Reflections

Getting Plucky with My Tasting Buddy

I was at a party at Dramaland's* house several months ago and met Leila.  Though I had been introduced to her early in the evening, she really entered my consciousness when somehow we started smelling each other's wrists and comparing notes on the essential oils we both favored.  Lavender, geranium and vetiver?  I hate those scents (except, what is vetiver?  Can't very well google a scent).  But on Leila (LEE lah) they smelled divine. 

Body chemistry really alters smells, I find, which is why all my life I have hated women's perfume--it mostly turns to a sickly-sweet smell on me.  I need to start off with something pretty yang and it mellows into...whatever it is my body does to it. An ex of mine claims I smell like apple pie. I think that's just because he associates me with all that is girl-next-door-ish. :-)

I won't reveal my proprietary blend here, but I will say it contains five oils, one of which I use only the tiniest drop, one of which is sweet and the remaining three are woodsy or musky.  I did have fun witnessing Leila trying to guess.I had at first pegged Leila as Jewish, for her immediacy in the realm of scent and physical contact (something more common in non-WASP/mainstream culture, I've found) but it turns out she is Iranian-American.  Still--she smells like mischpocheh (family). 

So anyway, it turns out Leila lives close by.  So who better to hunt down blackberries with than my new friend?

It turns out most of the blackberry bushes had been cut away and the remaining fruits tended toward the acidic.  But I couldn't resist braving the brambles for a motherlode or two of huge black shiny prizes.  Of course once I reached the inner circle I could hardly move for fear of being pricked. Made the juice all the sweeter.

See the full set here. 

*Dramaland made a name for herself among Bay area womyn-loving-womyn...Oops! Brain fart, it's not 1979...dykes, I mean...by posting these hysterical rants on craigslist about how sad it was that her oatmeal got burnt and her drain wasn't working properly...all a deadpan twist on the drama dykes are known for.

Humble Pie

So, Alex was barbequeing (someone please tell me how to spell that) pork ribs out back.  Nana and Cainan were about, Shelly had just arrived and I was making noises about what kind of dessert to make.
     "We've got those frozen blackberries," Alex said
     "Aargh!  Why use frozen when this whole area's crawling with fresh blackberries?" I ranted.
     "I'd love to go pick some," Shelly offered.
     "By the time you get back, you're gonna have to leave," Alex said.

After a few round of the merits of fresh vs. frozen, and time constraints, I was about to resign myself to baking a Linzertorte with frozen blackberries.

We were hanging out in the backyard admiring Alex's barbecue (did I get it right that time?) prowess when someone shouted, "Hey! We've got cherries!"

Sure enough, the cherry tree, which hadn't fruited in two years, was weighty with little red prizes.  A sour cherry variety, most of the little guys were up top near the sunshine.  And they were quite ripe, having gone unnoticed all summer.

"Okay, I'll bake them, but someone else needs to gather and pit them."

As it turns out, this particular variety just needs a little squeeze to release the seed.

Okay, sleep break, I'll finish tomorrow.  My first abortive attempt at crust and how I recycled my remains, and why chunks of butter have never liked me, and how to let cherry flavor stand out while still paying homage to early pie memories thickened with cornstarch.  Plus a few photos.

All Aboard the Happy Birthday Cainan Bus

First Cainan (born 6/11/2003) had asked for a train cake, then at the last minute changed his mind and asked for a "bus cake."  I started off with the chocolate sheet cake from Cook's Illustrated, then added the components with a slab of genoise I tend to have in the refrigerator for just such cake-itechtural emergencies.  A big batch of buttercream, with some challenging mixing moments, became school bus-, window-, tire-, sun-, stop sign-, grass- and asphalt-colored, per above.

Here's Cainan blowing out his big numeral "3" candle.  He didn't get the concept of wax and attempted to eat the candle before we stopped him, explaining that wax was, in fact, yucky.

This is Mr. C doing his birthday boogie. Yes, he's wearing a dress.

