Through the gray rain
I see cormorants lining the pier
their tails resembling long black
top coats reaching down to the ground—
is it the height of fashion or disturbed
adolescence? Through the splattering
of water spotting the window I count in twos
and threes—more than a hundred.
They’re sitting out the storm
in the middle of the storm.
How often we keep raging
while all the while a haven awaits.
It just takes sitting there,
breathing.
Perhaps dessert is like the savasana of a meal,
when finally we can rest in the sweetness.
A fork-full of chocolate mocha cake:
still, floating, letting-go,
as the so-solid sensations of body
can no longer be found, weight
falling away, spirit roaming, life is . . .
good. Remember?
The berry patch by the pond near
the rope swing? Grapes on the bench
at the playground? Baking home-made
cookies with mama: all that mixing
and shaping, and finally
a chance to clean
the bowl.
“WHAT DO YOU THINK,” SUZUKI ROSHI asked, “that you can add cream and sugar to everything to make it taste the way you want it to?” No, not really, desserts do not a diet make, nevertheless, they have a place in our hearts and at the table.
When I think about desserts I often think first of fruit crisps. My favorite dessert at YMCA camp, years later I was delighted to find out how to make them. I love the buttery sweetness and juicy vitality.
These days many people think that butter and sugar are unhealthy, but I still believe in old-fashioned desserts. Thoughts can rigidify into hard and fast rules, creating a regimen that doesn’t leave much room for enjoyment and satisfaction. I would rather be flexible and keep finding out for myself what truly nourishes me and what doesn’t. Returning to my own experience and learning from it how various foods affect me is an engaging and absorbing activity, whereas trying to impose someone else’s thinking or scientific findings on myself ends up being stultifying and at times demeaning. Who is telling whom what? In Zen sometimes we say, “Don’t put another head over your own head.” I think that also means to “use your head” to find your way.
I don’t have dessert that often—who can afford the added body dimensions? But when I do, fruit crisps still bring me great pleasure, and I feel warm and thankful. I am also grateful for cakes and cookies, fruit and custard.
See what you like. There’s plenty here to choose from.
Sour Cream–Poppy Seed Cake
A tender, moist cake that was one of the all-time favorites at our Tassajara Bread Bakery in San Francisco. We got the recipe originally from our friends at the Nityananda Institute, which is now located in Portland, Oregon—wonderful people. Serve plain, dusted with powdered sugar, or frosted with cream cheese icing. It’s also good with ripe, red strawberries and whipped cream or Vanilla Crème Anglaise.
MAKES 1 8-INCH LOAF
½ cup butter
¾ to 1 cup sugar
3 egg yolks
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all-purpose flour or cake flour, sifted before measuring
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ cup sour cream
3 egg whites
⅓ cup poppy seeds
Preheat oven to 350°. Butter and flour an 8-inch tube pan.
Cream the butter and sugar until fluffy, beat in the egg yolks one at a time, and add the vanilla. Sift the flour, salt, and baking soda together and fold them into the butter mixture alternately with the sour cream.
Beat the egg whites until they form stiff peaks, then fold gently into the batter. Fold in the poppy seeds, then pour the batter into the prepared pan. Bake in the center of the oven until the top is brown and firm to the touch and a toothpick comes out clean when inserted in the center, about 45 minutes.
Mocha Cake with Mocha Icing
Otherwise known as Allen’s Groovy Chocolate Cake (which appropriately dates the supposed originator), this cake, with remarkable flavor and texture, also has ease of mixing in its favor. The instructions are not classic, but they seem to work well.
MAKES 2 FROSTED, 8-INCH LAYERS
4 ounces unsweetened chocolate
½ cup unsalted butter
1 cup strong coffee (could be decaf)
2 cups white flour
2 cups sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
1½ teaspoons baking soda
1 cup yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs, beaten
unsweetened cocoa
1 batch Mocha Icing
Preheat oven to 350°. Melt chocolate and butter with coffee over double boiler or very low heat. Set aside to cool. Sift flour together with sugar, salt, and baking soda. Pour chocolate mixture into the dries and mix well. Add yogurt and vanilla, then mix in eggs. This makes a really liquidy batter.
Butter 2 8-inch cake pans and then dust them with unsweetened cocoa. Pour the batter into the 2 pans, and bake for 30 to 35 minutes. Rotate the pans from front to back or side to side midway through to ensure even baking. When done, the cake will have risen in the middle and pulled away from the sides of the pans. A toothpick inserted in the center will come out clean.
Let sit in the pans for five minutes, then turn out onto cake racks to cool. Spread the Mocha Icing on the top and sides of the cake.
Mocha Icing
MAKES ENOUGH TO ICE THE TOPS AND SIDES OF 2 8-INCH CAKES
6 ounces semi-sweet chocolate
½ cup strong coffee (could be decaf)
6 ounces unsalted butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Warm the chocolate and coffee in a small, heavy saucepan over low heat—just until the chocolate melts. Stir frequently to avoid burning. When melted, pour into a bowl and beat in the butter, a little at a time. As the frosting cools it will thicken to spreading consistency. Mix in the vanilla extract.
Spread on top and sides of the cake. Give the cake away to a friend, and know the joy of chocolate generosity. Perhaps a piece of it will come back.
Hazelnut-Chocolate Cake
Chocolate cake is not one of my personal favorites generally, but here’s another chocolate fantasy, with hazelnuts. Check the ingredients on the chocolate chips, so you know you are not getting an imitation of good quality. I prefer them to have cocoa or chocolate rather than “flavor,” butter rather than a partially hardened vegetable fat, and actual vanilla rather than something ersatz.
