The first Valentine's Day Scott and I shared as a married couple, I decided to make an elaborate cookie recipe that I remember took me almost 1/2 day to complete. Looking back, I'm sure the recipe wasn't all that complicated, but I hadn't baked much if at all back then, and so it probably took me double the time, and more angst and stumbling around in the kitchen than it ought to have taken. Plus, it didn't help that our kitchen was a true galley kitchen, and you could literally stand in the midle and touch both sides of the counters on opposite ends. The cookies were some kind of heart-shaped sandwich affair, with a heart cut-out middle, and lots of rasberry jam, and dusted over the tops with confectioner's sugar. I'm sure they were good but, of course, I remember the process of it all rather than the results.

I try and make a special cookie every year for Valentine's Day, but I know I've skipped many years in-between--like the ones when I was nursing a newborn, or too exhausted to even open a package of dry noodles, let alone bake something. This year, I definitely felt the baking bug bite, but I wanted something simple, yet memorable. Something with maybe a taste of cherry, something I could easily veganize if I needed to so, of course, I could enjoy the results, too.

Yesterday the weather was amazing--temperatures in the low 60s, and the smell and feel of spring in the air everywhere. Sometimes you can feel the change in the seasons in your bones, or on the ends of your hair as the wind lifts it up. The daffodils at the bottom of the yard have opened, there are purple crocuses along the rocky path in the front yard, and on the way home from work yesterday I noticed that some of the cherry blossom tree buds had opened up into flowers. Despite how springy everything is I feel a little sad about what might be a "false start" and can't quite give myself over to it. It is, after all, only February 1st today, and I worry about what will happen to the new flowers if we get a wintry cold spell, or snow or sleet.

And while baking on a balmy winter day seems contradictory somehow, I did it anyway, while T. was hard at work on her math problems.

In her thinking cap. Math was hard yesterday.

I made cookies--chocolate chip cherry ones, and they're healthy, to boot!

Chocolate Chip Cherry Cookies (Vegan)

1/2 cup Earth Balance, softened in the microwave

3/4 cup turbinado sugar

1/4 cup chia egg (I just added a tablespoon of chia seeds to my 1/4 cup measuring cup filled with water to create the "egg")

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 3/4 cups spelt flour

1/2 cup vegan chocolate chips

1/2 cup chopped dried cherries 

Preheat the oven to 350. In a large bowl, add flour and baking soda. Mix in melted Earth Balance, sugar, chia egg, and vanilla. Stir until combined. Fold in chocolate chips and cherries. Drop in balls on an oiled baking sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes, or until the bottom edges are lightly brown.

We are starting the fourth week of the new semester, and I'm already horribly behind. The kids are both fighting head colds, and getting them up and going in the morning has taken double the amount of work (triple for L.). We can't seem to make a dent in the laundry pile. The stack of quizzes to grade doesn't seem to be getting any smaller, and the papers are piling up. Although I would love a day to stay in bed, I have been fantasizing lately about having a day to catch up--no students, no course prep, just me in my office, working my way through the grading, and crossing off things on my to-do list. 

Oh, the bliss of it all, such a dream.

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On a lighter note...ever since I discovered that I can buy a gigantic pillow-sized bag of chopped, pre-washed kale at Whole Foods for only $4.99, I have been in kale heaven.

I love the stuff. I also seem to crave it, with an intensity that I thought was only reserved for chocolate. But I truly do. This makes me happy, because it's proof that the more good things you put into your body, the more your body wants them. In fact, I eat so much kale these days that T. has dubbed me "Kale Monster" and she took this picture of me the other day, standing over a tray of roasted kale. The added bonus is that T. loves kale, too, and my heart does little jumps of joy when I see her stuffing the rich, green kale leaves into her mouth as an after school snack, or at dinnertime. If I could only get L. to eat kale I would be truly happy and, while Scott will eat kale when I prepare it, he has confessed that he likes spinach more.

