Swedish Rusk

Dr. Bear - tinyeditor’s note: This was a recipe from my good friend Sandy, who was quite proud of her Swedish heritage. Rusk can, in general, refer to any hard, twice-baked bread, but this is no zwieback or melba toast. This is an amazing almond rusk, or mandel skorper. Similar cookies/biscuits are found in other countries, such as the Italian biscotti or the Yiddische mandelbrodt, but I am partial to this one.
It keeps forever, travels well, and is perfectly suited to afternoon coffee or tea.

Ingredients:

  • 3 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1/2 cup butter, softened
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1/2 cup sour cream
  • 1 tsp almond extract
  • 1 cup chopped almonds
  • (optional 1 tsp cardamom)

Step n a bowl, cream butter and sugar. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Combine the flour, salt and baking soda; add to the creamed mixture alternately with buttermilk. Stir in almonds.

  1. On a greased baking sheet, shape the dough into two 11-in. x 3-1/2-in. rectangles. Bake at 325° for 40 minutes or until lightly browned. Carefully remove to wire racks; cool for 20 minutes.
  2. Transfer to a cutting board; cut with a serrated knife into 3/4-in. slices. Place cut side down on greased baking sheets.
  3. Bake at 325° for 10-12 minutes; turn slices over. Bake 10-12 minutes longer or until golden brown. Remove to a wire racks to cool. Drizzle with melted chocolate if desired. Store in an airtight container. Yield: 2-1/2 dozen.

Sing!

When was the last time you heard a voice singing–in person, not a reproduction or something amplified, but a human voice? When was the last time you sang?

A few weeks ago, two heroes of mine passed away, Jean Ritchie and Ronnie Gilbert.

Ronnie Gilbert was one of the founding members of The Weavers, a folk group that was influential and then black-listed in the early 50s. Along with Pete Seeger, Lee Hays, and Fred Hellerman, and with the help of Alan Lomax and input from Woodie Guthrie, they sang both American and international folk music, as well as Union and labour songs. They were some of the people who influenced the Folk Revival of the 60s, which influenced me.

Jean Ritchie was an authentic Kentucky-born folk singer. She brought American folk music back to Appalachian roots music with her traditional performances of many of the old ballads that had travelled across from Scotland, Ireland, Wales, and the rest of Britain.

There is a great deal I love about folk music, but today I would like to focus on what is perhaps the most important quality it has: It is the everyday person’s music. It can belong to any of us. I dearly love Yo Yo Ma playing Bach, or Jessye Norman singing Wagner, but these are the tasks of demi-gods few of us can hope to follow. The melody of a folk tune is one which almost anybody can sing, and then can learn a little more challenging harmonies. They are words which anybody can learn, even if the complex lyrics like Finnegan’s Wake can be a little harder.

One of the greatest gifts my parents gave me was a love for music. They are each amazingly talented, but most of all they loved music. Since dad was a preacher, we all learned to sing in church in 4-part harmony. We also sang grace at every meal. But they also sang around the house or around the piano. Most of all, when we would be driving home from a long trip at night–and my dad loved to drive–they would sing together in harmony, and that’s how we kids learned to sing as well. I was the smallest, and usually in the back, or even in the hatch, and some of my fondest and safest memories were listening to them sing in the front of the car.

We learned a lot of folk songs from them. Where have all the Flowers Gone?, Puff the Magic Dragon, Turn, Turn, Turn, as well as show tunes and standards. I continue to hum or whistle of even sing out loud whenever I can. I had a job a while back which involved an early stocking shift before the store opened, and my friend Rachel and I would sing Patsy Cline and Johnny Cash and what-ever else suited our fancy. One of my great prides in parenting is how many songs I taught my daughter, who says that I have a voice that makes anybody feel like they can sing.

And anyone can!!!!!

Sing to say what you cannot say! Singing for joy or to express our sadness, or just to pass the time away is a rare gift. The blues, the agony, the ecstasy, the longing, the loneliness, the peace—all of these are bubbling down deep within you and waiting to be expressed.

Sing to remember who you are and what you love! Singing opens up something inside of us that makes us more like who we really are than anything else. No other human being, no nightingale or lark, no violin or glockenspiel has your unique voice. It might not be the prettiest, but it is yours, and it can be your fun.

Sing because it’s beautiful! The world is full of beauty, but singing–even if you do it really poorly–allows you to touch and to be part of that beauty, that joy, that infinite and immediate wonder which is music. It is so rooted in the earth, so material, such a matter of vibrations and modulations, but it is also so sublime. Music immerses us in our senses and sensations, but moves us out of subjective feeling. It is the world and it is transcendence.

So when was the last time you sang?

You’re alone now, wasting time reading a blog, just you and your electronic device….why don’t you sing now?

WoodyGuthriePoster

 

 

An Apology.

It has been a while.