MAKES 2 8-INCH CAKES
FOR THE CAKE:
Butter
Unsweetened cocoa
1½ cups hazelnuts
1¼ cups good quality semisweet chocolate chips
½ cup unsalted butter, softened
½ cup sugar
3 eggs, separated
¼ cup unbleached white flour
FOR THE GLAZE:
¾ cups hazelnuts (reserved from cake recipe), roasted and skinned
¾ cup semisweet chocolate chips
½ cup unsalted butter
Preheat oven to 350°. Butter 2 cake pans and then dust them with unsweetened cocoa. Toast the hazelnuts for 8 minutes, cool, and remove skins (as best you can). Set aside ¾ cup for the glaze. Finely grind the remaining ¾ cup of nuts into a fine powder, using a food processor or clean coffee mill. Melt chocolate in double boiler (or chop into small pieces and melt in saucepan over low heat, stirring) and cool.
Cream butter with sugar, then beat in yolks one at a time. Beat in chocolate and ground hazelnuts. Beat the egg whites until they form soft peaks, and fold half of the egg whites into the batter. Then stir in the flour and fold in the remaining egg whites.
Pour into the 2 prepared baking pans. Bake for about 30 minutes, until firm—a toothpick inserted in the center should come out clean. Let cool before coating with glaze.
To prepare the glaze, chop the reserved hazelnuts. Melt chocolate and butter together over very low heat (or in double boiler), until just melted. Coat the cake with the glaze and let it cool. Cover with the chopped nuts, pressing them into the sides with your fingers.
Orange-Raisin-Walnut Cake
Scented, fruited, nutty, this cake is reminiscent of carrot cake (without the carrots). The orange syrup provides an unusual moistness and an appealing fragrance, especially if you add one of the final optional (alcoholic) ingredients—and saves having to think about frosting or icing.
MAKES A 1-LAYER, 8-INCH CAKE
Butter
1 cup raisins, plumped in hot water
½ cup walnuts
Zest of 1 large orange
½ cup butter
¾ cup sugar or brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 large eggs
2½ cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup buttermilk
Juice of 1 large orange
4 tablespoons honey
Orange flower water
Rum, Curaçao, or Grand Marnier (optional)
Preheat oven to 300°. Butter and flour an 8-inch cake pan and line the bottom with parchment paper or foil.
Grind the raisins, along with the walnuts and orange zest (which can be removed in strips with a vegetable peeler), in a food mill or blender to make a coarse puree that retains some texture. (It may be necessary to use a little of the juice if the mixture is too dry.) Alternatively, mince coarsely by hand with a sharp knife.
Cream the butter and sugar together until they are light. Add the vanilla and beat in the eggs, one at a time. Combine and sift the flour, soda, and salt. Alternating with the buttermilk, blend the dry ingredients into the butter-sugar mixture, until all are incorporated. You will have a smooth, thick batter. Fold in the raisin-walnut mixture and then pour the batter into the pan. Tap once or twice on the counter to settle the batter then bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour, or until the cake is firm to the touch.
When the cake is done, remove it from the pan and peel off the baking parchment. Turn out the cake upside down onto a serving plate and let it cool while you make a syrup of the orange juice and honey. Boil the two together and flavor with a little orange flower water, if you have it—or season with one of the optional liquors. Brush all the syrup over the top of the cake. It will sink into the cake and make it very moist. Alternatively, you could simply soak the cake with a little rum, Curaçao, or Grand Marnier—if you keep such things around. Spoon on a shot or two. Give the cake a taste. Use care when transferring the cooled cake to a cake plate—perhaps a few wide spatulas would help.
Fresh Ginger Gingerbread
With its marvelous blend of spices, this well-spiced cake makes a great dessert that can finish off a dull, drab dinner with a flavorful burst of enjoyment. And if you don’t know how to make a dull, drab dinner, you can serve the gingerbread to finish off an exciting, seasonal dinner with a flourish. You can’t go wrong!
MAKES 1 8-INCH CAKE
¾ cup white pastry flour or all-purpose flour
¾ cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
¾ teaspoon freshly ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon grated nutmeg
¼ teaspoon ground cloves
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon mustard powder
1 pinch of cayenne
1 pinch of pepper
¼ cup butter
¼ cup brown sugar
3 tablespoons fresh ginger root, peeled and grated finely
½ cup molasses
½ teaspoon baking soda
¾ cup boiling water
¼ teaspoon baking soda
2 eggs, beaten
Preheat oven to 350°. Sift together all the dry ingredients, except the brown sugar and baking soda. Cream the butter and sugar together and add the ginger. Beat the molasses and the ½ teaspoon baking soda together until the color lightens and little bubbles form. Combine the boiling water and the ¼ teaspoon baking soda. Mix the molasses a little at a time thoroughly into the butter-ginger-sugar mixture. Add the dry ingredients alternately with the boiling water-soda, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients.
When this is finished, fold in the beaten eggs. Pour the batter into a thoroughly buttered and floured cake pan and bake for 30 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Serve with piles of softly whipped cream, or generous scoops of vanilla ice cream.
Apple–Walnut–Sour Cream Bread
This is a tender, golden brown loaf, best made in the fall when new crop apples and fresh walnuts are at their peak. Known as a dessert bread, this could also be served with a special holiday dinner. Serve with cream cheese or a buttery cheese like St. André or Brie.
MAKES 1 9-INCH LOAF
½ cup butter, plus extra butter for the pan
½ cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon ground cardamom
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup sour cream
2 cups chopped apples
½ to 1 cup chopped walnuts
Preheat oven to 350°. Butter and flour a 9-inch bread pan.
