Sure

It was an extremely long week. Each day seemed to build on the last until Friday we came to an inevitable halt and had to regroup. I made a decision to stay, to stick it out a little longer and try again. We walked out Friday night and headed home, having made a stand to adjust priorities and refocus. Saturday was about family, about necessary distance from the workplace I devote so much energy towards. And we came into the new shop on Sunday with reserved hope, renewed perspective, regained composure.

I feel as if in some ways that this cycle is familiar life, that I continually get drawn out and then refilled. I am learning balance though tough. I am seeing that sometimes I wear myself out willingly and call it resilience. I sacrifice my comfort and heart and call it setting a good example when really it is unnecessary. In my crazy high expectations for myself I neglect to account for my own strength, or lack thereof. I demand perfection and fall short, insufficient on my own.

There is a song by Sara Groves with a line that continually catches my attention whenever I hear it. The lyrics describe conversations between friends, lovers, people who are facing mistakes, misjudged actions. There are explanations offered, apologies. But the chorus, the message there is simple:
love wash over a multitude of things; make us whole.

And that becomes enough. There is a love that never falters, a healing that continues despite our failings. We are actually wildly insufficient but are made whole. And this being a Christian song, a Christian singer, one- I - would expect that the chorus would end "make us holy", not "make us whole". But she sings it so simply. We are not about that, we are not even close to being enough to contemplate any sort of attainable life based in holiness. We are barely getting by. But the point is that we are not asking to be made perfect. We are asking to be made complete.

I can struggle, sure, to try to be star manager at my shop. I can wake up refreshed and excited for my day like I was yesterday, anxiously unable to sleep because I was so ready to make my day begin. Or my alarm will go off and I will pry open my eyes unwillingly, struggling to stay buoyant in the wake of frustrations and sadness at my inability to affect change. But the reality is- whether good or bad, I'm not really enough at any point on my own. I have to trust that my support, my strength will be supplemented so that I am able to go on when I'm running out.

City

I think I am finally starting to fall for Boston.

It is fitting, then, that this occurred to me on a day where the sky was Seattle grey, when the rubber soles of my new boots squeaked against the rain-coated sidewalks. It is not surprising that this fair city decided to win my heart by playing to what I know, what I love. It gave me rain and gloominess and I chose to walk home within it.

The new shop opens this week- I'm a mix of anticipation and dread. It is hands-down one of the most beautiful cafes I have stood within: high ceilings, newsprint wall-coverings, elegant shadowboxes of ancient typewriters, telephones, coffee grinders. The bar is crowned with a shiny new GB5 and a gallery of pristine siphons. It is a barista's paradise and we swoon.

But like many aspects of my life, I have a soft-spot for the clumsy, the handmade and awkward. I have never been one who felt that the image was more important than the heart, that a drink offered genuinely meant less if it was not topped with a perfect rosetta. I miss the pieced-together homeyness of the 'Den, in that things were haphazard and mismatched but cozy, inviting in a way stripped of all pretensions. I miss a shop so steeped in its community, and am just starting to see how I fit within the community I am now a part of.

So we prepare for a possible move to the new location with some sadness. I have strived to build something tangible out of my time at the shop, and feel in some ways I have succeeded. I have met some lovely people. I have poured some ridiculous drinks. I have dialed in the espresso on my opening mornings with Mountain Goats on the stereo and no one in the cafe, feeling invincible. I am blessed to spend the day in the trenches with yet another incredible staff. It is all these things and more that keep me here, even on the days when I ache to be home.

So, Boston, you have my attention. You are coaxing me to you and making me comfortable in your space. But every so often, I feel the need for familiarity and peace in what I know. So am given rain in my skies, like Noah's rainbow after the storm. A promise that we are lucky, and we are taken care of.

