your all-important manuscript deadline and finally see your cookbook come to life!

The last time my parents came to visit, my mom brought a small cookbook that belonged to my great grandmother, published on December 14, 1940. It was compiled by the King's Daughter's Class of the First Methodist Church in Las Animas, Colorado, and from the description looks to have been a gathering of young women, some newly married and others recently graduated from high school, who met on Sundays. There's even a sonnet inside, making clear that the virtue of this book is not in its looks, but in its usefulness.

"My pages will be stained and written o'er
With careless pencil or pens.
My leaves will be ragged, my back bent,
And I will never look the same again.
But, oh the dainties I helped to make,
In the busy summer morning..."

As I flipped the pages, I found the preserves section. The timing was right since I was looking to make a little cheese platter for a dinner with friends, and warm brie slathered with jam sounded perfect. The only problem was, there were hardly any instructions. Case in point: The instructions for the Grape Conserve recipe totaled six words: Blend and cook down as marmalade. No tips about how long to cook it, no notes about whether or not to strain the sauce (I didn't), or visual cues to tell you how it should look. It harkens back to a time when cooking acumen was handed down and recipes assumed the cook already has an understanding of the fundamentals.

I got to work. But first, poetry.

SUNDAY MORNING

by David Bubell

Our neighbor's home-cured, applewood-smoked, slab bacon
I've sliced myself. Mary Jo's cage-free organic eggs "the girls"

Have made for us. Two for each of us, one for Lu Shan, our dog.
And sometimes my own homegrown potatoes parboiled and fried

in oil with onions, green pepper, celery, herb salt, and black pepper.
A little stack of toast from bread baked locally and spread with local

butter. Three or four kinds of jam, one of which I made myself from
my own grapes. A pot of tea—Keemun or Assam, a little golden Yunnan

tossed in. Then sit down at the table as the early morning sun
comes streaming through the windows.

From Happy Life by David Bubell (Copper Canyon Press, 2011). Reprinted with permission from Copper Canyon Press.

This is how I like to eat on the weekends, and I imagine many of you appreciate a leisurely morning as well. There are slabs of bacon, eggs, homemade jam, and bread. It's an idyllic scene, made better because it's actually attainable. It's about friendship and sharing, too, and that's exactly what I did with my jam. I spread it over a hunk of warm brie, and shared it with friends in their backyard while our kids played in the grass. 

We need more of these meals, where we're not checking Instagram, carrying stresses from the work week, or worrying about needing to get out the door at a certain time. Meals where we're laughing, filling our plates (two or three times), and sipping on a summer wine. Poetry and food have always been an antidote to stress, chaos, and uncertainty, and what I'm always surprised by (though I shouldn't be), is how they're always available to us. It doesn't matter if it's Monday morning or Saturday night. We can always nourish ourselves and read a little poetry.

This book of poems was one of the first I've read in a while, and I devoured it cover to cover in bed one night. It did my soul some good, and reminded me (although I should never be surprised anymore), of how a beautiful line of verse can go straight to the heart. And in this space, we bring poetry straight to the stomach, too. 

BAKED BRIE WITH EASY GRAPE JAM

You might be skeptical when you read the instructions. The walnuts threw me off, especially when I pureed everything in the blender and the ingredients turned pale brown and soupy. Was I actually making jam? I wasn't convinced. I was mentally preparing to stop by the store on the way to our dinner party for a jarred option, but then everything started warming on the stove and as I tasted it after it thickened and bubbled, my fears melted away. It tastes like the inside of a fig newton. 

This is a very unfussy jam. I don't boil my jars and save them for winter. Instead, I make a batch and eat it within a couple of weeks. It pairs beautifully with cheese, and after the dinner party, I added a big spoonful to my oatmeal the next morning.

Makes about 2 cups

Ingredients
2 pounds grapes, washed and stemmed
Juice and zest of 1 lemon
Juice and zest of 1 orange
1 cup walnuts
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup granulated sugar

A round of brie
Crackers, for serving

Instructions
Add the grapes, citrus juice and zest, walnuts, and raisins to a Vitamix. Blend on medium high speed for 1 minute, until smooth and pale in color. Add to a 4-quart stock pot and bring to a boil; reduce and simmer 45 minutes to 1 hour, until reduced and slightly thickened. Let cool slightly, then transfer to glass jars. Use within a week, or freeze for later.