Cream the butter and sugar until fluffy. Add the eggs and vanilla and beat until smooth. Sift the dry ingredients together and, alternating with the sour cream, gently fold them into the butter-egg mixture. The batter will be very thick, but avoid overworking it.
Fold in the apples and walnuts. Spread the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top. Bake for 1 hour, or until the top is firm to the touch and a deep golden brown. Allow the bread to cool at least 10 minutes before slicing.
Fig Bread
This sweet, rather cakelike bread is one of our regular luncheon desserts or tea snacks. We leave the figs whole, to appear as tasty slabs once the bread is sliced, but they could be sliced into rounds.
MAKES 1 MEDIUM LOAF
1 cup apple or orange juice
1½ cups mission figs, destemmed but left whole
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ cup butter
2 eggs
⅓ cup sugar
½ teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon lemon or orange rind, grated
1¾ cups pastry flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon baking soda
Preheat oven to 350°. Heat the juice almost to boiling and pour it over the figs, salt, and butter in a mixing bowl. Stir to melt the butter and set aside in the refrigerator to cool.
Beat the eggs, then beat in the sugar, vanilla, and fruit rind. Stir this into the well-cooled (room temperature) fig mixture. Sift the flour together with the baking powder and baking soda. Mix into the wet ingredients with a minimum number of strokes.
Grease and flour a medium-sized loaf pan, pour in the batter, and bake for about 1 hour, until a toothpick comes out clean.
Quick Vegan Spice Cake
Easy to mix, a soft crumb, good spiciness, what’s not to like? This cake has no eggs, no dairy.
MAKES 1 8-INCH CAKE
1½ cups unbleached white flour
¾ cup sugar
¾ teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon nutmeg
¼ teaspoon cloves
⅓ cup melted coconut oil
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar or raspberry vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup cold water
Powdered sugar
Preheat oven to 350°. Grease and flour an 8-inch cake pan.
Sift dry ingredients together. Combine coconut oil with vinegar, vanilla, and water. Stir together with a few (about 20) quick strokes. Do not overmix.
Pour into prepared pan, and bake for 30 to 35 minutes until the edges pull away from the sides of the pan and the center of the cake springs back to touch—also when a toothpick comes out clean. To serve, sprinkle with powdered sugar.
Coffee-Almond Butter Cookies
The coffee flavor comes as a surprise in what is already an excellent almond butter cookie.
MAKES 2½ DOZEN COOKIES
1 cup unsalted butter
¾ cup brown sugar
4½ teaspoons instant coffee
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon almond extract
1 cup almonds, finely chopped
½ cup semisweet chocolate, cut into various-sized pieces smaller than the intended size of the cookies (optional)
2 cups all-purpose flour
Preheat oven to 350°. Cream the butter and sugar together, then mix in the coffee, salt, and almond extract. Fold in the almonds, chocolate (optional), and then mix in the flour.
Roll the dough into 1-inch balls. Flatten with a glass or the heel of your palm. Bake for 15 minutes or until they are lightly browned.
Wishful Thinking Fails Again
Once during a cooking class I found myself holding a pan of biscotti in one hand while I opened the door of the oven with the other. Since the top shelf of the oven was occupied by a pan of lasagna, I aimed the biscotti for the unoccupied bottom shelf. “Let’s get these cookies baking,” I thought. However, a second thought followed quickly after the first: “If you put them on the bottom shelf, they’re going to burn.”
What to do? There ensued a lively inner monologue enumerating the necessary steps: Close oven door, find somewhere to put biscotti down, open oven door, remove lasagna, find place to put lasagna, move top shelf up one notch, move bottom shelf up one notch, replace lasagna, close door, get biscotti, open door, place in oven, close door. What a nuisance. It hardly seemed worth it.
“Forget it,” I thought. “Let’s get on with it. They’ll be okay this time.” In they went.
These are a cook’s famous last words: “This time they’ll be okay.” Sure. This time the oven will understand how awkward and inconvenient it is for me to do all that switching, placing, lifting, reaching, and it will go out of its way to accommodate me. The oven will make a special effort not to burn the cookies to compensate for my not making a special effort to arrange things differently. This time, undoubtedly, the oven will be forgiving and make allowances for my laziness. Only this time the cookies burned on the bottom.
Once I used some vanilla sugar at a friend’s house to make a birthday cake for my father. At least I thought it was vanilla sugar, since it was a white granular substance with a vanilla bean in it, and when I dipped my finger in it and licked, it tasted like sugar. Yet tasting the cake batter after creaming the sugar with the butter and adding the eggs, I found it extremely salty. And going back to the jar with the vanilla bean, it tasted like salt. Big surprise!
Not wanting to waste the butter and eggs, I decided to go ahead and finish making the cake, thinking rather wishfully that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad once all the flour and milk and seasoning was added. It was. Yet my wishful thinking continued: “Maybe it won’t be so bad after it’s baked.” It was. It was really bad, not at all what a cake should be. That was a strange birthday celebration.
The ability to believe in wishful thinking right up until you smell the smoke or taste the cake is really a wonderful trait in many ways—naive, trusting, childlike—but the food may be an uncustomary and undesirable shade of brown or black. The taste may bring tears to the eyes.
Although I still find it painfully annoying at times, the universe (including ovens and other cookware) does not arrange itself to pick up after me. Things are the way they are, regardless of how I would like them to be. If anything, it seems that the universe is conspiring to wise us up to our own wishful thinking. Would you wish it to be any other way?
Oatmeal Shortbread
With a delicate caramel flavor and a substantial texture worthy of lingering over, this shortbread proves easy to make—and not so difficult to eat either.