Here's the very beautiful Nacha, my sister-in-love and mama-to-be...one of three women at the party who were all five month's pregnant!

And here's Laura (say the Latina version, Laaaurrrra) another of the three preg-o mamas, former nanny of Cainan, and also bisexual activist I met in the trenches many years ago.  She and I actually went on the Jane Whitney show about 13 years ago as polyamorous bisexuals.  Now she's a midwife and recently returned from Peru, where she was born, to settle in and have a babe of her own.

Chris, our former housemate, "cranberry monster" buddy to Cainan.  An overheard dialogue between Laura and Chris went something like this:
Laura: So you sell perfume?  What does that entail?
Chris: Mostly just stand around and look pretty.
Laura (pregnant pause): I imagine that must be very difficult for you.
The very pretty Chris, I just learned today, has quit perfume, is kicking baristahood, and indeed the whole Bay Area, to the curb to return to LA to go to cooking school!  Yay, Chris, though we'll miss the big CMonster...waaahhhh.

Heartbreakingly cute little Finn (short for Finian), daughter of preg-o mama #3, Fred, pictured below.

Cainan, singing himself a birthday serenade?  To his left, Fred, mama of Finn, and Felicia, mama of Kayman.  Me n Storm n Bit-o on the right in the background (click to enlarge and see the entire cast).

Bit-o, chowin' down on the bus cake.
Storm, still finger-lickin' good, with any icing.
Being a matzoh queen is one thing, Storm, but growing a menorah halo is a 'ho nother.
Dean, Laura's partner, Cainan, Dada (Alex, Cainan's "donor"), and Laura.

Some o' Mr. C's birthday gang. Note the train tracks in the center of the room.

See you all next year!

My Secret Love

Boletus, most butch of all mushrooms, I adore you, I covet you, I search you out among ordinary fruits. Yet you show yourself so seldom, and I never seem quite able to catch you in your natural habitat, tethered to the mothership mycelium so that I might pluck you therefrom, cradle you tenderly in my palm, admire your fine spores, your stolid trunk and hulking cap, take you home and slice you with the sharpest knife, run my fingers over the cross-section of your changing flesh before stroking you with oil, applying fire.  Over the minutes you become something I chew, swallow, flesh of my flesh, touching my thousands of cells, changing me in ways I’ll never see.  This all started because of a hunger...for you. 

I first read about boletus, the hunky, rich genus of mushroom that includes boletus edulis, AKA porcini, at age eight or so.  During my family's yearly trek through the Carolinas, which culminated in my arrival at summer camp, my family would pitch tent and park van in various woods. My dad had given me a colorful book on mushrooms in response to my fungal proclivities. 

But when I identified a fat bolete in its natural habitat, my dad forbade me to gather, let alone eat it.  The only wild mushroom he allowed me to ingest (and even fried it up in butter for me over hot coals) was the lowly puffball, because he could identify it with complete certainty.  However, the early imprint of the boletes never left me.  I could almost hear their earthy, moist beckoning: "Eat me...I'm thick with what you want..."

Mushrooms fascinate me, in part because they're fungus, and so neither plant nor animal.  Also, the parts we see shoot up from the larger organism, the mycelium, which lives beneath the ground.  In fact the largest living organism on earth (though whether it's a single organism is disputed) is a mycelium, which spans about 3 1/2 square miles in Arizona.

The fleshlike quality of mushrooms means they're often the first thing vegans will turn to when trying to find a weighty meat counterpart.  Hence all the grilled portobello sandwiches around town.

For a brief period, my partner and I kept company with a mycologist, or mushroom scientist. We both thought that was the hottest thing ever.  She even took us on a mushroom foray at Salt Point, ID-ing the many species along the way.  It's a wonder we all made it back home on six feet.

I'm now just a check and a stamp away from being a card-carrying member of the Sonoma County Mycological Association.  We attended a mushroom dinner of theirs one night while staying up at River Rest.  I also receive updates about forays (none of which I've managed to go on this year, darn it,) from Wild About Mushrooms, an independent organization dedicated to, well, you can probably figure it out.  I was especially bummed to miss the porcini foray.  Though I haven't yet gone so far as to plan my year around mushroom forays, I do think about them quite a bit, especially ones involving the boletus genus of my youth.