It's been a long time since I've put up a recipe post. It may seem like I haven't been busy much in the kitchen, but I have. I got this new cookbook for Christmas, and I've been enjoying meal planning each week, and looking forward to trying out the recipes. But sometimes the camera is out of batteries, or the meal/dessert is so yummy I forgot to snap a picture before it's all gone, and then another food post opportunity has passed me by.

I made a scrumptious seitan and mushroom recipe, simmered in red wine and shallots. Scott was thrilled I made a dish with mushrooms. I'm not a huge mushroom fan, but I do like them cooked in a nice hearty sauce, and mushrooms and a red wine-based sauce do go particularly well together. 

I also made stuffed tomatoes with orzo, and a hearty and healthy dish using chickpeas and broccoli rabe, and brown rice.

And once a week I've been baking this simple but satisfying bread, which conveniently makes two loaves at a time. It's perfect as toast, and freezes well, too. I substitute non-dairy milk and the recipe works out just fine.

I've always found New Year's Day to be a bipolar sort of occasion, marked by extreme opposite ranges of emotions all crowding in for time in the spotlight. Even as a young child, I always felt both the thrill of a new year and the weight of the passage of time. I remember being awed and saddened, too, by the idea that one year was gone forever. I was often, on New Year's Eve, kept awake by the thought that a new year awaited, stretching out ahead like an empty patch of ocean, and that the familiar landscape of the poor old year, with all its bumps and glorious parts, had receded away into the distance.

It didn't help matters that this New Year's Eve, L. slept with a heavy pipe wrench in his bed, to ward off maruaders. He's been worried about all the 2012 end-of-the-world business for quite some time, and was in an anxious panic.

One of the rooms I always miss the most when we travel away from home is my kitchen. I miss the space of it, and the light coming in through the windows in the morning; I miss how I feel when I'm in the kitchen, cooking up food for my family, or making myself the first pot of coffee in the morning. At our house the kitchen is very much the heart of the home. I felt this the minute we first saw the house. I didn't care that the walls were covered in 1960s flowery wallpaper, or that we'd have to replace the appliances immediately, they were that bad, or that there were brass knobs on the cabinets. I loved the space, and the light, and the sense that this was a place where good things could happen, and where everyone would want to be.

And everyone does, most of the time. You can run through our kitchen, as the kids do constantly, from the dining room and into the hall and around again, in a loop. T. likes to sit at the kitchen table and color or draw, or she'll sit on the end of the counter and help me cook.

It's outdated, our kitchen, but I love it. It's the heart of it that matters, anyway, and its heart is sound and good.

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Scott and I have been working away at a long to-do list this week. We made the most of the three days the kids were still in school to do lots of wrapping, and last-minute gift buying, and organizing the odds and ends that always go along with Christmas. On Thursday we were all home together, and I had cookie baking on my to-do list. Cookie baking--at long last! What I did not have on my list was taking both kids in to the pediatrician. L. has been complaining of a sore throat for a couple fo days now, and T.'s sinus infection, which clearly didn't clear up after the first round of antibiotics (that terrible round that resulted in her allergic reaction--she still has some residual hives from that!), has come back in full swing. Since we are traveling for Christmas, the thought of hitting the road with sickies in tow just wasn't at all appealing. Plus we were worried about spreading any serious germs to our family members--especially to my baby nephew. Luckily, both kids have only non-contagious sinus infections, so we'll be packing antibiotics with us and they should be feeling back to themselves by the weekend.

Once we had crossed the pediatrician off our list, T. and I turned to cookie making. One of our favorite cookies to bake at Christmas are stained glass cookies.

I veganized the recipe and used Ener-G egg replacer and Earth Balance, and the dough came out perfectly fine. I chilled it overnight, brought it to room temperature in the morning (while we were at the pediatrician) and working it with my hands a bit before rolling helped.