For the baked brie, heat oven to 350 degrees. Place brie on a parchment-lined baking sheet and cook for 5 minutes, until warmed through. Drizzle thickly with jam and serve with crackers.

October 2013 was the last time I was in New York. It was a work trip (a stressful one at that), and I spent most of my time in Manhattan. Four years later, life looks a bit different than when I turned left out of the Waldorf-Astoria and kept walking until I arrived at NYU. 

On Eat This Poem's book tour, my latest stop was Brooklyn. I recorded an episode of The Food Seen podcast, and had an amazing bookstore event at WORD Books where I was joined with Erin Boyle from Reading My Tea Leaves. In between, I did a lot of walking. I even spent three uninterrupted hours in a coffee shop, which was pure bliss. Here are the places I visited and loved!

6 Places to Visit in Brooklyn

Devocion | This is a bright, open space for Columbian coffee. I loved their iced fruit infusion, and would have stayed longer if it weren't for a dinner reservation nearby. (Williamsburg)

Bien Cuit | Smith Street is a vibrant street with plenty of shops to get lost in. Bien Cuit is one of them. It's a darling place to grab a cup of tea, or even a sandwich to take down to the water (I loved the asparagus baguette). The outdoor patio is relaxing, too. (Brooklyn Heights)

Books Are Magic | Another Smith Street gem, Books Are Magic is the new shop on the block. There's a cozy children's area for reading.

WORD Books | The Greenpoint location was home for my discussion with Erin Boyle. Upstairs is for the books, and downstairs is a spacious event space with a small stage. I heard from the staff they're getting ready to open a children's-only store down the street. (Greenpoint)

Aurora | An Italian restaurant with fresh pastas and a cozy garden in the heart of Williamsburg. (Williamsburg)

Rucola | I headed here for breakfast one morning, and to me, it's the quintessential New York restaurant. It's cozy, rustic, and if you sit facing the dining room, perfect for people watching. (Boerum Hill)

I'm fresh off my first out of state book tour stop—Seattle! I flew up to the Emerald City for an event at Book Larder, hosted with my friend and fellow author Megan Gordon (who writes the blog A Sweet Spoonful AND runs an amazing granola company, Marge).

The last time I was on a plane was before my son was born, when we went to Kansas City for a wedding. I hadn't missed the recycled air and modest leg room, but it felt great to get out there again, officially, and do something just for me. I even managed to sleep in until 8:15 one morning. 

During my brief visit I explored downtown and a little bit of Ballard, aided in part by our very own Literary City Guide! Here are some of the other gems I discovered along the way.

9 Places to Visit in Downtown Seattle and Ballard

Ellenos | This stall at Pike's Place Market drew me in as soon as I discovered their homemade, not too tangy, not too sweet Greek yogurt was topped with passion fruit. There were plenty of other flavor options, too, but I hardly noticed. I should have gone back a second time to try them.

Beecher's Handmade Cheese | Just down the street from Ellenos, this was the perfect spot to tuck into during a light drizzle and devour a paper bowl of tomato soup. Be sure to get it with curds and garlic croutons. 

The London Plane | This was a breakfast/brunch/lunch nook recommended by Reading My Tea Leaves, and it didn't disappoint. (Really, how could a spot that's half cafe and half flower shop disappoint?). It's located on the corner of a quiet little square, and the bar is an excellent place to linger and people watch. 

Slate Coffee Roasters | This was a must-stop on our Literary City Guides list, and my husband confirmed it when he was in town for a conference a few weeks ahead of me. I sipped a cup of tea and actually read a book, without interruption, for thirty minutes.

The Dane | I can see why Ballard neighbors love The Dane—you can get coffee, beer, and ice cream all in one spacious, family-friendly location. Also, free wi-fi! I made the mistake of sitting next to the children's bookshelf, which was darling but also a little distracting. Otherwise, it's definitely the kind of place I could easily sit and write in all afternoon. 

Book Larder | This cozy cookbook-only shop is a neighborhood gem. They hosted my author talk, where we ate popcorn, talked about writing and creativity, and were just the most wonderful hosts. Please stop in and buy books if you're in the neighborhood. 

