Joy

If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough.

Meister Eckhart

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Happy Valentine's Day!

Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same. --Emily Bronte

 

... and I can't stop watching Downton Abbey.

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Paczki-lala

So, let's talk about my grandma. To borrow a phrase from the Queen Bee herself, she is just "the nuts." An avid animal lover and gardener by day, she takes the Northeastern Pennsylvania pony races by storm at night.  She has, on occasion, been known to refer to something lovely, impressive, or silly as "tchotchy-la-la." To this day, the Kef Family compliments one another as such ("Well, aren't you just a tchotchy-la-la?"). No one said we were normal.

In addition to the unending affection of her grandchildren, daughers, and beloved Golden Doodle, she has captured the heart of one of the most amazing humans alive, BFKef.  These two love each other in a way that makes one thing abundantly clear: I've become superfluous.

A few Mardi Gras seasons ago, at the first meeting of this dangerous duo, GrandmaKef introduced BFKef and I to an amazing thing called the paczki (pronounced ponchki).  Apparently, these are a grand tradition for Mardi Gras among the Polish diaspora, so much so that Fat Tuesday is known as "Paczki Day" in large parts of the Midwest.  When GrandmaKef introduced BFKef to these donut-like delicacies, you can bet BFKef would have thrown his beads all over Northeastern Pennsylvania for another dozen... or two.
 

Every so often, I make something and think to myself, "Holy Moly, Chef Kef, I can't believe you made this." This is absolutely one of those times. Like most bread-based recipes, this one is time-intensive but absolutely not skill-intensive (As proof: I blew through Season 2 of Downton Abbey while I cooked these, which I will ABSOLUTELY be writing about at another time). Turns out fast food has been on to something this whole time and deep-frying is actually quite an easy process. I used a recipe from Serious Eats and followed it to a 'T' without problem.

My first thought when I saw the finished result? Tchotchy-la-la. 

Paczki Fit For a Polish Prince*

Ingredients 

• 2 c whole milk
• 4 1/2 tsp instant yeast (2 Fleishmann's envelopes)
• 1/2 c PLUS 1 TBS sugar
• 5 c all-purpose flour
• 4 egg yolks PLUS one whole egg
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/4 c unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• A whole lot of canola oil, for frying (you will need at least enough to fill a wide, deep pot up to 2 inches)
• 1 1/2 c berry jelly--try and find one that is smooth and without too many chunks to make filling easier
• 1 c powdered sugar, for dusting

Assembly 
1. In a small saucepan heat milk to between 110 an 115°F. Pour warmed milk into a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer. Dissolve yeast in milk. Add one Tablespoon sugar and two cups of flour. Mix until consistency of pancake batter then cover with plastic wrap and place in a warm spot to allow yeast to activate. Let rest for 30 minutes or until starter is very bubbly. 

2. In a medium bowl combine egg and yolks. Whisk until light and frothy, about 4 minutes. Whisk in 1/2 cup sugar, salt and vanilla.

3. Slowly stir cooled melted butter into yeast starter until combined. Then slowly incorporate egg mixture until just combined. Fit mixer with dough hook. Stir in flour, working 1/2 a cup in at a time until a soft dough comes together. Note: this dough is very sticky.

4. Spray a large bowl with cooking spray and transfer dough to bowl. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and set in a warm place to rise until double in size. About an hour.

5. Turn out dough on a very generously floured surface. Dust surface of dough with flour then punch down dough to about half an inch high. Using anything hard and round (I used an empty tomato sauce jar, a wine glass would also work), cut out doughnuts. Carefully transfer doughnut rounds to parchment lined baking sheets. Cover sheets with a clean dish towel and set in a warm place to rise until doubled in size, about 30 minutes.

6. Pour canola oil into a large dutch oven to a depth of 2 inches. Heat oil to 360°F. Once oil reaches the proper temperature use a heat resistant spatula or shallow strainer to carefully drop doughnuts in, one at a time, cooking a maximum of 3 at once. Cook doughnuts until a warm, deep brown on one side, then using heat resistance tongs turn the doughnut and cook the other side until it reaches the same degree of doneness. Remove from oil letting any excess oil drain off then transfer to a wire rack for cooling. Test your first doughnut to make sure that the insides are completely cooked, if not adjust your cooking time accordingly. Let doughnut cool.

7. Prepare a wide and shallow bowl with powdered sugar. Fill your pastry bag with your favorite preserves and fit the bag with a filling tip. Pipe filling into pączki then dip each side in powdered sugar until covered. (Chef Kefi, RN Editor's Note: the filling was the messiest part for me--I ended up filling from the top to make this a big easier, but separate one or two paczkis for practice specimen!)

*A story for another time.

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A Very Kefi Christmas

"It is a miracle if you can find true friends, and it is a miracle if you have enough food to eat, and it is a miracle if you get to spend your days and evenings doing whatever it is you like to do, and the holiday season—like all the other seasons—is a good time not only to tell stories of miracles, but to think about the miracles in your own life, and to be grateful for them." —Lemony Snicket








There are many things that have afforded me great success in this world-- I'm a white person from the US who went to college and is employed.  To 99.99% of the rest of the world, I wasn't just born on third--I came onto Earth an inch from home plate.

