Second Day of Fall Break: Cooking with Recipes

I have been having a great Fall Break.  We've been cooking to use up the odds and ends in the refrigerator, and yesterday was the day to use up the poblano peppers that I bought for a different recipe and didn't use.

My spouse loves chile rellenos and whenever we go to a new-to-us Mexican restaurant, that's what he orders. We try making our own periodically, but it's a huge undertaking.  But yesterday we had the time, so we decided to give it a go.  Here's the finished project:

My spouse made the tomato sauce which was spooned on to; my spouse wished that he had put it on the plate underneath the peppers, but I was fine either way.  The peppers are stuffed with a combination of beef crumples and a Mexican white cheese, the kind that looks like fresh-ish mozzarella, but tastes saltier and less creamy.  We whipped egg whites and gently folded in the yokes.  We dipped the peppers in the eggs and then a flour and cornmeal mixture, and then we fried them in our biggest cast iron skillet.

After lunch, we settled in to watch a cooking show.  I found The Great American Baking Show Halloween edition.  What a treat!  It was the type of show with celebrity cooks, in this case 4 comics.  In some ways, I like those versions of the cooking shows best--no one's hopes and dreams are being squashed.

The disadvantage to baking shows is that they make me want to bake--and so, I did.  My spouse had a birthday in the past week, and because I was out of town helping to lead a retreat, we didn't celebrate.  I wanted a chocolate cake, to use up some souring milk, and he loves German Chocolate cake.  Lo and behold, I had all the ingredients, and so, we made this cake:

It would not have looked this way without my spouse.  I have two round cake pans--my spouse cut each round cake into two cakes, which left us with 4 layers, not two.  I would not have had the patience.

Here is the recipe for the cake:

Chocolate Sour Milk Cake

2 c. sugar
1/2 c. shortening
2 eggs
3 c. flour
1/2 c. cocoa
2 tsp. baking soda
2 c. sour milk
Vanilla

Beat together sugar and shortening. Sift together flour, cocoa and baking soda. Add liquid and dry ingredients alternately to first mixture (I just mixed it all together, and it was fine). Grease pan (9x13) generously; dust with flour. Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes. Do not open oven before 30 minutes.

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And here is the recipe for the frosting, from a Southern Living website recipe:

2 cups chopped pecans or walnuts (I used pecans)

 

Toast the nuts in a 350 oven--or don't.  Other recipes call for toasting the coconut, but I didn't.

Mix the following in a pan and heat:

1 (12-oz.) can evaporated milk
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
3/4 cups butter
6 large egg yolks, lightly beaten

Some recipes will tell you not to let the mix boil, but mine did.  You want to cook the frosting for 12-14 minutes--it should bubble and become golden-brown, with a pudding consistency.

Once you've cooked the mix, add the nuts and the following:

2 - 2 1/2 cups sweetened flaked coconut
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

As it cools, it will become thicker and more spreadable.

First Day of Fall Break in Variations of Fabric

Yesterday was one of those days when I feel like I didn't get anything done.  I could make the argument that I didn't have to get anything done--it was my first day of Fall Break, after all.  But let me focus on the real truth:  I got a lot of stuff done.

I went to the bank and got some money transferred to savings and ordered some more checks.  Sure, I could have done that online, although not with my phone.  I do not do mobile banking.  I could have called the 1-800 # and done the self service.  Actually, I tried that, and the automated voice told me that I last ordered checks in 2023, which I thought was not correct, so I worried I would order checks and get the wrong check #s.  Going to my local branch is easier than the other options I had, and I do realize how unusual that is.

While I was out, I went to the Fresh Market to pick up some more provolone cheese for the rice-veggie dish I wanted to make.  Those of you paying attention may say, "Didn't you make that weeks ago?"  No, gentle reader, I did not.  I bought the ingredients.  Yesterday I decided that if I didn't use the eggplant in a day or two, it would be going to the compost bin.

As I crossed the Fresh Market parking lot, I thought about Asheville Cotton, one of my favorite fabric stores near me; it's in the same shopping plaza, and I don't go there enough.  It's one of the stores that I would feel sad if it closed, and I know I need to do more to support those stores.

I knew that the store had a reduced price section in the back, but I didn't know they had several baskets of remnants:  fat quarters for $1.33 (usual price $3.99) and remnants for $6.99 a yard.  I indulged:

I got home and made the recipe (which you can find in this blog post) and then ate some of it for a later lunch.  It was not as delicious as I remember, perhaps because I used smoked provolone from an Italian market in earlier incarnations, and this time, I did not.  But it was tasty enough.