Chocolate Chip Cookies with Dried Apricots and Espresso
(Found on Orangette, who made them from a recipe from a little Seattle bakery called Macrina)

2¼ cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
¼ tsp salt
1¼ tsp finely ground espresso beans*
10 ounces good-quality semisweet chocolate chips, such as Ghirardelli
¾ cup unsulfured dried apricots, diced
8 ounces (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
¾ cup granulated sugar
¾ cup light brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 tsp pure vanilla extract

In a mixing bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt, espresso- whisking well until combined. Add in chocolate chips and apricots, tossing in the flour mixture until coated. This helps the sticky apricots not clump in the cookies.

Beat together butter and sugars in stand mixer (or by hand- if you have not that newfangled lifesaver called the KitchenAid) until pale and fluffy- approximately 5 minutes. Scrape sides of bowl with spatula, then add in eggs one at a time, integrating completely and scraping down bowl before adding the next. Add vanilla extract; mix.

Integrate flour in two stages, making sure to scrape sides and bottom of mixing bowl as the batter comes together quickly and leaves flour clumps on the hard-to-reach bottom portion of the bowl. Work quickly and don't overmix, as these cookies are best when the fluffy texture of the batter is retained.

Scrape bowl a final time to push all the batter to the bottom of the bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least an hour. I have made them as soon as possible, and after a day of the batter chilling in the fridge and they both come out well, though you get fatter doughier cookies after a day of rest.

After chilling, parchment-paper your cookie sheets and preheat oven to 350 degrees, with your rack in the center of your oven. Spoon out dough to bouncy-ball sized portions and roll before placing on sheet. If dough is fairly close to when it was put together, no need to compress balls at all before baking, although if dough is harder you may want to. Bake for 15 minutes or so, until the edges are slightly browned. Remove from sheet and move to cooling rack until they are cooled enough so as not to burn the tips of your fingers while you eat them. I recommend a solid cup of coffee to accompany.

Makes approximately 4-dozen smallish cookies.

*The original recipe called for 1/4 tsp espresso. I used, of course, the Herkimer Espresso Blend, and added a substantial portion more than the pitiful hint of coffee suggested. C'mon now.

Heart (Leaving Seattle)

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)

i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

Space

Quarter to one. The quiet is different. The sound of cars passing outside does not carry with it the roll of the highway or the speed of the busy neighborhood surrounding. We are out of the city, outside the familiar community and narrow potholed streets. We are back contained within walls we left so many years ago. It is foreign and too close, separate but comfortable, a guest at home. I left. I left the rhythm of my little Greenwood house because I had to. Because I couldn't stay and see things not change. I packed clothes into a messenger bag and shut the door behind me. I pulled together what I knew was mine and moved it out of those walls and into boxes taped shut and put into storage. Heart aching for unfinished conversations and things left to accomplish that no longer can happen in that space. I'm adjusting. But it is strange. I'm finding stability over breakfast with supportive friends, over cups of coffee at familiar shops, in bending over my kitchen-aid carefully sifting flour into butter or separating yolks in my palms.

Time Out

This change is infectuous, overwhelming and complicated. There are new beans in the hoppers, new bags on our shelves. We are beaming with excitement, the eagerness to demonstrate proficiency and confidence in our brewing coming out in every pour. We are tired but willing to push through because we can see the promise of where we are heading.

The sun is starting to draw itself out of the cloud cover. I can see the warmth building through the cafe windows as I nibble on my scone and sip the remnants of my latte. This is comfort, rest: me with my legs tucked up on the barstool reading, the cracking of the roaster, the tangible earthy sweetness of the latest batch of beans cooling.

It has been a crazy stressful couple of weeks, so much pressure and long hours. I have not given myself time to just sit and let my muscles unwind, so this morning is a welcome gift. Much like the loyalty of a staff. A comfortable dinner with a friend to laugh or talk through things. A day devoted to only pots de creme and clean socks and chasing a seven year old around a park on a sunny Sunday.


Blueberry Wollondi Pots de Creme

This pot de creme was inspired simply by a cup of Ethiopian Wollondi that tasted so fiercely like blueberries, I knew I had to incorporate it into a dessert. The coffee itself was so fragrant even from grinding, and upon tasting, the bright citrus came out as well.