Before you start baking, put the hard candy in ziploc bags, cover with a dish towel (place on a wooden cutting board, too), and turn your older child loose with a hammer.

I left the house with L. yesterday at 7:00 a.m, and around the corner to our street we could see the rhythmic rotating smudge of red ambulance lights, breaking the gray morning. My heart fell to think why they might be there--some older neighbor, perhaps in that yellow house on the corner, stricken in the night?

"Maybe someone died," L. said, in that abrupt, realistic way 11-year old boys sometimes have of talking. 

"Oh no," I said emphatically. "Maybe someone fell and got hurt." I said it because I wanted it to be true--it's too close to Christmas for more sad things, I thought. But really, there is no "right" time for sad things. For some reason they hurt more keenly at the holidays; we rush to rewrite endings, hoping for a happy one.

The morning was icy-cold, and had brought a thick layer of frost that coated eveything, even my windshield. Only the night before our house had been filled with family and good, warm food, and a fire in the fireplace. Our Christmas tree, which I imagine must ache each year when we leave, like empty arms do to contain, stood tall over gifts wrapped in bright Christmas wrapping and ribbons. That was the night before; on Monday morning it was back-to-school again. Christmas parties are difficult to let go of, when you have to get up the next day and slip back into the real world again.

Because Scott's Nana wasn't here with us this year, I thought a lot about the hole the death of a loved one leaves in a family. And as I watched the kids play, I saw how pure and happy their excitement is over the things we grown-ups take for granted. I also thought about that special power children have to mend those holes; they are the thread that pulls closed the gaps, the promise of new memories and experiences, the bearers of past stories into the future. 

Yesterday we hosted the family Christmas gathering for Scott's side of the family. I made lots of vegan food, and didn't tell anyone what it was. I've found that announcing things as vegan--or vegetarian--to die-hard, life-long meat-eaters just predisposes them against it, no matter how yummy it tastes. I like to take people by surprise. Once they try something I've made, and exclaim about it, then I'll reveal the "secret."

Sometimes the experiment falls flat, as it did this past Thursday, when we had our good friends L. and P. and their kids over for dinner. At the last minute I decided to put out a hunk of vegan cheese, alongside "regular" cheese. I admit it was almost a joke on my part (my friend L. appreciates a good cheese). Would they notice? Would they say anything? I've known L. a long time, and we are way past being nice just for the sake of politeness; still, I saw her eat the cheese and, thoughtfully, walk away without comment, a strange expression on her face.

I follwed her into the dining room. "So what did you think about the cheese?" I asked.

"Which one?" 

"The really orange one."

She made a face. "It wasn't bad," she said, searching for the right words. "But I thought it was sort of...bland."

It WAS bland. Really bland. You just can't find a substitute for cheese, and there's no point in even trying.

If Thanksgiving is my most favorite holiday, the day-after is pretty great, too. There's no need to be in the kitchen cooking and baking, yet we get to enjoy the fruits of that labor all day long, if we choose. I like the lazy, quiet feeling of the house on the day after Thanksgiving. I like the way the house smells--still warm and aroma-filled from the cooking and baking of the day before. And then there's the promise of decorating for Christmas, those bins waiting in the crawl space for the lids to be popped and then, overflowing, the plush Santas and the Christmas village, and the candles that smell like cinnamon, and the jingle bells and the ornaments and lights. But not yet. Today is that in-between day, set aside for just enjoying, pure and simple.

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Aside from the Quorn roast (which contains some egg white), we had an almost entirely vegan feast. I was so pleased with the way almost everything turned out.

There was the artichoke stuffing, veganized accordingly.

I also made dinner rolls, and L. ate four of them (and nothing else). And my cranberry sauce? Heavenly. Adding maple syrup instead of only sugar really gave the sauce the right sweet and tart ratio, I think.

And the heaping plate of roasted veggies. I found some purple sweet potatoes this year and they were wonderful--melt-in-your mouth luscious, and so aromatic when roasted.