The Bistro has still not reopened. I have been catering, roofing, painting, landscaping, and anything else I can. Percy has gone to visit relatives back home in the Falklands for their winter. Anno is ghostwriting, editing and translating on-line, where nobody knows you are a mouse. Wode Toad has disappeared.

We are still considering vagabonding across Europe in a horse-drawn Food-truck/Gypsy-caravan. We’ll keep you posted.
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GREAT SHOW! PLAN TO SEE IT!!!!

MUCH ADOVERY, VERY, VERY FUNNY!
This production updates the setting, but retains the great script, and the cast speaks it so naturally that it is really easy to understand. It’s a great young cast–exciting and energetic and with a wonderful sense of comedy timing.
In the history of theater, Benedick & Beatrice are the emperor & empress of snark, and Hannah Swayze & Nathaniel Couper do them justice.
Five more performance:
Sunday, May 17 at 2 p.m.
Friday, May 22 at 7 p.m.
Saturday, May 23 at 2 p.m and at 7 p.m.
Sunday, May 24 at 2 p.m.

GIRAFFES!!!!!!!

I SAW GIRAFFES!!!

MackawsRachel, a friend of mine and one of the mostbok wonderful people I know, took me to a zoo–Brights Zoo in Limestone Tennessee, in fact. We walked around and saw all sorts of animals–mostly animals from Savannahs, since the climates are similar  in summer, as is the grazing. It is still a bit chilly in the mornings here, so it wasn’t until the second time around the park, when the sun came out, that many of the animals came outside.

Going around the corner, I couldn’t speak; there, standing in a paddock, were 3 giraffes!

Everybody has that special thing–a blanket or stuffed animal–that wasStuffed Giraffe (4) their special little security thing when they are little. Mine was Giraffe. He was a medium sized stuffed giraffe (that’s how he got the name). When I was 7, we moved 3979 miles, across the Atlantic. I had my pillow and Giraffe. He was a good listener and a reassuring friend, and he could be flipped over and used as a machine gun when flying over France trying to shoot down Eddie Rickenbacker. I don’t think I have ever lived anywhere without him.

Giraffe 2I have seen giraffes at zoos before, but generally from a distance. I was able to stand up on a platform eye to eye. They are graceful and very tall. They are a little mischievous, and have a purple tongue that is almost 2 feet long. They are quiet, mostly because breathing all that way can be rough, but can make moaning orGiraffe tounge bleating noises. I have a friend who once followed a herd (a tower? who comes up with these things?!?) on a motorcycle to see what noise they made, but apparently they have non-verbal ways of saying “what’s with the creeper on the motorcycle?” because they stayed quiet. And they have huge beautiful eyes with long eyelashes.Giraffe me - Copy

I think I just stood there with my mouth open for 5 minutes, unable to speak (really unusual for me). Honestly, I felt like dancing around and squealing, but at my age that is difficult to pull off. Rachel bought a carrot for me to feed to him. All the rest of the day I was saying “I saw a giraffe!!!” to flamingoanyone who would listen.

Life has had its ups and downs lately, but for just one moment, I couldn’t ask for more. The sun was shining, and I was hanging out with a good friend and with giraffes. What more could you want?

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Ireland, again

It is nearing Saint Patrick’s day, so I am rerunning this.

Verdant Place, Limerick, Dr Bear 2013 2Ireland is beautiful and very, very green. It really is called the Emerald Isle for a good reason. I once drove through England to Ireland in a drought. England looked like a sun-faded newspaper, and–even though locals kept telling us how bad the dry weather was–Ireland was lush. That summer, it rained ever night from midnight to around 4, and then cleared.

If you have a low tolerance level for quaintness, I would advise you never to visit.

We flew into Shannon, because we decided that we wanted to force ourselves to see the Irish countryside, and were afraid that otherwise we might get stuck only seeing Dublin—lovely in its own right, but not the country.Limerick Dr Bear 2013

We knew we would be arriving at 6:30 am local time, and that it would feel like 2:30 am to us, so we didn’t have anything specific planned. We managed to find our way to the bus, and climbed up to the second story. Apparently, all Irish (and most Scottish and English) bus drivers are expected to drive like the night bus from Harry Potter—lurching back and forth, taking turns at frightening speeds, etc.—but we were also driving across green rolling hills, past stone cottages; Railway Hotel, Limerick 2013castles, all under a brilliantly stormy sky.

We unfolded ourselves at the train station in Limerick, and found the Railway Hotel (Lovely! I would recommend it). The check-in time was 2:00 in the afternoon, and the clerk frowned as we walked in. She suggested we eat breakfast, and I realized she was frowning because she was trying to think of a way to allow us to check into our rooms early.

Inhabitants of North America distinguish themselves by smiling (also, with the help of bleach and orthodonture, shiny, perfect teeth). We expect it of others, and when others don’t smile, we think that they are frowning, or troubled, or rude, or even hostile. To a lot of the world, the constant pleasant smiling seems artificial, and I think I agree, even if it takes some getting used to).

