(VEGAN) BURGER BUNS

November 2, 2020 Posie Brien

Baking is so obedient. So reliably consistent —you add a tablespoon of yeast to your dough, and it rises. Slowly and imperceptibly at first, sure, but then you turn around and it’s doubled into a pillowy soft mound. Magic! So close at hand!

(Unless, of course, your yeast is no good or your water is too hot or you add too much flour or something unexpected goes awry and your dough doesn’t rise. And then you have to fight the urge to crumble to the floor of the kitchen and quietly moan things like “is nothing sacred?” and “god I need some warm carbs” and “I’d like to divorce 2020 and have a torrid affair with 2018”.)

SPICED PEAR BREAD

October 24, 2020 Posie Brien

Actor Hugh Laurie (yes, he of the sardonic British wit and House acting fame, although I know and love him best for his role in Jeeves and Wooster) apparently put out a blues album a few years ago. Who knew he had such versatility?! We all contain multitudes, as it turns out. Upon being asked why he went out on such a limb, career-wise, he said this: “It’s a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until you’re ready. I have this feeling now that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There is almost no such thing as ready. There is only now. And you may as well do it now. Generally speaking, now is as good a time as any.”

TAHINI FRANGIPANE BABKA

October 8, 2020 Posie Brien

While we’re on the subject of extremely lovely things (we were, weren't we?), I’ve long been collecting a list of words that are too beautiful not to say or write over and over again, and here are some for you. Celestial, cotton, sultry, papaya, crisp, freesia, eclectic, marigold, smoky, lush, vellichor, effervescent, delicacy, frangipane. (More on that last one below.)

We can’t talk about gorgeous words without poetry, really, unless we’re talking about someone turning to you to say “I love you” for the first time. Or the fiftieth time. Or a two-year-old’s babbling, bubbly speech, their words tripping over giggles. Or the lyrics of Nathaniel Rafeliff’s “Time Stands” as he belts out the song to a completely empty Red Rocks Amphitheater. Or the product page of McConnell’s Fine Ice Cream limited releases: central Coast wildflower honey from the hives at San Marcos Farms stirred in rich, sweet cream then studded with chunks of our housemade sweet & salty cornbread cookies. Or Timothy Liu’s poem “The Lovers”:

VANILLA CRÈME FRAÎCHE BANANA BREAD

September 29, 2020 Posie Brien

At my first job out of college, a guy on my team used to eat the exact same lunch every single day. (Okay technically it was my second job—but the real first lasted a whopping 5 days that flew by in a whirl of tailored pencil skirts with stilettos, mergers & acquisitions trainings, mind-numbing Excel spreadsheet manipulation, Seamless-ordered dinners with beers enjoyed in an airless cubicle, and deeply existential misery as to my life’s path: a story for another time!)

SAVORY BLACK SESAME + CHEESE BABKA

September 26, 2020 Posie Brien

There’s a particular, specific delight in finding pleasure in unexpected places. When I was 13, I spent a month in Europe with my grandparents and my little sister, who was 11 and wretchedly homesick at the time. The evenings were the hardest for her, as they tend to be (isn’t it always when dusk falls when we feel the most woebegone when we’re sick or sad or down?).

Eating and adventuring.

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