MAKES 1 9-INCH ROUND
1 cup butter, softened
⅔ cup brown sugar
⅔ cup rolled oats
1 cup all-purpose flour
Preheat oven to 300°. Put all the ingredients in a bowl and work them together with your fingers until you have a soft, uniform dough, using another tablespoon or two of flour if necessary so that it is not sticky. Press the dough into a 9-inch pie pan, mark the edges with the tines of a fork, and score deeply so that it will be easy to cut into pieces. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes until firm and only lightly browned. Be careful not to overbake or the shortbread will be hard.
Following the score lines, slice the shortbread into wedges while still warm.
Pecan Dreams
This is a recipe from Brian’s sister’s friend’s mom, and who knows where before that. This is the way cookies were meant to be before we worried about butter, sugar, white flour, salt, and whether or not the nuts were rancid. If you can get by that without drinking the rum and vanilla extracts, you’ve got yourself a cookie; otherwise, just dreams.
MAKES 3 DOZEN 1-INCH COOKIES
1 cup butter
½ cup sifted powdered sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 teaspoons water or rum
½ teaspoon salt
2 cups sifted all-purpose flour
2 cups pecans, finely chopped
Sifted powdered sugar, for garnish
Preheat oven to 325°. Cream the butter and powdered sugar until fluffy, then beat in the vanilla, water or rum, and salt. Stir the flour into the butter mixture, then add the pecans, and stir to make an evenly textured dough.
Roll the dough into 1¼-inch balls and place on an unbuttered cookie sheet. Bake in the upper third of the oven for 20 minutes. Remove the cookies to a cooling rack to firm. While still warm, roll the cookies in the powdered sugar. Remember, “no sugar, no enlightenment,”—don’t let the cookies sit around too long.
VARIATION
Use walnuts or almonds in place of the pecans.
Brian’s Chocolate Chip Cookies
You’ve had Toll House, Famous Amos, and Mrs. Fields. And among all these, you probably have your favorite. Here is ours (for now). Three things distinguish this cookie: a touch of molasses, some instant coffee, and chocolate cut to bits. (The kitchen staff at our farm, Green Gulch, is going through a whole book of chocolate chip cookie recipes and compiling rankings, but Brian’s cookies have yet to be rated.) The chocolate pieces can range in size from powder and crumbs to pieces as large as a shelled almond (anything smaller than the intended size of the cookie). If you use preformed chocolate chips, the cookie will not be the same.
MAKES 4 DOZEN COOKIES
1 cup butter, softened
⅔ cup brown sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 teaspoons molasses
1 teaspoon instant coffee, finely powdered
1 cup white flour, unbleached
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour or additional white flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
2 cups walnuts, finely chopped
14 ounces semisweet or bittersweet chocolate, chopped or cut into pieces
Preheat oven to 375°. Cream the butter until free of lumps, then add the sugar, and cream until fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, the vanilla, molasses, and coffee. Beat well. Sift the dry ingredients together and mix them in. Fold in the walnuts and chocolate pieces.
Form into balls 1 inch in diameter, place on a buttered and floured cookie sheet. Flatten slightly, then bake for 12 minutes, or until lightly browned underneath.
Glazed Cream Cheese–Lemon Cookies
These lemony delights are a good cookie to serve with tea or with a fruit dessert such as Gingered Figs.
MAKES 3 DOZEN 1-INCH COOKIES
FOR THE COOKIES:
¾ cup butter
⅓ cup cream cheese
¾ cup sugar
1 egg
1 tablespoon grated lemon peel
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
2 cups all-purpose flour
Walnuts or almonds, finely chopped
FOR THE LEMON GLAZE:
3 to 4 tablespoons lemon juice
1 cup sifted powdered sugar
½ cup finely chopped walnuts or almonds
Preheat oven to 375°. Cream the butter, cream cheese, and sugar until fluffy, then beat in the egg, lemon peel, and lemon juice. Sift the dry ingredients together and gently mix them into the butter mixture. Refrigerate the dough for at least 1 hour—this makes shaping the cookies easier.
Roll the dough into balls about 1 inch in diameter and place them on an unbuttered cookie sheet. (For a nicely rounded cookie, leave the dough in balls; for a thinner cookie, flatten the dough with the bottom of a glass dipped in sugar.) Bake in the upper third of the oven for 12 to 15 minutes, or until the bottoms and edges of the cookies are light brown. Transfer the cookies to a rack, let cool briefly.
To make the glaze, stir the lemon juice into the powdered sugar—it should have the consistency of thick cream. Pour the glaze in a shallow dish to make it easy to dip the cookies. Dip the cookies in the glaze and dust with finely chopped walnuts or almonds while the glaze is still soft. The nuts don’t have to be set in place before the kids can try one—especially if they’ve been helping. And in this case, being a kid has no age limit.
Date and Pecan Confection
Here is a rich, moist, cookie-like confection that Brian dreamed up. Great for people with allergies to wheat, butter, or eggs, and great for those without allergies, too—this sweet tastes delicious to any tongue.
Note: If you don’t have orange flower water, add ½ teaspoon of either orange peel or lemon peel, or omit.
MAKES 30 1½-INCH COOKIES
1 cup pitted moist dates
2 cups pecans, finely ground
1 teaspoon orange flower water
30 pecan halves
Powdered sugar (optional)
Preheat oven to 325°. Roughly chop the dates. Then, using the back of a wooden spoon or your fingers, mix the dates with the ground pecans and the orange flower water until a dough is formed.
Roll the lumps of dough between your palms into walnut-size balls, place on an unbuttered baking sheet, then press a pecan into the center of each. (These cookies will not spread when baking so they can be placed close together.) Bake in the upper third of the oven for 12 to 15 minutes or until the bottoms are lightly browned. Serve plain or dusted with powdered sugar.