The coffee flavor here was not that strong, and since you won't be able to get your hands on these specific beans now, another lighter-roasted fruity coffee (think African for the berry tones) would work. I followed Whisk-Kid's recipe and left out the chocolate, as I didn't want too many flavors competing and the blueberry to not be the central focus.
Geeky note: after further tasting and discussing, I am playing with other ways to incorporate the coffee flavor into the cream. Check back for updates as I tweak and play. :)

That said, this will not disappoint.

Coffee Pots de Creme

3 cups heavy cream
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 cup whole coffee beans

6 egg yolks
1/2 c sugar
3 tbls brewed coffee (or espresso- see geeky note)

Preheat your oven to 325 degrees F.

Combine cream, extract and coffee beans in heavy saucepan, and heat until simmering, letting the beans infuse into the cream. When heated, strain out beans using a mesh collander, and let the cream cool on the counter.

Whisk together egg yolks and sugar until light and fluffy in texture (about 3 min). Slowly temper the cream into the egg sugar mixture by adding a small bit at a time, whisking constantly so mixture will not curdle. Continue adding until cream is fully incorporated.

Stir in brewed coffee. (I brewed a slightly stronger cup through pour-over in my baby Hario, but the original recipe used espresso instead). Pour mixture into 8 6-oz ramikens (they will fill about half way- this is good!), and place the filled ramekins in a baking pan with an inch or two of warm water. Bake pots de creme in water bath for approximately 35 min. They will be jiggly in the center but mostly firm when they are done. They should cool about ten minutes in the pan before taking them out and letting them cool on the rack. Once cool enough, they should fully set in the fridge for at least two hours before serving.

Meanwhile... make the Blueberry reduction!

Blueberry-Lemon Sauce

2 cups blueberries, washed
1/3 c sugar
Zest of 1 lemon
1 tbl lemon juice
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Pour blueberries into saucepan, and using a potato masher, gently squish berries to release juices. Add sugar, lemon zest, juice and extract. On medium heat, bring blueberry sauce to a gentlt boil, stirring to keep berries from sticking to bottom of pan. When sauce begins to thicken, remove from heat and strain through fine mesh strainer (so you'd better have washed the one you used for the coffee beans, or you're going to have to do it now!). It may take a bit of coaxing with the back of a spoon to get all the juices out of the berries. The sauce will be a deep sparkly purple-blue. Put bowl of sauce in fridge to cool completely.

Once Pots de creme and sauce have cooled completely, spoon or pour a layer of blueberry sauce over the top of the custards. Evenly distribute sauce over all the ramekins. Sauce-topped custards will stay fresh covered in fridge for a couple days, though I dare say you will have a hard time making them last that long.

Soothe

For a recent goodbye party, a halting awkward sorrowful last day, I made poppyseed lime cupcakes, topped with a lime-zet buttercream and dark poppyseeds that crunched between your teeth. They were decent; my buttercream came together without issue and the cupcakes were squat little rounds buttery and slightly tangy with citrus. I wanted to be happier about how pretty they were- I mean, look, they are adorable with their polka-dotted top.


But my heart just wasn't in it. There is such deep joy in baking for me- in baking, giving, celebrating- and this, for my vast attempts to be joyful, was a struggle. I am not good with change.

I however was renewed in my next effort: Coconut Almond cupcakes for a friend's birthday the following week. They were dense and moist, with pockets of shredded coconut and nuggets of marzipan that had stubbornly refused to incorporate, and so became tiny treasures buried in coconut-milk batter. I swooned. I beamed. I felt all the heart and happiness lacking in the poppyseed cakes was imparted into these little guys. I resisted, with great restraint, eating them all myself.



Coconut-Almond Cupcakes

1 cup butter, room temp
2 c sugar
4 oz marzipan or sweetened almond paste

2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 tsp coconut extract

1 tsp salt
2 cups flour (the original recipe calls for cake flour)
1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 cup coconut milk

3 egg whites
1/2 cup shredded coconut

In a stand mixer, cream together butter and sugar. Add in marzipan/almond paste and mix until combined. Add in two whole eggs, and both vanilla and coconut extracts.

