Not that I need an excuse to spread it on extra thick or anything. Why, just this morning I had a nice slice of lightly toasted multi-grain bread slathered with 365 All Natural Creamy Peanut Butter and Hawaiian Sun Guava Jelly. Don’t you love the way peanut butter melts on warm toast, making you lick the corners of your mouth after biting into it? Mmmmmmm!
If I’m feeling extra naughty, I’ll forego the jelly and spread on some Nutella. Then there’s my peanut butter and apple mid-morning snack, the late afternoon Reese’s PB Cup or PB on celery pick-me-up. Sigh. I blame my addiction on my dad, who always seemed to be snacking on cocktail peanuts while I was growing up. Sound familiar?
Do you fancy a cream-filled lady lock, a rich chocolatey buckeye, a peanut butter blossom?
No need to toil in your kitchen beating butter, sugar, eggs, and flour into submission or raid your neighborhood bakery. Just invite yourself to a Pittsburgh wedding!
Those in-the-know will tell you that a well laden Cookie Table is absolutely de rigueur in the Steel City, where skyscrapers tickle the clouds and arched yellow bridges invite exciting adventures on both sides of the Allegheny, Ohio and Monongahela Rivers.
I’m happy to report that since I attended my first Pittsburgh wedding about two weeks ago, I am now officially in-the-know. Just call me “Crumbs.”
“Oh please take me fishing, oh please, pretty please,” insisted my sister the pest. She drives me bananas when she’s at her worst, she bugs me when she’s at her best.
She wouldn’t give up, so I’ve got her along, but I’ve not decided her fate. Maybe I’ll patiently teach her to fish — maybe I’ll use her for bait!
~ from A Pizza the Size of the Sun (Greenwillow Books, 1996).
* * *
Unlike the sister in Prelutsky’s poem, I was never a pest (*cough*), but the narrator sounds very familiar.
While my brother and Dad went fishing, I stayed home and played with my Ruthy doll and read Madeline’s Rescue. When it was time to take a picture of the day’s catch, I was only too happy to oblige. Even though I didn’t go fishing, this is still my favorite childhood picture. It hangs in our den and makes me very happy.
Newton and I spent a lot of time together growing up because we were latchkey kids. During the summer we rode our bicycles all over, bought fuzzy chicks at the carnival, tried to sell the macadamia nuts from my grandma’s tree, played marbles and ate hamburgers at Dairy Queen.
#16 in the Poetry Potluck Series, celebrating National Poetry Month 2012.
If you give a poet a cookie, she will eat it, learn to make more, and then grow up to write a poem about it that millions of people will hear on the radio.
I’m talking about Sondra Gash’s, “Rugelah, 5 a.m.,” of course, which Garrison Keillor read on The Writer’s Almanac back in August 2010. Sondra’s poem made me hungry to learn more about this popular Jewish confection, which is enjoyed year round and often called “cream cheese cookies” here in the U.S.
Rugelach dough is commonly rolled into a circle, then sliced into pie wedges which are then rolled up to form crescent shapes (via S. Filson).
Depending upon whom you talk to, the Yiddish term”rugelach,” can be translated as “royal,” “little twists,” or “horns.” The practice of combining cream cheese or sour cream with fruit, nuts, jams, and spices to make cookies, cakes and other pastries is a central European tradition with ancient Middle Eastern roots.
We have to thank Eastern European immigrants for bringing the first rugelach recipes to this country. According to Joan Nathan (JewishCooking in America), “There is no other Jewish sweet that has gone more mainstream than rugelach.” Though I have yet to bake any myself, thus far I’ve been unable to resist these rich, flaky little crescents whenever they appear on a holiday cookie tray or in a bakery window: raspberry jam and dark chocolate! marzipan and walnuts! cinnamon, poppy seeds, apricot preserves, raisins! A bite of history that stays with you forever.
Take another bite of this Apricot-Pecan-Raisin Rugelach. Yum! (via S. Filson)
Longtime readers of this blog know I’ve been a big Cakespy fan for the last three years. It’s been such fun (a decidedly
photo by Paul Hipple
delicious vicarious thrill) to follow Jessie’s ever-burgeoning career as an author, artist, “adventure” baker, gallery owner, savvy businesswoman and primo blogger.
As Head Spy of her very own Dessert Detective Agency, whose mission is “Seeking Sweetness in Everyday Life,” Jessie has proven that following one’s passions, working hard, consistently cultivating a positive outlook and transmitting mega-watt joy can reap sweet, sweet rewards.
Not that I need an excuse to spread it on extra thick or anything. Why, just this morning I had a nice slice of lightly toasted multi-grain bread slathered with 365 All Natural Creamy Peanut Butter and Hawaiian Sun Guava Jelly. Don’t you love the way peanut butter melts on warm toast, making you lick the corners of your mouth after biting into it? Mmmmmmm!
Jama's Alphabet Soup 