We watched The Four Seasons, the original movie, not the updated Tina Fey version.  It was delightful, but not as funny as I remembered.  I checked in on my online students and answered some e-mails.  And then we watched Redwood Highway, which had been recommended based on some other viewing, and since it was free, why not?  As we watched, I stitched.

So why do I feel I've done nothing?  In part, because I spent a lot of time on the Realtor.com site.  Why did I do this?  Am I hoping to sell this house?  No, absolutely not.  Am I looking to buy an additional house?  There are situations where I could see this option making sense, but so far, I haven't seen anything that inspires me to move forward.  So in some ways, that perusing of houses feels like a waste of time, but if I slant it differently, it's research that shows that there's no property worth pursuing right now.

It also feels like I "wasted" a day because I didn't do much writing, and I didn't get a walk in.  But I did a lot of other activities that fed my soul, so let me consider yesterday a win.

Fall Break Begins

My Fall Break is off to a good start, despite a trash can mix up in the predawn hours.  I dragged/rolled the trash can to the street only to discover that it was the recycling, which doesn't get picked up until next week.  Happily, my spouse had put the cans in the wrong spaces last week, and the recycling had been put into the recycling can in the days that followed.   I did have this vision of needing to resort the garbage and the recycling, and happily, that was not the case.

I have not done much in the way of writing this morning, and I haven't gone for my walk.  But happily, I have hours and hours to do that still.  

I am always torn on these days off:  part of me wants to accomplish a lot, and part of me wants to unwind.  I usually end up doing some of both.

I love having a 4 day week-end, as this Fall Break will be.  I could have one day be a loafing day, and 1 day be a getting things accomplished day, and I still have Saturday.

I have had this blog post open for several hours.  Perhaps it's time to just admit that I am done blogging for this morning.

Surrealistic Poem Generating in Creative Writing Class

Once again, not as much writing time this morning--but the next two mornings will be glorious.  Finally, Fall Break is here!  I've been going full steam ahead since CPE started on June 9.  I thought about scheduling all sorts of appointments:  hair, dermatologist, car.  But I've decided that I really need something else, which will probably look like staying home to bake--although I might see if I can get the car in for an oil change. 

I need to do some planning for my Creative Writing class; I need poems for next week.  Yesterday I changed plans when I realized it was going to take time to get individual poems together.  I shifted to my surrealistic poem experiment, which I tweaked to be both individualistic and collaborative.

Yesterday went well.  That's my best case brain talking.  My worst case brain says that they were overwhelmed and mystified at how what we did constitutes poem writing.

I left all the samples in the office, but we created some fascinating poems.  I gave them my document of abandoned lines, which had space above and below to add lines of their own.  Here's an example, the first page of the document:

----
In a past time, you’d have been Magellan

I watch you solder bits to a motherboard

This body, a country with no maps

Some days the backyard garden explodes

I keep the quilts made by a spinster aunt.

-----

I have 15 pages, so they have plenty of lines to choose from.  I had them write companion lines and then cut the pages into strips.  And then we did a lot of experiments.

First we chose 6 strips at random and turned them over.  We asked ourselves, how did they work together?  We had the option to add more lines from our collection of strips.  We could create more lines.  We could rearrange.

I had also rearranged the tables so that we had several tables with long sheets of paper on them.  I had them put the strips they weren't going to use on those sheets of paper--ideally, everyone would put at least one strip on each strip of long paper.

Everyone had a long sheet of paper with strips, and we spent 15 minutes arranging the strips into something resembling a poem.  I read a few out loud.  I thought they worked as poems, but my students seemed more hesitant.

I do realize that one reason why I think they work is that the abandoned lines are my lines, so in some sense, they do work well together.  I also realize that I have more training in doing reading without insisting on some external meeting; I did confess to my students that I like having a clear meaning, which these poems may not always have.

Next week, when we return from fall break, I'll back up a little.  We'll do some poems with clear meanings and talk about how/if/why they work.  And we'll do a bit more experimenting with form:  sestina and villanelle and pantoum and sonnets--but maybe we'll do something simple, like triolets, and avoid/save the harder stuff.

But first, Fall Break!  Actually, first I go down to Spartanburg Methodist College.  Today is a writing day for my students, so it will be easier for me--which is good, because midterm grades are due, and we have a Humanities department meeting.

Teaching Anxiety and Gratitude

I have been feeling anxious this morning, which is strange for a woman who will have a fall break this week.  Of course, midterm grades are due tomorrow, which is probably why I'm feeling a bit anxious.  But I have most of the grading done--so why anxiety?