Few things have made me feel as privileged as this past weekend, when my family got together to celebrate a pre-Christmas Extravaganza with me before I headed back to DC to work both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.  It was an amazing 36-hour love fest that featured all of the people I hold dearest, from the family with which I was born to the mish-mash of folks I have chosen over the years to count among my people.  

The Kefis have always believed in a big, fat, decorative Christmas, but our winter holidays have not always been as movie-esque as this one was-- those years that began when the oldest of my siblings became a teenager and ended when the youngest of us left adolescence behind brought as much angst and posturing around the holidays for us as they did any other family.  We worked hard for our practically-perfect pre-Christmas, and it made me think about how wonderfully lucky we are if, as adults, we can move past the family squabbles about presents and table turf that our complicated world increasingly encourages, and remember how truly magic Christmas can be, if only we bring to the table with us best wishes for each other and a healthy sense of humor about ourselves (making Christmas a champagne-only event doesn't hurt, either).

It is, of course, more than happy circumstance that my family gets to enjoy holidays like these at a time when so many families are splintered by the demands of our world.  In some other post at some other time, I will wax and wane on how closely linked happiness is to privilege.  But, for now, let me say without hope or agenda--just because it's Christmas, and at Christmas you tell the truth--to me, we are perfect.  

 

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I LIVE For This

Jada Pinkett-Smith, when asked why she let her daughter, Willow, shave her head:

“This subject is old but I have never answered it in its entirety. And even with this post it will remain incomplete. The question why I would LET Willow cut her hair. First the LET must be challenged. This is a world where women, girls are constantly reminded that they don’t belong to themselves; that their bodies are not their own, nor their power, or self determination. I made a promise to endow my little girl with the power to always know that her body, spirit, and her mind are HER domain. Willow cut her hair because her beauty, her value, her worth is not measured by the length of her hair. It’s also a statement that claims that even little girls have the RIGHT to own themselves and should not be a slave to even their mother’s deepest insecurities, hopes, and desires. Even little girls should not be a slave to the preconceived ideas of what a culture believes a little girl should be. More to come. Another day.” 

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Love is, Actually, All Around

The First Family remains a shining example of what happens when enduring love, fiery passion, and true partnership rule the roost

... and more importantly:

Wisconsin elects the nation's first openly-gay Senator

Hawaii sends the first Japanese-American woman to the Senate, and she will join a Congress with a record number of women members


AND FINALLY....

Maryland, Maine, Minnesota, and Washington become the four newest states to recognize justice, equity under the law, and a more inclusive understanding of love!

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In case you still don't know what kefi means...

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Same Love

I just love this sweet little video sent around by the good people at Upworthiest (actually--I don't know if they're good people, I just know that they put together one helluva great library of progressive videos with which I fill my rainy days off!)-- it speaks for itself, so I won't bother trying to add. Get out the tissues and remember that today is the LAST DAY to register to vote in many states!

 

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Live Your Best Life

I babysit for two of the sweetest children alive, E & W. After looking forward to his 4th birthday for about 9 months, W had an existential crisis the night before the Big Day.

Mom, to W: Aren't you so excited? Today is the last day you'll be three--tomorrow you'll be four!
W: But, Mom-- I loved three! I'm going to miss three!
Mom: Four is going to be so great! And when you're five you'll go to kindergarten, and when you're six you'll learn to read, and by the time you're seven you'll be able to ride a two-wheeler all by yourself ... which birthday do you think will be your favorite?
W: (crying) I think three was my favorite! And now it's gone. I'm going to miss three!
... thinks for a few seconds ... Mom, you're going to be 39 soon. Aren't you going to miss 38?


Around birthday time, I think we all get a little nostalgic--I take solace in the fact that I haven't had one year that wasn't better than the last, at least not yet. Thanks to everyone who made 26 so fun- on to 27!

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Butternut Squash "Spaghetti"

I thought about not blogging today.  It seems strange to spend time thinking and writing about the banalities of butternut squash on a day with such looming significance.  

I didn't know anyone who was in the either of the Towers that day, nor did I know anyone in lower Manhattan.  Back then, the only people in my sleepy suburb who worked in the city were fire fighters and police officers, and so for our town the horror of the day grew more personal as time went by-- no one I knew had a parent who worked in the World Trade Center, but we all knew parents who went down to Ground Zero for weeks at a time, often unable to communicate with their families during those long shifts of sifting through the remains of what we knew.  Our attempts at efficacy reflected our bizarre new reality: the blood drive organized by the senior class was cancelled when it became clear that there would be few survivors; instead we donated bagged lunches to the first responders and clean-up crews, who would be in harm's way indefinitely.