So you can imagine my delight at finding butter boletes (pictured above) at the Berkeley Bowl. It was a nanosecond decision: I had sprinted from the checkout line, leaving Cainan with a woman who had agreed to watch him, and whom he was holding captive, explaining in a loud voice how the "train tracks" ran all across the ceiling and "...the trains are gonna run over there and out of the building, and then they're gonna line up and go on the tracks in a line, and then they're gonna..."   His voice got fainter and fainter as I ran to grab my shiitakes, and within seconds, also a handful of butter boletes I found nestled in a bin among their mycological cousins. 

As I ran back to my groceries, Cainan's voice got louder again "...and all the trains are gonna come in, and Thomas is at the front and all the other cars follow Thomas because Thomas is at the front because Thomas is, becaaaaauuse Thomas is, Thomas is at the front, Thomas is at the front because, Thomas is at the front, because Thomas is BLUE."  I thanked the woman for bearing witness, loaded up my shrooms and headed home.

That night, I sauteed the boletes and discovered with dismay that some of my lot sported spores of the kind you don't want.  There's some sort of irony in a moldy mushroom.  Spore on spore.  A sort of homomycological parasitical hookup.  I think it best I stop that thread right there.

I scraped away the mold, and sauteed my prizes in a bit of butter, and late in the game, did what I tend to do with many veggies: add a squeeze of lemon and a dash of RealSalt.  Meanwhile, I barely-boiled up some porcini fettucini from Phoenix Pastificio I had gotten that morning at the Farmer's Market.  A drain, a toss, a scoche of truffle oil and a splash of cream later, I was in heaven.

An aside: as much as I love truffle oil, I have yet to fall for the source.  My one rendezvous with truffles from a jar left me cold and dejected.  The texture was about the unsexiest I could dream, crumbly and brittle yet rubbery, something akin to a piece of tire soaked in brine for a number of months.  The fresh truffles were better, to be sure, but their cartilaginous texture still left me puzzled.  Ideas welcome here, BTW.

But truffle oil...now that takes me someplace.  The nutty muskiness of it evokes sex, muscle and focused attention over a long period of time.  I mean, who would want to leave? In fact, in those moments when I've felt moved to anoint a lovers body, it's truffle oil I think of, not some god-awful cherry thing you'd find in a adult store in North Beach--that'd be like dipping smoked sable in strawberries.  Just as with food on a plate, beloved bodies across sheets call for careful choice in that with which we mix their particular scents and flavors.

But back to my dish. The taste of the porcini pasta in my mouth, with the firm, tender chew of the butter boletes, the truffle oil wafting through my inhalations, might have been overkill for some but for me it was a perfect mushroom melange.  A far cry from the daily white-capped soldiers of my childhood, and their canned brown rubbery counterparts, the fungi of farmer's markets and local groceries call out to be caressed with moist slippery care, to mount little piles of goat cheese, pasta and toasty breads brushed with olive oil, to enter our mouths with that most mysterious scent and flavor of underground worlds that give rise to surprising life.

Brownies for Butches

Especially for You, with deep reverence and love for what it takes to move through the world as a butch.  We love the paradoxes you embody, the beauty you shine and the irresistible sexy energy that draws us to you.  Please accept these butch brownies, made by our own femme hands, as a small but passionate token of appreciation for your existence.  You are rare gems, and you rock our worlds!  Love, Jill and Melanie

All or most batches organic: unbleached all-purpose wheat flour, unrefined or refined sugar, unsweetened chocolate, butter, eggs, semisweet chocolate, cocoa, natural flavorings.

As ever, click on any image to enlarge it.  (Too bad this doesn't work for other parts of life.)