That first breakfast in Limerick was one of the best meals we had—Irish brown bread toast and jam, strong Irish breakfast tea, scones, a full Irish breakfast (rashers? black pudding? white pudding? roasted tomatoes?), porridge—it was so good, I have tried to duplicate the bread.Picnic in Limerick Dr Bear 2013

After a nap into the afternoon, we wandered about Limerick, and found a local farmer’s market that was just shutting down. The very Irish and very sturdy looking lady behind the counter at the cheese mongers frowned at us, then gave us samples of several cheeses, discussing where each had come from, and how long each was aged, and we left with supplies for a plowman’s lunch down by the wharf.

Again and again, we encountered Irish natives who were friendly and kind—the bartender at the Bram Stocker hotel warning us with a heavy brogue that the people in Bram Stocker HotelCork “spoke funny and are hard to understand,” the Dublin cab driver who refused to take us to Cornucopia on Wicklow Street—“Oh, I’d be embarrassed; it’s only t’ree blocks, now. Just cross the bridge and through those tall buildings” (I knew how far it was—6 blocks—and I had a 20 pound pack)—although often, the kindness was about fixing something that had gone wrong.

Things going wrong is apparently common in Ireland, and they all seem to have developed what I think of as “a bemused complacency towards the fecked-up-ness of it all” (“Oh, I can’t sell you a ticket on the bus; you can only get those from a machine, and that one there, it is broken. Marvelous!” “They closed at 3:20? How odd.”) It did surprise me that I had trouble getting used to the b.c.t.f. (as well as the occupied frown), since ??????????????????those are both things with which I face the world. That and the heavy lidded Irish eyes that are part of my genetic heritage.

Another odd observation, though: any given block in Ireland seems to have two pubs, a bookie shop, a homeless person or two and their dogs, and a pro-life billboard. It seems to me that there are vices that might be more important to fight than allowing a woman the right to choose, but, then again, Ireland only reluctantly legalized birth control.
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Murphy's in Dublin Dr Bear 2013It was one marvel after another–a beautiful countryside here, a harpist there, music in a pub, the stormy skies at sunset, the voices–Irish is not so much an accent as a cadence, a lilt, a language sung softly. Kind people, great ale, and wonderful food–yes, my friends: the French were polite and the British Isles had good food; re-examine your prejudices!
If you are ever in Dublin, drop by the Murphy Brother’s Ice Cream Shop. They are always smiling.

Of course, who wouldn’t, spending the day around ice cream hand-made in Dingle. (“hand-made in Dingle” that makes me giggle.)

Wheaten Bread (Irish Brown Bread)

Irish Wheaten Bread 007On our first day in Ireland, for our very first meal in Europe, we had breakfast at the Railway Hotel. Besides some marvelous tea and incredible service, we also had some toast, which included a brown bread. My foodie daughter was in love. “Wouldn’t it be ironic,” she asked, “if after going through Germany and France, my favorite bread ended up being Irish Brown Bread, and my favorite cheese really was a sharp Irish Cheddar?”

Ne Gustibus Disputatem Est.

Ingredients:

  • 3 cups extra-course whole wheat flour
  • ½ cup bread flour
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 cup oat bran
  • 1 cup wheat germ
  • ¼ cup brewer’s yeast (optional)
  • ¼ cup melted butter (I might consider more)
  • 2 cups buttermilk or milk
  • 1 Tbsp dark corn syrup or honey
  • 1 egg

Step 1, Prepare Ye the way: Preheat the oven to 400°, assemble all the ingredients, run to the store because you are out of butter, and grease & flour a baking sheet or cake pan.

Step 2, sifting the dry ingredients: In one bowl sift (mix if you don’t have a sifter) the flours, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add in the oat bran, wheat germ, and brewer’s yeast.  Mix thoroughly.

Step 3, pastry cutting: Mix in the butter, much as you would cut in cold butter or shortening.

Step 4, mixing the wet ingredients: In another bowl, beat the egg, then mix in the buttermilk and the corn syrup.

Step 4, combining the big mess: Add the wet ingredients to the dry ones and mix well. The results might be a bit gloppy. No, I take that back: they result will be very gloppy. Flour your hands and try to fashion this into a ball, and if you cannot, add a bit more flour until this is manageable. Irish Wheaten Bread 001

Step 5, baking: Set the round loaf (or round loaves, if you are making little ones) onto the pan. Score the top with a cross. Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. Rotate them to make sure they brown evenly, reduce the oven temperature to 375, and bake for 30 minutes more. The result should be a crumbly brown loaf.

Final Step, share and enjoy Irish Wheaten Bread 009They break along the score, so you can each munch a quarter. You can have them with a mug of strong Irish tea, and some cold butter, and some current jam. They are perfect as a toast for breakfast, or to accompany a hearty plowman’s lunch.

As always, they are perfect for giving to somebody you love, either in person, or by post.