Dear bread,
Do you know that I'm also in love with pancakes? That the first meal I shared with my husband was corncakes, sweet and savory, topped with Cornelian cherry syrup he made and some fresh tomatoes? That my love of freshly milled flour made me love pancakes even more? That instead of toast, for the first 10 years of my first son's life, we mostly ate pancakes? Bread darling, I don't think you will mind my devotion.
Because aren't all food stories love stories?
Aren't all stories love stories? They are tales of mystery and attachment, hunt and satisfaction. Stories let us, as writers, look for our feelings in the world, and stories let us as readers, look for ourselves. Verbal foraging.
This is the season for Cornelian cherries. Cornus mas is a common street and landscaping tree, and my would-be husband picked his from the Arboretum at the University of Seattle. Two rows of trees made an aisle, and he put a sheet down under some loaded branches and shook the little garnet gems free.
There's nothing like these cherries. They are exceptionally astringent, and used for jam and syrups. There's no easy way to pry the flesh from the big pit; some recipes have you make a marmalade that includes the pits, and eaters have grown used to enjoying the food while watching out for those pits. The recipes I use are Turkish or Persian.
Jack and our first son, Francis, found a favorite variety of Cornus mas to plant at home, in the strip between the sidewalk and the street. The kind they got is beautiful and teardrop shaped, much bigger than the ones I've been picking over on the RPI campus on my morning walks. I fill my pockets, never organized enough to bring a sheet and shake the trees.
I'm making some syrup to bring a pancake breakfast Sunday. This is part of a fund-raising weekend for Heritage Radio Network, which runs incredible food programming. They have a million shows and I'm a fan especially of Beer Sessions Radio and A Taste of the Past. Jimmy Carbone, host of Beer Sessions, has been a big supporter of regional grain work, making sure that the stories of great beers are followed all the way back to the field. Here's a farm to can playlist of all the episodes that tell regional beer stories.
The Catskills Field Day has a lot of fun stuff, including live storytelling/recording at the Putt Putt Van Winkle Golf Course. I'm going to be interviewing Sarah Litvin about the Reher Center in Kingston, an incredible museum project that happens to be in an old bakery. And on Sunday, I'll be making up Farmer Ground Flour pancakes, dipping in to the Dutch tradition of my favorite food: maybe the cakes will be good enough to wake Rip Van Winkle once again!
If you are anywhere near Bovina, New York, I hope you’ll join this weekend’s events. Especially the pancake breakfast, because I’d love to feed you my love for this food.
Yours, Amy