Sift together all dry ingredients. Add half of dry ingredients to batter, then 1/2 of coconut milk, scraping the bowl as you go, then put in remaining coconut milk and flour mixture.

Beat egg whites until fluffy and soft peaks and fold gently into mixed batter along with the shredded coconut.

Bake in cupcake tins for 15-20 minutes at 350 degrees, or until toothpick comes out clean.

Makes 18 cupcakes, plus two 4 1/2 inch springform cakes. :)


Almond Buttercream
5 egg whites
1 cup sugar
2 sticks butter, left to soften on counter for half-an-hour
1 tsp almond extract

Start water boiling in a pot for the bottom of a double boiler. In the meantime, combine egg whites and sugar, whisking together gently until combined. I usually do this in the bowl of my stand mixer. When water boils, bring back down to a simmer, then position bowl over simmering water (making sure water does not touch bottom of pan). Whisk egg/sugar mixture for a few moments over double boiler, until mixture rubbed between thumb and finger comes away smooth and warmed, not grainy. It should "ribbon" into bowl in thin strings when pulled out of mixture.

Remove bowl from stovetop and immediately put back on stand mixer base. Using the whisk attachment, beat egg/sugar mixture on high until it forms a stiff-peak meringue. While this is mixing, cut butter into 1/2 tablespoon-sized pieces.

When meringue has come together, turn mixer down to medium-low speed. Start adding butter cubes, pausing between each to let the cube integrate into meringue. After all butter is in, turn mixer back up to medium-high and beat until frosting comes together. It should happen fairly quickly after speed is increased. If after a few moments the frosting is still liquidy, pull bowl off mixer and put in freezer for about five minutes, then whip again.

Pipe or spread onto cooled cupcakes and top with toasted coconut flakes.

Ground

Caramel corn. I plunge my nose closer to the wide-mouthed pint jar and breathe. The Sulawesi smells like caramel corn.

The cafe is sparsely filled, students clustered over books and laptops, two girls at the high table pasting hearts and sparkles on homemade valentines. The mid shift has ended and Rachel has gone home. With a eyebrow raise, I throw out a subtle "soooo did you bring coffee?" which prompts Brady to pull three jam jars from his bag with a grin.

Freshly roasted, small batches in an airpopper. The beans are brightly cocoa, dry and fragrant. Eagerly (but subtley, not at all excited about this), I unscrew the tops.

Ten minutes later, we've assembled our spread. Three squat glasses with precisely-measured grounds, spoons, water glasses, spit cups. The water is heating and the timer is set. We wait.

It is with an odd mixture of enjoyment and awkwardness that we break through the crust of grounds and start slurping. The customers seem too busy with whatever they're immersed in to notice our loud "FTTTTTTT!" as we suck the coffee over our tongues and then spit it back out after a moment of savoring. The El Salvador is brightly citrusy; the Sulawesi herby, with a black tea bitterness that contrasts so brightly with the glorious Panama next to it that is overwhelmingly chocolate, dark berries, honey sweetness.

I am amazed at the quality and, frankly, deliciousness, of these coffees. It is bittersweet to me that we are not prouder of what we pour daily, what we sell, especially since the scope of coffee in general is so grand. When my husband and I started dating, our first date was (I'm ashamed to say) at a Seattle's Best. I think I chose a white chocolate something, drowning the espresso in frothy milk and sweetness. When I started at the shop eight years ago, my drink of choice was heavy with fat and syrup, again masking the boldness of the coffee I have grown to love purely for itself now.

I dip my spoon into the glass again and scoop off the top, then bring it to my lips to taste. I am met with a spicy bittersweetness that swirls gently around my mouth long after I swallow the last drop.


Panama: Chocolate-Cardamom Cupcakes with Honey-Cinnamon Buttercream

The cupcakes were made from this recipe, with 3/4 tsp of ground cardamom added to the batter.
The buttercream was made from this delicious recipe, with a generous squirt of honey, a couple shakes of cinnamon, and 1/2 tsp of vanilla bean paste.