Delancey | My trip to Seattle wouldn't have been complete without a pilgrimage to Delancey for pizza. I enjoyed a glass of rose, a springy salad with fava beans and asparagus, and a flavorful pie with a friend. It doesn't get much better than that! 

Waterfall Garden Park | One of the wonderful things about walking around a new city is you always discover something unexpected. I stumbled into this small garden just off Pioneer square, and it was a tranquil place to sit for a few minutes and just listen to the sound of the water rushing by. 

Seattle Public Library | I made my way inside the doors just as a passing rainstorm started. This 10-story building downtown is a real gem, with lots of places to read and write across multiple floors.

It's probably the right time to finally put together a proper post about the poem I read every year on my birthday. I'm not sure when it started exactly, but a handful of years ago I began a new ritual for myself that involves reading Elizabeth Bishop's poem "The Bight" the morning of May 23, and usually enjoying some kind of strawberry dessert later in the day.

It's not what you might typically think of as a birthday poem, but in fact, she wrote it on her 35th birthday so you can just imagine her working over the lines, watching the boats come in, thinking about where to go next. I think what strikes me the most is how well it captures the "awful but cheerful" aspects of the day. I've written about this before (see 2012 and 2013) but I can't seem to stop—there's just something about getting older and having time to reflect about where life has taken you so far, right? Looking out into the harbor or across some expansive landscape isn't necessary, but certainly helps to remind you just how big the world is. It also might encourage your eyes to get a little bit glassy (or maybe that's just me).

The Bight

[on my birthday]

At low tide like this how sheer the water is.
White, crumbling ribs of marl protrude and glare
and the boats are dry, the pilings dry as matches.
Absorbing, rather than being absorbed,
the water in the bight doesn't wet anything,
the color of the gas flame turned as low as possible.
One can smell it turning to gas; if one were Baudelaire
one could probably hear it turning to marimba music.
The little ocher dredge at work off the end of the dock
already plays the dry perfectly off-beat claves.
The birds are outsize. Pelicans crash
into this peculiar gas unnecessarily hard,
it seems to me, like pickaxes,
rarely coming up with anything to show for it,
and going off with humorous elbowings.
Black-and-white man-of-war birds soar
on impalpable drafts
and open their tails like scissors on the curves
or tense them like wishbones, till they tremble.
The frowsy sponge boats keep coming in
with the obliging air of retrievers,
bristling with jackstraw gaffs and hooks
and decorated with bobbles of sponges.
There is a fence of chicken wire along the dock
where, glinting like little plowshares,
the blue-gray shark tails are hung up to dry
for the Chinese-restaurant trade.
Some of the little white boats are still piled up
against each other, or lie on their sides, stove in,
and not yet salvaged, if they ever will be, from the last bad storm,
like torn-open, unanswered letters.
The bight is littered with old correspondences.
Click. Click. Goes the dredge,
and brings up a dripping jawful of marl.
All the untidy activity continues,
awful but cheerful.

—Elizabeth Bishop

Bishop is so, so good as describing the world around her. It's one of the things that attracted me to her work when I was in college and traveling a bit. Read a poem of hers, and you just feel grounded, present, alert to every detail in the scene. Her poems, in some ways, feel perfect in that way, but in studying her work more closely in graduate school (and simply knowing the challenges any writer faces), settling on just the right words was an enormously difficult task for her, which often meant it took her years to complete a single poem. (Ever wondered why her collected poems volume is so slim? Call it a case of perfectionism, perhaps.)

Anyway, come May, Elizabeth Bishop and strawberries are always on my mind, so here's this year's recipe.

Strawberry Pistachio Crumble

Serves 4 to 6

For the berries
2 pounds strawberries, hulled and quartered
Juice of 1 lemon
2 tablespoons turbinado sugar
1 teaspoon cornstarch

For the crumble
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup shelled pistachios, unsalted
1/2 cup spelt or whole-grain flour
1/4 cup turbinado sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Place strawberries in a large bowl and add the lemon juice, sugar, and cornstarch; gently toss to coat. Pour into an 8- by 8-inch baking dish.