Thumbprints
Tasty and substantial, these thumbprints combine the virtues of earthy almonds and oats with the sunlight of jam—and they have no eggs and no dairy.
MAKES 3 DOZEN COOKIES
2 cups rolled oats
1 cup almonds
½ cup flour
¼ teaspoon salt
½ cup maple syrup
½ cup canola oil
A few tablespoons raspberry jam or other jam
Preheat oven to 350°. Briefly chop the rolled oats in a food processor or a clean coffee mill, until a coarse meal. Grind the almonds into meal. By hand combine the oats with the almonds, flour, salt, maple syrup, and oil.
Shape into ¾-inch balls—this will be easier if your hands are wet. Put balls near each other on a greased cookie sheet. Use your thumb to make an indentation and put ¼ teaspoon of jam in each one. These cookies may also be made larger, but the smaller size makes for a tasty morsel. Bake for about 12 to 15 minutes, or until lightly brown on the bottom, taking care not to overbake.
Mystery Bites
A holiday favorite in my family; even now I am sometimes inspired to bake these—it’s traditional! My mom still has the recipe on a 3-by-5 card brown with age. I substitute butter for the original vegetable shortening.
MAKES 2 TO 3 DOZEN
½ cup butter
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons unbleached white flour
1½ cups brown sugar
2 eggs
½ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ cup shredded coconut
1 cup chopped walnuts or almonds
Preheat oven to 350°. Cut the butter into 1 cup of the flour and ½ cup of the sugar with 2 knives or a pastry cutter until mealy. Press into the bottom of an 8 by 8 inch baking pan. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes until aromatic and the dough has begun to pull away from the sides of the pan—it does not need to brown.
Beat the eggs, and then mix in the remaining 1 cup of sugar, 2 tablespoons of flour, the baking powder, salt, and vanilla extract. When this is well mixed, fold in the coconut and nuts.
Spread over the bottom layer, and return to the oven. Bake an additional 25 to 30 minutes until the top is firm and dry. Allow to cool, then cut into squares.
Enjoying Your Food
At my Saturday meditation retreats, when we break for lunch, I often tell people, “Please enjoy your food.” All morning I have been offering various instructions in sitting and walking meditation, and by lunchtime we have also had an hour of yoga with further directives, so I may leave it at that. I don’t want eating to be another chore or yet another place to worry about whether or not you are doing it right. We do enough of that already, so I want to invite people to simply “please enjoy your food.”
Occasionally I might say a bit more, although I don’t want people trying too hard to have fun. I explain that enjoying our food is very important, because through enjoyment we are connecting to the world, to one another, to our inner being. When you enjoy your food you will be happy and well nourished by what you eat.
Sometimes I also explain to people that by enjoying their food, they will naturally find themselves practicing meditation. They will be paying attention to what they are eating, noticing flavors and textures and nuances of taste, because to enjoy something you need to experience it.
Also they will have to stay present, because if they get carried away by greed, they will miss what they are eating in the present while thinking about the future possibilities. Entering into full enjoyment, they will be relaxing and opening their hearts to the food, not worrying about good and bad or right and wrong. The question of “how well am I doing this practice” will not come up.
Mostly I think it’s better to say as little as possible. Then enjoying your food may be the best meditation you do all day. It takes care of itself without your having to try too hard.
Following the path of pleasure is deep and profound and richly rewarding. Sometimes people complain that it doesn’t work that way and that one needs discipline and restraint (“or I’d be a blimp!”). That’s nonsense the way it’s usually understood, implying that one’s inherent being lacks wisdom or any sense of beauty and consequently needs to be kept in line and tamed.
Most of the problems that arise in the pursuit of pleasure are due to lack of devotion—not being fully enough committed to pleasure. Which bite of chocolate cake is no longer pleasurable? Which swallow of wine brings you down instead of up? Sure, restraint is needed, but it comes after pleasure or along with pleasure, not before and in place of pleasure.
When pleasure or enjoyment is forbidden, then we look for stupor or unconsciousness, which is the closest we can get to relief from the insane drive to discipline and restrain and the overriding admonition not to have any fun.
Please enjoy your food.
Chocolate-Walnut Cookies
This Chocolate-Walnut Cookie is ethereal—it simply melts in your mouth—due to the added oil content of the walnuts. I could not believe how good these were the first time I tried them.
MAKES 3 DOZEN OR MORE COOKIES
¾ cup unsalted (sweet) butter, softened
½ cup white sugar
1 egg
4 ounces unsweetened baking chocolate, melted and cooled
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup finely ground walnuts
1 teaspoon baking powder
2¼ cups unbleached white flour
Preheat oven to 375°. I usually just dump everything into the bowl and mush together with my hands, but if you want . . . Cream the butter and blend in the sugar. Mix in the egg, beating well, then the chocolate, vanilla, and nuts.
Combine the baking powder with the flour, then mix into the other ingredients. The dough should be dry enough to shape into balls with your hands without too much sticking to your fingers and wet enough that it does not crumble apart. If necessary, add more flour to make it drier. Add a spot of water or a bit more butter to moisten.
Roll the dough into balls the size of walnuts and place about 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. Press them flat with a cookie stamp, a glass, or teacup. Flour the bottom of the pressing implement if it is sticking to the cookies. Bake for 8 minutes. They are done when the top of the cookies are cracked, and the bottoms slightly browned. Better when not overbaked.
Once-Baked Biscotti
Bis is the word for “again,” indicating that these cookies are twice-baked, but I much prefer them once-baked. Perhaps we should call them uns-cotti. Even once-baked they keep well, and are quite pleasant with tea or coffee. This recipe uses anise seed and fresh orange peel in place of orange and anise extracts to make the flavors brighter and fresher.
