I suppose it's about time that I kicked off this blog in earnest. But really? I don't want to. Quite frankly, I'm terrified. To even get to this point, my brother had to start the bloody blog for me. I had to be guilted into posting in the first place. Then I had to build up the pressure of desperation and bravado, like shaking a bottle of soda, for 4 months before the top blew tonight and I'm finally trying to post again. Truly, truly, blogging scares me.
I realize that rising incredulity may forcibly roll the eyes most of the people who've actually met me. I was a thespian, drama geek, and even theater teacher before the baking became my primary obsession, and somehow it's difficult to convince people you're an introvert when they know you love the stage. But an introvert I am, and an especially self-conscious one at that. I'll play any role in the world, just as long as you don't ask me to play myself. Which of course, is exactly what blogging does. Somehow, I have to play me. And I don't wanna.
But I do have to start somewhere. It's hard to sell books that no one's ever heard of. And harder still to justify all of the amazing experimenting I'm doing creating recipes for a holiday book when I can't sell the first one, because again, no one's ever heard of it. Unjustifiable baking. That's what I'm doing. But that's the part I love!
I love working and reworking a recipe until that eureka moment when it finally comes together just right. I love the miraculous few times when I've made something out of the blue and it was completely perfect on the first try. I even adore those few recipes that I keep tossing aside in frustration only to pick them up again a few months later to bang away at once more. Some I may never finish, but I've thought that before and pulled off what felt like miracles in the end. The flat bread and pie crust in my book were both like that. I remember making and remaking the flat bread for whole days, day after day, really aiming for a foldable tortilla but shhh, you didn't hear that. I went through so much flour! But then I turned out this batch that was so heavenly soft and satisfying that we gobbled all of them up plain. They didn't roll well without cracking, but damn! Were they ever good. One more revision, and I had my eureka moment. I felt like I was feeding myself all the way down to my soul as I took bite after slow bite of that bread. Indescribable satisfaction. That's what I found there. That's what I find in the kitchen.
Quite frankly, I just want to bake.
And eat rum cake. Blatant non-sequitur, sure, but none the less true. I do like my rum cake. Wish I had some right now instead of a blog...
Think I've been me enough for one night? Thank god! Have some rum cake.
