To honor the launch of this blog, I wanted to begin with a project that epitomizes this particular time and place. It is high summer here in the Pacific Northwest, all sun-burnished grasses, sparkling lakes, and cool evergreen woods. It is the season that compensates for those other nine months of perpetual drizzle and leaden gray. So I cast about for a symbol of summer bounty. It had to be blackberries. They are everywhere, lining country roads, sprawling across patches of wasteland, and clinging to edges of forests. And although they are not strictly Northwest natives, having jostled their way into our ecosystems with their European bearers, they are now a dominant feature of our landscape. If you can't beat them, you might as well eat them!
And so yesterday, after a bleary-eyed, ever so slightly hung-over start to the morning, I set out in search of the ubiquitous Himalayan blackberry. Alas, nature remained stubbornly uncooperative. The bulk of berries are were yet ripe and all I could capture, after a half hour of swearing at thorns and spiders, was a pitiful handful—hardly enough to adorn my breakfast granola.
Back to the drawing board, in this case the kitchen. I sat mulling over a suitable first project . . . something symbolic, something magnificent . . .
“Look at this, darling.” Mother came bustling over. “Look how well it rose.”
I glanced down as she held out a domed, sandy brown loaf. “That’s sourdough?” I asked, hoping it wasn’t.
“Yes! Impressive, isn’t it.”
“Fantastic.” I was seething inside, attempting to keep the jealously from my voice.
This is it. I thought. This is the bloody limit. I am the foodie in this family. I am the baker. I simply must make a better loaf than that! And just like that, fueled by envy and competitive zeal, I found my first project.
Then, with great effort I swallowed my pride and inquired with studied casualness. “So, uh, so which recipe did you use exactly?”
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