I also have last week's travel done--again, I would have thought my anxiety would be dying down, not flaring up.

It may have to do with today's lesson plans.  I have a plan, so why anxiety?  But it might rain, which means going out to observe our trees again may not be the best plan.  I changed my approach in Creative Writing so that I have time to find more poems for next week--it should work fine, but who knows (it will be a variation on the process I described in this blog post, poem writing when we don't feel inspired).

Let me focus on some gratitudes--and then I'll shower and head on down the mountain:

--My travel was fairly easy yesterday, despite a day of rain.  The rain was mostly light, and it wasn't the tropical hurricane type rain that might have happened, if the hurricane had moved differently.

--My teaching review was fine; I got the evaluation back and read it this morning.  That also happened last week, and while I thought it was fine, I always like confirmation.

--I slept for part of the night with the sound of gentle rain.

--I have fall break this week; I feel like I really need it.

--The retreat went well, and before that, the reunion with grad school friends went well.

Keeping Our Lamps Trimmed and Burning

I've had the spiritual "Keep Your Lamps Trimmed and Burning" in my head for much of the week-end:  "Keep Your Lamps, Trimmed and Burning, for this work is almost done.  Children don't grow weary."  It was the anthem for Sunday worship at St. Stephens, and it was also the theme for the women's retreat that the church offered, the retreat where I led workshops on spiritual journaling (more on those workshops in this blog post).  

It was a great retreat, with lots of thoughts on what keeps us on fire and how our lights are threatened by candlesnuffers everywhere.  It was a rich subject, and we could have spent a week or more on the subject.

I was most moved by the closing worship for the retreat.  We gathered around the paschal candle in the worship sanctuary.  Earlier in the retreat, we had thought about something that's important to us that we worry will be lost.  My list could have been long, but we were asked to choose one to bring with us to closing worship.  

As we entered the worship space, we were given small candles, the kind that we get on Christmas Eve.  At the end of the short worship, each woman came to the paschal candle and lit her candle while she said the thing that was important.  The whole assembly said, "Keep Your Lamp Trimmed and Burning."

We heard things like "freedom" and "democracy" along with specific items.  Mine was "the idea of the value of a liberal arts education."  I loved that we took time for each woman to state her item and we met each offering with a prayerful chant.

We ended with a song, and not for the first time, I reflected on how wonderful it is to sing together.  I am much more used to sitting in spread out sanctuaries where I only hear my own voice.  I much prefer to sing in closer quarters, where I can't hear any individual voice.

It was also a great way to close the retreat.  We have much work to do, but it was good to remember that we're not doing it alone.

A Tale of Two Writing Workshops

Yesterday, I facilitated two writing workshops; the topic was spiritual journaling.  The approach was the same, but the attendance was different.

I presented a variety of writing prompts with time to write.  We didn't have time to read our writing out loud to each other, and I wouldn't have done that, even if we had lots of workshop time.  If we had had more time, I might have had us do some out loud processing of the writing experience itself. 

Here's what we did:

--I had objects on a table (yes, that old chestnut--but I haven't ever done it with this group), and I had people choose several.  Then we wrote for 5 minutes.  Because it's a religious retreat, I added 2 minutes of writing about what God might be saying to us through the object.

--We wrote to our current selves.  We wrote in the voice of ourselves 20-50 years from now.  We wrote in the voice of our younger selves, the women we were when we were 18-20 years old.   After doing that, we wrote in the voice of God:  Creator, Redeemer, Holy Spirit and/or The Trinity.

--Because writing in the voice of God might have felt sacrilegious, I had us make a list of what's bringing us joy and then talked about the Ignatian ideas of consolation and desolation, and the value of making that list at the end of the day.  We also talked about gratitude lists.

--I handed out two double-sided sheets of writing prompts.  We talked about the value of doing spiritual journaling alone and with a group.  

--I also talked about non-word ways of journaling, like sketching or taking a daily photo.

--I reminded us that two thousand years of spiritual practices gives us lots of options, and the assurance that if we've dropped a practice and want to return, we can.

The first workshop was just before lunch, and we had less time than the scheduled 45 minutes, which was fine with me.  It was a completely full workshop:  people had three to choose from.

In the afternoon, a workshop was added:  the chance to meet with the retreat leader.  My afternoon spiritual journaling workshop had one person.  So that it would feel less strange to us both, I decided to do the prompts too.  It turned out to be a nice variation.

Originally I had planned to leave Williamsburg today, but I decided that I needed to be gentle with myself and that my Monday students can have a writing day without me.  I'm glad that I have an extra day to linger in the satisfaction of a good retreat.