Saturday June 24th was a happy day in my life.  Before the Dyke March, when hordes of women gather in Dolores Park, I got to combine two of my favorite passions: brownies and butches.  With a little exhibitionism thrown in, its a wonder I didn't get sent straight to hell.

For a week, I made brownies.  Before the march, I went over to my friends Brett and Melanie (butch boi and femme respectively) and combined my brownies with Mel's.  We wrapped the brownies in a butch appreciation message (reproduced above) printed on colored paper with glittery designs on the back: red with gold, white with blue, pink with silver and so on.  As we walked out the door, the brownies nestled in a red satin box with a gold flap, on which we mounted the ingredients along with the butch appreciation message in a pink heart.  I can't remember the last time I was so excited.

Giving away the brownies wound up much less straightforward (so to speak) than I would have guessed.  For one thing, eight out of ten people assumed we were proffering "special" brownies.  Luckily, we ran into a woman doing just that, and she followed us around so we referred those clientele to her.  Strategic business alliances rock.

Secondly, femmes and men and (apparently) straight folks were mighty interested in brownies.  I explained that they were for self-identified butch women only. Brett chimed in with flowers for femmes some of the time, which placated a few, but a number of men went away empty-handed.  One inebriated young feminine woman went on and on about how she had a butch cousin.  I told her the brownies were made especially for self-identified butch women. 

"Oh, like YOU'RE butch!?  She said, looking me up and down.

Oh.  Like you have a brain cell left?

M weak attempt at explanation proved futile.  She repeated herself, gesture and all.  Finally she picked up a brownie.

"That's not okay with me," I said.

"Oh, well, we're all family," she said, and ate the brownie as she walked away.

Hello?

Meanwhile, the butches seemed delighted.  About half of them would reach for their wallets, and I explained that they were not for sale, that they were our gift of love to butch women.  They lit up with gratitude.  When they read the message we included, a few came back to personally thank me for my words.

Some clearly (to me) butch women arrived unsure if they qualified.  "Well, I'm sort of a soft butch," a few offered.  We told them their identity was up to them.  I saw a couple of out-and-out lies, chocolate-induced, for sure.  I finally interrupted the implausible yarn about identity being spun by one cleavage, makeup and miniskirt-sporting woman by asking her to please respect our intention.  She backed off, I like to think a bit relieved of having to sustain her awkward lie.

The thing that (at first) surprised me the most was how miffed some people got when they found out they could not buy a brownie for themselves.  In particular, one woman's face tightened up.

"That's discrimination," she said.

"I made these with my own hands and am giving them to whom I wish," I said.

"That's really racist," the woman retorted.

Huh?

Finally, I got it.  Those slighted (all white) felt entitled to have whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted.  The butch women of the world have to deal every day with judgment and exclusion, crude and subtle.  For once, here was something sweet offered ONLY to butch women, a direct reversal of the usual order of things.  It reminded me of similar reactions when years ago I charge white women and people of color less to come to some of my flirtation workshops.  Some white men got miffed, as if we were actually on a level playing field to begin with, and I was somehow introducing rather than repairing an inequality.  And here I was just wanted to give butches something yummy.

Brett and Melanie had the foresight to anticipate these awkward moments.  I did not.  I thought we'd just show up and the appropriate targets would identify themselves.  Instead I got a chance to become a sort of lingerie-wearing, brownie-toting anthropologist.

My m.o. in general, and for this gig in particular, was to share my love through food, not piss people off by denying it to them.  At the same time, I felt strongly that I wanted to stick to my intention.  I think it was really powerful for the butches who got to witness me telling men, femmes and straight folks effectively, No, actually, this is for her, not you.  How often does that happen to a butch woman?  I enjoyed that part of the dynamic, which helped make up for how the food withholding violated my Jewish Mama gene.

Oh, did someone ask about the lingerie?  The dress was a $1,000.00 Perla number that I borrowed from a friend.  I had tried it on weeks before just for fun, and was amazed at how it looked on me.  I don't think most lingerie looks that good on me, but I just loved how this dress, with its matching bra and panties worn underneath, flattered.  I wound up using my own undergarments, preferring a black lace thong and leopard push-up bra to their Perla counterparts.