When I left New York to attend college in DC, I would spend four September 11ths feeling a strange guilt for not being in New York, not living out the grief I felt with the people closest to the loss.  Perhaps most difficult for me was the strange brand of grief I watched take shape in the rest of the country, outside New York, where it was some twisted trend to "out-9/11" the person next to you in order to validate your grief.  Five years after the attacks, there were still no words to name adequately the mourning we felt for the loss of our old world order, which left many who did not have the name of a lost loved one to mourn grasping for something that would make our sadness comprehensible.  It wasn't enough just to have watched the crumbling of some 3,000 lives: soon, everyone had a story of someone they knew who had run out of Lower Manhattan, been in the Pentagon, or would have been on one of those flights, if not for some divine intervention.  I never felt able to say to anyone but my roommate, who was also from a small suburb of the city, that I felt incredibly empty, that I still couldn't watch footage from the day without weeping, or that it was difficult to make it through this day every year.  Not because any one thing had changed in my life, but because everything was, in some way, completely different.

And so today I write about butternut squash spaghetti.  There is no link between this dish and this day, nor do I have a clever transition from the above emotions to the below recipe.  It seems that this is what we do--note the date, feel the sadness, move on to the next topic. 
--- 
Butternut Squash "Spaghetti"

Ingredients 
-- 1 butternut squash (a medium will serve 2), peeled
-- 3 cloves of garlic, minced
-- 1.5 TBS butter (olive oil would prob work also)
-- Fresh basil, to taste (optional)
-- Whatever tomato sauce you like (I love this smokey marinara)

Assembly
1. Using a julienne peeler (which are widely available for about $5 at most grocery stores--they look like a regular "Y" peeler with teeth), shred the skinned butternut until the seeds in the bulb are exposed. Do not make this difficult: hold the butternut vertically and move the julienne peeler down it.  This will make "noodles." Collect them in a bowl.
2. Heat the butter until it is melted over medium heat in a saucepan big enough for your "pasta." Add the minced garlic and let that sizzle for 2-3 minutes.
3. Add the squash.  Using tongs if you've got 'em and a spatula if you don't, move around the pasta so spread out the butter and garlic.  Then, let it sit over medium-high heat for 10-13 minutes, turning occasionally so all the "noodles" get cooked.  You'll know it's done when it has the consistency you like your pasta to be.  Throw the basil in and let it wilt.
4. Top with your favorite tomato sauce and enjoy.

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Lady, Don't You Know We Love You?

Happy Mother's Day to MamaKef!

And now, a few words about the incredibly difficult task of mothering, from the incredible Khalil Gibran

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.

Shout out to moms everywhere, who work tirelessly, and often without thanks, compensation, or appreciation, to raise up some babies.

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John Steinbeck, on Falling in Love

On a nearly-winter's day in 1958, John Steinbeck received a letter from his teenage son.  From it, Steinbeck learned that his son had fallen desperately in love with a young woman he attended boarding school with.  Below is the thoughtful response Steinbeck composed that afternoon, full of advice worth considering. 

 ---

New York
November 10, 1958
Dear Thom:

We had your letter this morning. I will answer it from my point of view and of course Elaine will from hers.

First -- if you are in love -- that's a good thing -- that's about the best thing that can happen to anyone. Don't let anyone make it small or light to you.

Second -- There are several kinds of love. One is a selfish, mean, grasping, egotistical thing which uses love for self-importance. This is the ugly and crippling kind. The other is an outpouring of everything good in you -- of kindness and consideration and respect -- not only the social respect of manners but the greater respect which is recognition of another person as unique and valuable. The first kind can make you sick and small and weak but the second can release in you strength, and courage and goodness and even wisdom you didn't know you had.

You say this is not puppy love. If you feel so deeply -- of course it isn't puppy love.

But I don't think you were asking me what you feel. You know better than anyone. What you wanted me to help you with is what to do about it -- and that I can tell you.

Glory in it for one thing and be very glad and grateful for it.

The object of love is the best and most beautiful. Try to live up to it.

If you love someone -- there is no possible harm in saying so -- only you must remember that some people are very shy and sometimes the saying must take that shyness into consideration.

Girls have a way of knowing or feeling what you feel, but they usually like to hear it also.

It sometimes happens that what you feel is not returned for one reason or another -- but that does not make your feeling less valuable and good.

Lastly, I know your feeling because I have it and I'm glad you have it.

We will be glad to meet Susan. She will be very welcome. But Elaine will make all such arrangements because that is her province and she will be very glad to. She knows about love too and maybe she can give you more help than I can.

And don't worry about losing. If it is right, it happens -- The main thing is not to hurry. Nothing good gets away.

Love,

Fa

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Isn't it lovely...

to just picture these two

 dancing in their beautiful brownstone living room to this...?

 

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Live Your Best Life

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Love Ever After

Despite being a somewhat pragmatic, generally critical member of our commercialized society, I still love Valentine's Day.  Today I share a photographer's account of New York couples married more than 50 years--incredible and touching. Enjoy!

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