waffles and a letter to my mother

To my mama:

How alike we are. I notice it more as I get older that I am speaking your phrases, using your laugh, gesturing with your hands (although I will never have such elegant hands as you). As a new wife, I think often of how life must have seemed when you and dad were first married, and looking at you now I hope I can be as happy, as gracious, as wise.

I think about how much I treasure our phone calls, even though half the time I’m too caught up in washing dishes or working on a project to put things down, really listen, and talk. This is the formal declaration of the end of that nonsense. Every time you exclaim with that particular note of joy in your voice when you answer the phone, I feel a stab of guilt over every time I’ve tried to do two things at once while talking to you.

Because I know how important it is to show you and to tell you, in little ways ever day, how glad I am that you’re my mother. I don’t want to dial your number one day to complain about the terrible job some dry-cleaner did or ask for advice on how to best leaven a cake only to remember that you aren’t there to call anymore. I don’t want that sinking pit in my stomach to remind me of all the times I failed to completely express my happiness at some good thing you’ve done for me, all the times I didn’t connect with you over a cup of coffee and a magazine.

For as much as you have taught me – about relationships, money, work ethic, compassion, service, dressing well, shopping for deals, driving – I still have so much to learn. You are an incredible woman with a vast store of strength inside you. Your heart is full of selflessness and optimism, and it has no rivals in capacity for love. The creativity inside you is busting at the seams, trying to get out. And I want to soak it all up.

Happy mother’s day to my mama and my friend. Thank you for being who and what you are, and for helping make me who and what I am.

— your daughter

Buckwheat Waffles with Hot Buttered Apple Chutney

If you’re lucky enough to live nearby your mother, make her some of these this weekend. You never need a reason to make waffles or to do something nice for the woman who birthed you, but thankfully Mother’s Day provides a nice excuse.

For waffles, adapted from Nourishing Traditions:

2 ½ c. freshly ground buckwheat flour

2 c. full-fat Bulgarian yogurt (or buttermilk, kefir, or acidic water)

2 egg yolks, lightly beaten

2-4 Tbsp. maple syrup

2 Tbsp. melted butter

1 tsp. sea salt

4 egg whites

2 tsp. cinnamon

Soak flour in yogurt overnight. In the morning, mix with egg yolks, melted butter, maple syrup, salt and cinnamon. In a separate bowl, beat egg whites until stiff – fold into batter gently. Pour onto a hot waffle iron and cook until crisp. If making enough for a group, keep waffles warm in an oven set to 200 degrees.

For the chutney:

4 small apples, cored and roughly chopped

2 Tbsp. butter

1 Tbsp. maple syrup

2 tsp. apple cider vinegar

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. coriander

¼ tsp. cardamom

½ tsp. ginger

¼ tsp. cloves

¼ tsp. salt

few grind of black pepper

dash of nutmeg

dash of cayenne

Melt butter in a small saucepan and cook apples, covered, over medium heat for 10-15 minutes. Apples will soften and release moisture. Reduce heat to low.

Stir in apple cider vinegar, maple syrup and spices and simmer until it make a thick paste.

Add a splash of water if more moisture is needed, or a dash of coarse mustard or mustard seeds if you’re daring.

an afternoon for cookies

It’s usually immediately after I make some sort of pledge to be the healthiest I can be that I make cookies. I’m afflicted with some sort of temporary good-intentions-amnesia, in which I think about how nice it would be to bake something on an afternoon, then I bake something, eat three of them, and then remember, “Wait a second…”

But all this gets me thinking about what is really means to be healthy. Good health encompasses so much more than blood sugar levels and body fat – good health is a radiance from happiness, from peace of mind. Good health does not come from obsessing over calorie content or macro- and micronutrient ratios. Good health means balance and joy and mindfulness.

My idea of good health has changed significantly in the last few years. In college I was fascinated by veganism, the raw food movement, by vegetarians and the moral high road they took by eschewing animal protein. Looking back on the way I lived an ate as a sophomore, it’s no wonder I was almost always sick. I prided myself in being healthy but, in reality, I was probably malnourished. I remember once when my parents came to visit and took me out for dinner at a nice steakhouse – I ordered a ribeye and felt better after the first bite, as if the lifeblood of another creature sustained my own.

The next couple of years were a mishmash of experimentation as I lived in my first apartments and learned to cook for myself. Within this was a struggle to accept my still-changing body. I went from a rail-thin, stick-straight high school athlete to something resembling a woman, and a petite woman at that; but anyone who has all of a sudden woken up one morning to find hips that weren’t there the night before can understand my disconnect with my new shape. And so I obsessed, I worried, I researched, I dieted. That worry balled up inside of me and kept me from appreciating the smooth skin of an Arkansas Black apple, the crisp lace of perfectly cooked bacon.

Because what we eat and how has so much to do with the larger scheme of our life. It orders our day, it affects our mood, it determines how long we will live and to what degree of happiness. Thinking about what I’m going to make for dinner now on any given night is a combination of my creativity, my family’s nutritional needs, and our emotional nourishment. Has it been a particularly hard day? I’ll reach for something savory that can stand up to a slow braise, pair it with wine, and make something decadently chocolate for dessert. Is it the start of a long-awaited weekend? We might set up a picnic in the living room with marrow bones, pate, a really nice cheese and a movie. Are we feeling a little under the weather? Nothing but homemade chicken vegetable soup will do the trick.

