From Scratch
Posted on 12 August 2010
Corn silks, those annoying little buggers that you can’t completely remove from your fresh ear of sweet corn, are linked to corn kernels, one to one. Each silk must be pollinated for a plump kernel to form at its end.
We husk the corn, my son cuts the okra we bought at the market, our own plants too wasted by their passionate affair with the Virginia sun to provide enough of what we adore. I make tortillas from scratch, corn meal, flour, water, salt, a simple recipe for something so delicious.
In the morning, it’s pancakes the little ones ask for, and my husband never stops wondering why I don’t buy Bisquick, it’s so easy. Instead I measure flour, Ethan cracks eggs, we stir gently, leaving lumps because the directions say to, and I never know why.
I am working on streamlining my life, incorporating routines, and I think about our mornings, how I make coffee every other day because I will reheat it the next day.
There there, now. Don’t judge.
The children love this little ritual of grinding beans, boiling water, scooping the coffee into my shiny, insulated press, but I think how nice it would be to have one of those one-cup makers, tidy little pods to put in the compartment, buttons to push. How much time I would save, and I’d hardly have to wait for it at all. No more microwaved coffee on off days, no more pots to clean.
Then I think about how my children would lose the memory of where coffee comes from. They would no longer see beans that looks like beans, and big canisters releasing their wonderful aroma when you open them.
They would see coffee not as a ritual, but as a machine, an invisible something that comes from…I don’t know where. They would see it as utilitarian.
But coffee is not, or at least, not just so. It’s made by a friend when you visit her farm and she tells you her father taught her to use her spoon to cool the liquid, dipping it, lifting it, letting the metal release its heat. It’s served by a HoJo’s waitress in the middle of the night while you solve the world’s problems at seventeen. It’s cupped in neighborly hands while you wait together for news, good or bad.
The farmer walks down his rows, arms shaking loose pollen from his corn tassels so it will do its work. The corn is ground into meal, mixed with flour and water, kneaded, rolled, cooked.
I wake, I grind the beans, boil the water, and wait. And I see that it is good.
6 responses to From Scratch
Nice Jen as always. I haven’t cooked since I fried bacon naked.
How did I miss this? Naked bacon?? MY FAVORITE!
You sound like the best possible mom a boy could have. I am envious!
You know how much of a coffee lover I am so this will surprise you. The instant over here is as good as the real stuff back home. Want me to ship you some?
How right you are to stay with ritual instead of caving in to convenience. I fear that we’ll lose too much in our rushing about. I love the smell of beans and fresh ground coffee, a wonderful morning ritual.
I have one of those instant machines. My husband gave it to me. It sits there waiting to give me what it doesn’t even labor or take pleasure to give. I like my coffee like I like my man, a lot of coaxing and waiting and anticipating. Some things around here are just done the old fashioned way….it often brings the most pleasure.
You write the best comments, Gaylyn. Come to think of it, I like my coffee like that, too.