MAKES 4 DOZEN OR MORE
1 cup unsalted (sweet) butter, softened
2 cups white sugar
2 eggs
2 tablespoons anise seed or 2 teaspoons anise extract
Peel of 2 oranges or 1 tablespoon orange extract
3 cups unbleached white flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
Preheat the oven to 350°. Cream the butter and sugar together, then beat in the eggs. Mince the anise seed with a knife, or blend in a spice mill. Remove the orange peel with a vegetable peeler, then chop it or cut it into thin strips. Add the seeds and peel to the creamed mixture. Mix the flours together with the baking powder, and combine well with the creamed mixture.
Divide the dough into 4 pieces and shape each one into a log about 12 to 15 inches long. Put 2 on each of 2 baking sheets, and bake until the bottoms are browned and the top surfaces are cracked, about 20 to 25 minutes. The logs will have flattened out sideways. Let them cool a few minutes and then cut crosswise into ¼-inch pieces.
If you insist on a second baking, place the biscotti on their sides in a 300° oven until they dry out, about 10 to 15 minutes. Once the biscotti are completely cooled, they may be stored in a tin.
Blueberry Crisp
Fresh, ripe berries in the summertime are one of nature’s remarkable blessings: plump and succulent, with intense, concentrated flavors—a soothing sweetness combined with a bracing tartness. I’m less interested in berries out of season, shipped halfway around the world or canned or frozen.
Often I have fresh berries for breakfast or dessert with a sprinkling of sugar and perhaps a few drops of balsamic vinegar, but they make for a quickly prepared crisp as well. Here’s the story.
SERVES 4 PEOPLE
12 ounces fresh berries (blueberries, blackberries, ollaliberries, raspberries)
2 tablespoons maple syrup, honey, or sugar
2 tablespoons water
⅔ cup unbleached white flour
⅓ cup white sugar or Rose-Scented Sugar
1 small pinch of salt
⅓ cup unsalted (sweet) butter
Preheat oven to 375°. Place berries in an 8- or 9-inch round baking dish or ceramic casserole with the maple syrup and water. I use a touch of water here for added juiciness.
Combine flour, sugar, and salt, and then cut in the butter with 2 knives or a pastry cutter. Distribute the topping over the berries and bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until the top is browned and the juices from the berries bubble up.
Peach or Nectarine Crisp
Peaches in season are a luscious and sensuous treat, but nectarines make a good substitute.
SERVES 6 TO 8 PEOPLE
4 to 6 peaches or nectarines, depending on size
Juice and grated peel of 1 lemon
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg or ¼ teaspoon mace
⅔ cup brown sugar
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 to 3 pinches of salt
½ cup unsalted (sweet) butter
Whipped cream or ice cream (optional)
Preheat oven to 375°. Put the peaches in boiling water for 10 to 30 seconds to loosen the skins, so that they may be peeled easily—the nectarines do not need peeling. Remove from the water, drain, peel, and cut into slices. Toss with the lemon juice and peel, cinnamon, and nutmeg, and arrange in a 9 by 13 inch baking pan.
Combine the sugar with the flour and salt and cut in the butter with a pastry cutter or 2 knives. Distribute the topping over the peaches. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes or until the peaches are fork-tender. Serve warm with a dollop of whipped cream or a scoop of ice cream as desired.
VARIATIONS
Rose-Scented Sugar
An excellent secret addition to fresh fruit desserts. One of the roses in my garden is especially fragrant, and the aroma of the rose is what makes the sugar what it is. I first came across this item at some cooking classes with the master chefs of Szechwan. I don’t know how they make it, but this is what I do.
MAKES 4 TO 6 CUPS SUGAR
3 to 4 roses
4 to 6 cups sugar
Find some aromatic roses. Remove the petals. Layer the petals in a jar with the sugar. Cover.
Leave covered for 2 to 3 days or longer. Check the aroma. The sugar will absorb much of the moisture in the fresh flower petals. Then, if the jar is kept closed, the flower petals will begin to rot. So after a few days, when the sugar is wet, you have a choice: Remove all the flower petals, or leave the lid off the jar for some days to let the sugar dry out a bit. Then it can be left covered and the petals removed later.
Peach or Apricot (Summer Fruit) Crisp
Summer fruit can be so sensual, intense, and intoxicating. It’s hard to go wrong making a simple fruit crisp to honor the season.
SERVES 4 TO 6 PEOPLE
1 pound cherries, blueberries, or other summer fruit
1½ pounds peaches and/or apricots or nectarines
¼ cup sugar
¾ teaspoon dried powdered ginger
1 teaspoon anise seed, freshly ground or minced
Zest of one lemon, minced
½ cup unsalted butter
1 cup flour
½ cup sugar
2 or 3 pinches of salt
Preheat oven to 375°. Wash and pit the cherries. You may use a cherry pitter, or flatten them with the side of a knife to make the pit accessible for removal. If using peaches, blanch them in boiling water for 10 to 15 seconds, so that the skins are easy to slip off. Slice the peaches and apricots or nectarines, and combine this fruit with the cherries or blueberries, the ¼ cup of sugar, the ginger, anise seed, and lemon peel. Place in a 9 by 13 inch baking pan or flat casserole.
Cut the butter into the flour, sugar, and salt, using a pastry cutter or two knives, until the mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. Distribute it over the fruit, and bake for 45 to 50 minutes or until the crumb topping has browned slightly and the fruit is fork tender. Serve with ice cream or whipped cream, if you desire. Or simply a spoonful or two of cream!