In a food processor, pulse the oats, pistachios, flour, sugar, salt, and butter until large clumps form. The butter should be evenly distributed, and the crumble should hold a bit of shape if you squeeze it between your fingers. 

Scatter the topping over the strawberries and nudge it around with your fingers until well covered. Bake for 45 to 50 minutes, or until golden and the strawberry juices are bubbling around the edges. Serve warm or room temperature with freshly whipped cream.

There was a time when I devoured new cookbooks, marking them with post-its and eagerly trying new from inside the pages. I tried my hand at making bread, or other more involved dishes that required a bit of time and patience.

Now, there are two kinds of cooking now: aspirational and real life. 

What is aspirational now, was normal before this happened. My weeks are regimented, dinner is simple, and I rely on a rotation of reliable standbys, save for the occasional fancier meal over a weekend. Here's what I mean: beans and rice, some kind of pasta, a big salad (lately with the creamy garlic dressing I share below) curry with whatever mix of lentils I have in the pantry, and perhaps a big scoop of paste from a jar.

Last week, I crisped some bacon in a cast iron pan. After draining the fat, I added two cans of chickpeas, plus a handful of frozen peas. I left it on the stove until it was warm, seasoned it with salt and pepper. In a glass measuring cup, I whisked equal parts tahini and yogurt, added a squeeze of lemon and honey, salt and pepper, thinned it with water, then drizzled it over our bowls and called it dinner.

But here's what I really did: I cooked something from nothing, as Tamar Adler likes to say. I cooked with economy and grace. I opened the pantry and, combined with my instincts and experience, made dinner without a recipe.

Isn't that magical? I have to remind myself what a tremendous thing it is, because I used to be one of those people who made something new every night and kept food magazines sprawled open on the dining room table. I'll probably meet her again one day, but until then, here's to keeping things simple. 

Creamy Garlic Dressing

Once I start making something I like, I latch onto it. This recipe has been in my weekly rotation since I first tried it when Laura's book arrived at my door in April. It's just the right thing to make a double batch of, and keep in the fridge all week for easy salads. I've also poured it over steamed broccoli and quinoa (just add an avocado and a bit of cheese to round out the meal). Laura's recipe doesn't use apple cider vinegar, but when I was doing three things at once one evening I ended up adding a splash instead of the lemon juice, and loved it! Her book is a real gem, and definitely worth adding to your shelf, if you haven't already.

Recipe slightly adapted from The First Mess Cookbook

1/4 cup cashew butter
1/4 cup water, plus more as needed
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
2 garlic cloves
Sea salt
Freshly cracked pepper

Put all ingredients in a blender or food processor. Blend until well combined and creamy, about 1 minute. If it's a bit thick, thin with additional water, adding a teaspoon at a time. Refrigerate in a glass jar for up to 1 week. If not using immediately, just add a few drops of water to thin out the chilled dressing before using. 

On my drive home from Orange County last month, the sun was setting just as I glided down a two-lane highway flanked by wildflowers. California in the spring is just dreamy! But it wasn’t only the landscape that put me into a good mood.

I’d just finished an event at Laguna Beach Books, where I read the introduction, plus some of my favorite poems, to more than 20 people—total strangers!—who showed up to learn more about the wonderful combination of food and poetry. In that moment I felt utterly, wholeheartedly happy.

This is one of the good memories, the best kind to savor. I wrote it down in my journal to remember on days when, inevitably, the writing life feels less exciting.

It’s been almost two months since my cookbook was released, which is certainly long enough to have some thoughts collected. Over the years I’ve watched many friends publish books from afar, but since this is my first time experiencing all the joys and challenges that come along with it, I thought I’d share what’s been going well, and what’s been the most difficult, too.

Let’s start with the good news!

5 Things I Love About Book Launches

1 | Feeling like I’m in the right place at the right time

A few days before publication, I went to the beach, which is something of a ritual whenever I need some space to reflect. I just sat on a bench looking out into the sea, thinking of who I was and where I was four years ago when I first started drafting the manuscript. Getting to this moment was a labor of love, and above all, I feel like I’m in the right place at the right time. Seeing my face on the cover of Pasadena Weekly certainly helped, too. 

