The Om Baker — Issue #9 — Life During Covid
Well ain’t this a kick in the pants? It feels like a different world than the one I wrote you from three weeks ago. It’s rather surreal; daily life is the same, except for the parts where interaction with the outside world takes place. Never has my home felt more like a sanctuary. But then trips to the grocery store feel like I’m in a movie, what with the masks, standing six feet apart, and consistently depleted shelves. As I sat down to write this newsletter I started thinking about the Talking Heads song “Life During Wartime”.
Wishing you peace, sweetness, and good health.
Leslie
Meditation
Meditation has been a lifeline for me during this pandemic. Know why? Because when you regularly practice sitting and calmly breathing with whatever arises (i.e., meditating) it helps you more calmly manage whatever arises when you’re up and moving around. Makes sense, right? Meditation is just training the mind. I’ve been giving meditation instruction to folks all around the country these past few weeks. Since I can’t bake for everyone, it’s my way of giving back.
I’ve also been taking a pretty great online Buddhism class taught by Sharon Salzberg. It’s called “The Whole Path: Kindness, Meditation, and Wisdom” and it’s lovely. It’s pre-recorded and self-paced I’m on Week 3 right now. Highly recommend.
What’s bakin’?
I feel like I haven’t baked much in the past few weeks, but I have. This is probably because I’ve been baking re-runs: stuff I’ve made before and know I like. (There’s quite enough uncertainty going on right now, thank you very much.) Per my husband’s request, I made Handle the Heat’s Sour Cream Old-Fashioned Doughnuts. They’re easy and so yummy. I once again have decided to adopt a sourdough starter — which is either brave or stupid of me. I have a tendency to starve them to death. I raised two kids, keep my husband and I extremely well fed, and pamper my dog to a ludicrous degree, but apparently regularly feeding flour and water to some glop in a jar is beyond my abilities — so I made another batch of Alton Brown’s Sourdough Cheese Crackers. It’s a fairly technical recipe, using a pasta machine to roll out the dough extra thin, but mmm, they’re good.
But there was one exciting new thing I made over the past few weeks, and it was a big hit:
The recipe is from Stella Park’s Bravetart cookbook. It requires freeze-dried corn and malted milk powder, both of which you can easily find on Amazon. I used cookie cutters like these, which really do a great job of adding detail. The recipe was a big hit, and people really gobbled these cookies up. By “people” I mean my husband (pictured below).
I can’t find a link from Stella herself for this recipe, but here’s a link to it from another blogger who made them. Please note: the recipe calls for baking them for 12 minutes. Mine started to burn at 10 minutes. My second batch was just right at 7 minutes. So keep a close eye on them.
That’s it! I’ve missed writing for you, and just the act of doing so has made me feel like I want to make a new recipe. Will I be brave (crazy) enough to attempt a Gateau St. Honoré? Will I make myself a Chocolate Chip Passion Fruit cake with Coffee Frosting for my birthday next week? Will someone invent a quarantine mask with a cake flap?
Stay tuned…