Halfway through our time there, I swapped out my platforms for bedroom slippers, and toward the end, donned a long silk bathrobe my mom had given me for my wedding.  Little does she know.  I did take off the bathrobe and hoist myself back up on the platforms for a final brownie giveaway round, braving the San Francisco cold.

All photos, BTW, by Sweet Boi Brett, except those of Brett hymself.  I took these--view hir and drool:

Speaking of drooling over sweet bois, someone asked about the brownies themselves: There were, essentially, two batches, Sweet Bois and Diesel Fuel.  The sweet bois were a classic recipe, the kind most folks would be familiar with. Melanie used a Martha Stewart recipe and I went to Cooks Illustrated.  The Diesel Fuel were my adaptation of the CI classics, adding cocoa, semi-sweet chocolate, strong coffee and brandy.  I wanted something with the classic texture but severely amped-up chocolate content.  CI offers a triple-fudge brownie, but the texture of that recipe is more like a thick chewy fudge than a brownie, and you can't really eat more than one square inch of them.  My Diesel Fuel recipe is still in progress, but I've reproduced the current version below.  Please do tell me how they turn out, if you use it.

Jill's Diesel Fuel Brownies

Note: These brownies were developed specifically for Dyke March 2006 where the lovely Miss Melanie and I served them under a sign that read "Brownies for Butches"

Be sure to test for doneness before removing the brownies from the oven. If underbaked (the toothpick has batter clinging to it), the texture of the brownies will be dense and gummy; if overbaked (the toothpick comes out completely clean), the brownies will be dry and cakey.

When serving to butches, supply lots of napkins, and don?t take it personally if appreciation gets expressed primarily in monosyllables.

Makes about forty brownies when cut small

1 cup plain cake flour (or all-purpose; the texture will be just slightly different)

1/2 tsp table salt

3/4 tsp. baking powder

3 T Green & Black's organic cocoa (this is the most potent--add 1 T at least if you use another brand)

6-8 oz. unsweetened chocolate, chopped fine

2 oz semisweet chocolate

12 T unsalted butter (1 1/2 sticks, cut into six 1-inch pieces)

2 1/4 cups granulated sugar

1/4 cup powdered sugar

4 large eggs

1T vanilla powder or crushed vanilla beans if possible, extract if not

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position; heat oven to 325 degrees. Line a 9 X 13-inch baking pan with tin foil so that it hangs over the sides (you'll use it to lift the brownies out later) and grease it up with butter or your oil of choice.

2. Sift  flour, salt, cocoa, powdered sugar and baking powder together, then whisk to combine in medium bowl; set aside.

4. Melt both unsweetened and semisweet chocolate along with butter in a  large heatproof bowl set over saucepan of almost-simmering water, stirring occasionally, until smooth. (Alternatively, in microwave, heat butter and chocolate in large microwave-safe bowl on high for 45 seconds, then stir and heat for 30 seconds more. Stir again, and, if necessary, repeat in 15-second increments; do not let chocolate burn.) When chocolate mixture is completely smooth, remove bowl from saucepan and gradually whisk in sugar. Add eggs one at time, whisking after each addition until thoroughly combined. Whisk in vanilla. Add flour/cocoa mixture in three additions, folding with rubber spatula until batter is completely smooth and homosexual.  Um, I mean homogeneous.

5. Transfer batter to prepared pan; using spatula, spread batter into corners of pan and smooth surface. Bake until toothpick or wooden skewer inserted into center of brownies comes out with few moist crumbs attached, 30 to 35 minutes. Cool on wire rack to room temperature, about 2 hours, then remove brownies from pan by lifting foil overhang. Cut brownies into 1.5-inch squares and serve. Store leftovers in airtight container at room temperature or in refrigerator up to 3 days.  Or freeze--these taste wonderful and chew quite tenderly just out of the freezer and are delightful in hot weather.