The thing I want to get to behind every meal, within every morsel, is that food is so much more than the vitamins and minerals that compose it. Our attitudes, our emotional associations with a dish, and how we savor certain flavors over others create this incredible tapestry of experience. This is why, when Andrew and I travel, we do our best to find the best street food or decadent restaurants. Sharing a candlelit cocktail or a greasy bite of paper-wrapped tacos in a park means a shared memory made, one with sights and smells and sensations.

Good health is being grateful at every table, no matter what is on the plate. Be it cookies, a giant salad, or a juicy ribeye, we can impart a little more health to ourselves if we slow down, appreciate, taste, and admit that it may not be so much about what we eat as how.

Gluten Free Salted Chocolate-Pretzel Peanut Butter Cookies

Adapted ever so slightly from Oh Ladycakes

1 stick butter, softened

½ c. chunky peanut butter

½ c. maple syrup

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1 egg

2 Tbsp. Bulgarian yogurt (or milk, or cream…)

¼ tsp. fine sea salt

¼ tsp. baking soda

¾ c. gluten free baking flour mix

½ c. finely ground gluten free pretzel crumbs

½ c. Enjoy Life mini chocolate chips

coarse sea salt, for topping

Speaking of how we enjoy our food, I found that these are best enjoyed in the company of another who enjoys cookies very much, perhaps with a cup of tea while the cookies are still warm. Treasure the slow moment in a busy day, relish the flavors and textures and decadence of cookies on a Tuesday for no real reason, and look back on it when you need to remember that things are good.

To make a gluten free flour mix: in a small bowl, combine 1 c. gluten free oat flour, 1 c. sweet rice flour, ¼ c. plus 1 Tbsp. arrowroot powder and sift until incorporated. Store in an airtight jar – feel free to increase the measurements proportionally to make a bigger batch for cookies, etc. I haven’t tried this mix with a cake yet, but so far it makes for a moist, crumbly cookie.

Cream together butter and maple syrup, then beat in egg, vanilla extract and yogurt. In a separate bowl, sift together salt, baking soda, gluten free flour and pretzel flour. Stir dry ingredients into wet and mix until combined; fold in chocolate chips. Dollop cookie dough onto a lined baking sheet and sprinkle a tiny bit of coarse sea salt on the top.

Bake at 350 degrees for 10-12 minutes. OL recommends freezing the cookies on the baking sheet for ten minutes or so before baking, but I accidentally skipped that step on my first batch and the world didn’t end. Her cookies were, however, more uniform than mine, so take from that what you will.

a colorful asian slaw, inspired by mom

For every church potluck and summer barbecue that I can recall, my mother has made her famous slaw. She makes it a couple of hours or even a day ahead of time, and then hauls it to whatever fellowship hall/backyard we’re invited to in her hexagonal glass Pyrex dish, the one with the plastic lid with a return-address sticker attached to it in case it gets left behind. Everyone who eats it — my dad in particular — goes crazy for the sweet-and-salty dressing, the crunch of the butter-fried Ramen noodles, the salted sunflower seeds and the green pop of onion. It’s kind of her thing, her reliable recipe she can pull from her back pocket in a pinch to jazz up a summer supper or a funeral dinner.

I was never been a huge fan of the slaw growing up. I preferred to filch the just-fried, still-hot crispy noodles from the dish beside the oven before she mixed it into the rest of the salad, to mingle with all the dressing and vegetables.

Times have changed, and so have my tastes. Now I’m more about the veggies than the Ramen noodles, and I’m usually content to make a salad with some sort of greens base and a Dijon vinaigrette should I be required to bring one to a function. But recently, there was a period of about two weeks that were full to our social calendar’s brim, and I was inspired to recreate the slaw of my mother’s kitchen.

This is arguably a healthier version, not to one-up my mom’s recipe — but it avoids the soy sauce, the brown sugar, and anything else that makes hers so addictively delicious. The base is a simple mix of shredded cabbages and carrots, and although I found the shredding attachment on my food processor to be the best for the job, a mandoline slicer or a bag of pre-shredded slaw mix from the store will work just fine. In fact, feel free to amp up the mix with the addition of fresh cilantro, spicy micro-greens, radishes sliced into rounds or matchsticks, or a few sparing scoops of pickled ginger.

The dressing, though, much like my mom’s recipe, is what makes this salad sing. There is sweet and salty, there are savory notes and bitter splashes, and there is a hum of warmth from the spices included. Top with sesame seeds, salted sunflower seeds and some diced onion, and this dish is good to go for any picnic or potluck.

(I certainly won’t assign blame if you want to add some butter-fried noodles, although don’t say I didn’t warn you.)

Asian Slaw

1/2 head green cabbage, shredded
1/2 head red cabbage, shredded
3 large carrots, shredded
3 green onions, diced
1/4 c. toasted sesame seeds
1/4 c. salted sunflower seeds

For the dressing:

1 Tbsp. toasted sesame oil
2 Tbsp. olive oil (or for a stronger flavor, use all sesame oil)
2 Tbsp. mirin
1 Tbsp. coconut aminos
1/2 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 tsp. Chinese 5 Spice powder
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
a few dashes of red pepper flakes

Whisk all dressing ingredients together in a small bowl. In a large bowl, combine shredded vegetables and toss with dressing. Sprinkle with green onions and seeds to garnish.

This would go really well with the avocado-tahini combo I urged you to try earlier this week!

Category Archives: Love

waffles and a letter to my mother

an afternoon for cookies

a colorful asian slaw, inspired by mom

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