Berry (or Nectarine) Lemon Pudding
Fruit on the bottom with a lemony pudding cake topping make this a simple and simply delicious dessert.
SERVES 4 TO 6 PEOPLE
1 pint blackberries, blueberries, raspberries or 2 cups sliced nectarines, apricots, or peaches
2 tablespoons sugar
2 eggs, separated
1 teaspoon lemon zest
3 tablespoons lemon juice
1½ tablespoons flour
1 pinch of salt
⅓ cup sugar
1½ tablespoons butter, melted
½ cup whole milk
1 tablespoon tapioca
Powdered sugar
Preheat oven to 325°. Rinse the berries and drain, or slice the larger fruit if you are using it. (If using peaches, blanch for 10 to 30 seconds and peel before slicing). Combine with the 2 tablespoons of sugar and let the flavors develop while you prepare the pudding topping.
Whisk egg yolks with lemon zest and juice. Whisk in flour, salt, and sugar until smooth. Whisk in butter and milk. Beat the egg whites until firm and gently fold them into the yolk mixture. Lightly combine the tapioca with the summer fruit.
Place the fruit in a buttered casserole and pour the batter over the top. Bake until the pudding is lightly browned and cooked through (well raised in the middle), about 45 to 50 minutes. Serve warm or at room temperature, dusted with powdered sugar.
VARIATIONS
Lemon Pudding Cake
Fragrant and light on the palate, this cake possesses a tart refreshing flavor. The combination of pudding and cake is appealing and enjoyable, the best of two worlds in one. I like it so much—the creamy, lemony, brilliant yellow is both soothing and vitalizing—that I sometimes use it in cooking classes. Instead of fruit on the bottom as in the previous recipes, you can serve stewed fruit on the side.
SERVES 6 PEOPLE
3 tablespoons butter
1 cup sugar
Grated peel of 4 lemons
5 egg yolks
6 tablespoons all-purpose flour
5 tablespoons lemon juice
1½ cups milk or light cream
5 egg whites
⅛ teaspoon salt
Preheat oven to 350°. Cream the butter, sugar, and grated lemon peels together. Then add the yolks, one at a time, beating well after each addition. When all the yolks are incorporated and the mixture is smooth and light, stir in the flour, alternating with the milk and lemon juice. Beat the egg whites and salt until stiff peaks are formed and fold into the batter.
Bake in an 8-inch baking dish or individual cups set in a water bath for 45 minutes, or until the top is golden brown and set. Serve with sweetened whipped cream if desired. I also enjoy this with stewed fruit, especially dried apricots.
Prayer Helps
Throughout the day I offer many prayers as the occasion arises: “May you be happy, healthy, and free from suffering.” “Just as I wish to be happy, may all beings be happy.” “May you enjoy vitality and ease of well-being.”
I am not asking for everything to be better, or for all your dreams to come true, but given that things are as they are and go as they go, I wish for your well-being and happiness in the face of all the changing circumstances. Things quite likely will not go ideally or according to plan, so I wish for the growth of buoyancy, flexibility, and resiliency. I wish for the nurturing of generosity and tolerance. Not by design, but something shifting inside.
In the context of Buddhism I do not see prayer as necessarily directed toward a supreme being or higher power. Rather, I see it as a clarification and expression of true heart’s desire, or what my teacher Suzuki Roshi called innermost request.
What is it we really want? To know and act on true heart’s desire or innermost request usually involves unearthing, sifting, and sorting. Speaking it can help to reveal and clarify it.
Each day I offer a prayer before meals. I like using an ecumenical expression: “We venerate all the great teachers and give thanks for this food, the work of many people and the offering of other forms of life.” There are many possibilities: “May this food bring us health, happiness, and well-being.” “Just as we have enough to eat today, may all beings have enough to eat.” “May this food nourish us (me) body, mind, and spirit.” It could be as simple as “Blessings on this food,” or “We thank Thee for this food.”
To have food on the table is truly a blessing, and one’s life can change profoundly by acknowledging one’s gratitude and appreciation. If you use your verse whenever you eat, even when snacking—it can be silent or spoken—it will help bring you into the present and will have a tremendous effect on how you receive your food and assimilate it. Acknowledging the blessedness of food is also acknowledging your own blessedness, your own capacity to nourish other beings as well as your self.
Nourishment comes from receiving food (or any experience), fully taking it in, assimilating what is useful, and letting go of what isn’t. In Buddhism what comes into our lives is called dharma, or teaching. In Christianity all that we receive can be viewed as a gift from God. Gratitude is called for: “We give thanks for this food, this ‘teaching,’ this ‘gift.’”
Lately I have been reading Larry Dossey’s Healing Words: The Power of Prayer and the Practice of Medicine. Dr. Dossey is a physician who began incorporating prayer into his practice of medicine after reviewing scientific studies that demonstrated its effectiveness. He found the evidence for the efficacy of prayer to be simply overwhelming, even though this is one of the best-kept secrets in medical science.
What he points out is that prayer works regardless of religious background or belief. Also, it turns out that the most powerful prayer is not one that aims for any particular result, but one that is more all-encompassing: “Thy will be done,” or “May the best results occur.”
Along with a blessing or grace before meals or snacks, other eating rituals can be beneficial. Ritual in this sense could include sitting down at a table to eat, rather than eating standing up, walking, or riding in an automobile. Another is to turn off the TV and radio and to eat in the company of family or friends, or to focus solely on eating rather than eating and reading, or eating and talking on the phone.