2 | Seeing books in the wild

Seeing my book out in the wild, as I like to say, is really a thrill. I’ve been assured by seasoned authors that it never gets old. It’s especially wonderful when someone outside your inner circle—like bookstores you’ve never heard of, or a friend’s aunt on Facebook—shares a photo of the book and you get to see it in bookstores, kitchens, and homes around the world.

3 | Expanding the inner circle

On Monday, March 20, a little independent bookstore in Maine posted an Instagram photo. It was a stack new releases hitting the shelves the next day, and Eat This Poem was stuck in the middle of the pile. That was the moment I realized the book would reach people even beyond my own inner circle. I think authors know this to be true, but something about seeing it happening, 3,000 miles away, made it all the more real.

4 | Making poetry more accessible

On more than one occasion a reader has told me “I didn’t enjoy poetry as much before, but now I’m hooked!” This is one of my favorite responses to the book, because it means poetry is taking root in places where it didn’t grow before. One of my early hopes in writing Eat This Poem was to make poetry more accessible, and by including it in the kitchen, giving both cooks and readers alike new ways to experience both of these essential life ingredients.

5 | Recording podcasts

Sign me up! I’ve recorded about six podcasts so far, and it’s been a blast getting to know fellow creatives and chatting about all things creativity, writing, food, and poetry. The conversations have felt effortless, like I’m talking to an old friend (when in reality, we’ve literally just met a few minutes before hitting the record button).

Now, being on the other side of publication is a place I’m loving, but it’s not without its difficult moments. Book publishing isn’t all about editors sending you flowers. Although this did happen to me on publication day, it’s certainly not a regular occurrence. Sometimes when all you see are cover photos popping up online, it doesn’t tell the whole story. With that in mind, here are a few things that are more challenging about the book launch process.

5 Things I Dislike About Book Launches

1| All the anticipation

I always feel amazing once an event is over. Actually, even during the event itself, like the one in Laguna Beach I told you about, I usually feel great. I’ve been trained in public speaking and did musical theatre growing up, so even though it’s not my favorite thing in the world, when I’m prepared, I’m relatively comfortable on stage. But the anticipation still gets me every time. The hours thinking, the traveling, the making sure my hair looks just right, picking out what to wear, wandering around the bookstore wondering if anyone will show up. That’s the part that depletes my energy and no amount of deep breaths or mindfulness seems to snap me out of it (although I’m working on it!).

2 | Keeping up with social media

Even though data shows most people aren’t buying books directly from social media (which is why having real, lasting relationships in places like a newsletter or Facebook group is important), it’s still part of the deal to talk about your work online, especially during a launch. Tools like Hootsuite make it easy to schedule posts in advance, and my trusty editorial calendar has helped me plan campaigns, too. The best way to survive is to do as much as you can in advance.

3 | Riding the emotional roller coaster

I’ve experienced the slow climb to the tallest peak, the rush down, and now I’m curving my way around some of the smaller bumps. This theme park metaphor is really just to say there are great days, good days, and average days. I’m not sure I’ve had any terrible days (yay!), but I’ve definitely noticed my energy change somewhat drastically, depending on what’s going on. For example, when a blogger publishes a post about Eat This Poem (super high!), then the next day there’s nothing new and the adrenaline starts coming down. Or, I hear about a potential mention in a big newspaper or magazine (exciting!), but feel disappointed when it doesn’t come through.

4 | Being back at the beginning

Once you publish a book, it’s officially done. You might be knee deep in promotion and PR and book touring, but the writing process is complete. The only thing for me to do is to dive head first into Book #2, which I’m realizing is perhaps the only thing more terrifying than a book launch. I haven’t been at the very beginning in more than four years, so it’s overwhelming to think just how far I need to go in order to do this all again. I have to constantly remind myself of my own advice: one thing at a time.

5 | Early morning flights

This should come as no surprise, but waking up at 4 a.m. isn’t really my favorite thing. Especially when I have to get dressed, put on my contacts, swipe mascara over my eyes, and go to the airport. But that’s what it takes to get to the east coast before the sun goes down. There are a lot of things I love about travel, but I always get a little bit anxious right at the beginning.

Well, that’s my first dispatch from the world of book launches! Have any questions about the process, or anything I shared? Please add a comment below!