Each of us can determine which rituals are most helpful. In this sense ritual can be seen as ways to do things that help to heighten or deepen awareness. Noticing tastes, physical sensations, feelings, thoughts, and moods will inform or enlighten the food choices we make, and our capacity to be nourished by the food we are eating. Giving our attention to the experience of eating is powerful, whether we are eating wholesome foods or unwholesome foods, or are overeating.
Ritual, prayer, your innermost request—please find your own way to bring yourself to your meal, to sitting down at the table and taking the time to eat and nourish yourself.
Melon Balls in Lemon-Ginger Syrup
A refreshing and colorful summer dessert.
SERVES 4 PEOPLE
2 cups water
1 cup sugar
Peel of one lemon
1 ounce fresh ginger
1 small cantaloupe or other melon
Cherries, raspberries, peaches, apricots, or nectarines (optional)
2 pods of cardamom
1 or 2 pinches of cinnamon
Salt
Combine water and sugar in saucepot. Over medium heat, bring to simmering. Strip the yellow of the peel off the lemon with a vegetable peeler, and cut the strips into narrow shreds. Add to the syrup. Trim the peel off the ginger, slice thinly, and cut the slices into strips. Add to the syrup. Simmer the syrup for 15 to 20 minutes with the lemon and ginger.
Cut the cantaloupe in half and scoop out the seeds. Use a melon baller, if you have one, to make decorative melon balls. Alternatively, cut the peel off the back of the melon and cut the flesh into chunks. A few cherries, raspberries, or peach / apricot / nectarine slices will make a beautiful addition.
Finish the syrup by adding the spices. Break open the cardamom pods, remove the dark seeds, and chop them with a good kitchen knife. Add seeds and cinnamon to the syrup, and pour the syrup over the fruit. Let marinate until serving, chilling if you prefer. Sprinkle on a touch of salt, if that’s how you are used to eating melon.
Lime Cream and Strawberries
Don’t look for the cream to be green. You have to add food coloring for that. Still, the deep red of the berries and the off white of the cream are an elegant combination, and the flavors offer a delightful interplay of sweet, tart, and the velvety butterfat. What could be better?
SERVES 4 PEOPLE
3 egg yolks
5 tablespoons sugar
1 cup half-and-half (or cream)
Peel of 1 small lime, zested or finely minced
1 pint strawberries
2 tablespoons sugar
Juice of 1 to 2 limes
½ cup whipping cream
Beat the yolks and the 5 tablespoons of sugar together until light and lemon colored.
Heat the half-and-half with the lime peel. Gradually whisk the heated cream into the yolks to warm them. Then, return this custard to the fire and cook gently—all the while continuing to whisk—until it coats the back of a spoon. Do not boil. It will still be liquid, but thickened slightly. (If it goes too far and scrambles, toss the mixture in the Cuisinart.) Strain out the peel and chill.
Rinse the berries and either dry them on toweling or let them drain for a while in a colander. Remove the stems (the end of a vegetable peeler is good for this). Slice them if they are large or leave them whole if they are small. Sprinkle the berries with the sugar and toss them with the lime juice. Refrigerate.
Before serving, whip the cream so that it softly peaks. Fold it into the custard. Divide the berries into serving dishes and spoon the lime cream over them. Or, put the lime cream in dishes and divide the berries over the dishes. Contemplate your good fortune to be enjoying berries and lime cream. Let your compassion know no bounds.
Vanilla Crème Anglaise
A classic custard cream for fresh fruit, simple cakes, or poached meringues, Vanilla Crème Anglaise can be either poured on top or served underneath the dessert in a pretty pool.
MAKES ABOUT 2½ CUPS
5 egg yolks
¼ cup sugar
2 cups light cream or milk
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise, or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
In a large bowl, beat the yolks and sugar until pale yellow and fluffy. Combine the cream or milk and vanilla in a saucepan and heat to simmering. Then gradually whisk the milk mixture into the bowl with the egg mixture.
Return the hot liquid to the saucepan. Then cook over low heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spatula until the custard is thick enough to coat the back of the spatula (180° on an instant reading thermometer). While heating the custard, do not let it boil.
Immediately pour the custard into a bowl. Scrape the little seeds out of the vanilla bean and add the pods to the custard. Allow to cool completely, then strain through a fine sieve.
Persimmon Cream
This is a sensual, simple dessert. Serve it chilled, with a crisp walnut cookie (a variation of Pecan Dreams). Use the large American persimmons, not the smaller Japanese persimmons which can be eaten while still crisp. The persimmons should be deep orange with black splotches and so soft they practically fall out of their skins. Estimate ½ cup persimmon puree per person.
Ripe, soft persimmons
Powdered sugar or honey
Heavy cream
Marsala (optional)
Remove the skin from the persimmons and whisk the pulp lightly to break it up, leaving some texture. Add powdered sugar or honey as needed to bring up the flavor of the fruit. Using 1 part cream for every 4 parts persimmon, estimate the amount required and whisk the cream briskly until stiff. Flavor the cream with Marsala if you wish, then fold it into the persimmon. Do not blend it completely; leave streaks of cream throughout. Mound into dessert bowls and chill. Serve with 1 or 2 walnut cookies.
Gingered Figs
An intense fruit dessert, Gingered Figs are warming and vitalizing in the cold months before the fresh fruit arrives.
SERVES 4 PEOPLE
½ pound dried mission figs
1 ounce peeled fresh ginger, thinly sliced (about two thumbs’ worth)
2 cups water
½ cup honey
Sour cream and grated lemon peel
Discard the knobby stems of the figs. Rinse and put the figs in a saucepan with the ginger, water, and honey. Bring to a boil, then simmer over low heat until the figs are soft and the liquid has thickened to a dark syrup, about 25 minutes. Chill and serve cold with the sour cream flavored with a bit of grated lemon peel.
