.."An apple, a pear, a plum and a cherry..."

I just love the ancient folk song, "A Soul Cake", I recently heard it sung by Sting on the radio. It made me want to "bake my brains out". So last Thursday and Friday, I did just that. Not the baked brains part, but, well, you know what I mean.

I was assigned to bring bread and salad to the family Christmas party on Saturday, so I decided to make "Gummy's Bread". I grew up in my maternal grandmother's kitchen watching her bake molasses bread and rolls often. One of my fondest memories of childhood is baking for something to do. We baked pies, cookies and made boiled fudge when we got bored. I still love to bake, but I discovered that, like anything else, you have to stay in practice for it to come out right.

I went to the local store for flour and nutmeg. A young woman behind the counter with a Santa hat on said, "Gonna do some baking?" I said, "Yes. I'm making my grandmother's bread." She asked, "Do you have a bread machine?" I said, "No. I do it the old-fashioned way with a mixing bowl and kneading dough." She exclaimed, "Oh wow." I thought, young people today, and smiled to myself.

Gummy's bread takes all day to make. There are two risings for two or more hours each time, and the kneading hurt my carpal tunnel right wrist. But the smell of yeast and molasses as I kneaded the dough brought me right back to Gummy's kitchen. I bought a couple of new Christmas CDs this year: Yo Yo Ma and Friends and one with a variety of contemporary women, like Beyonce, singing songs of the season. I also had some of my favorites queued up like Clay Aiken. I just love his "Mary's Baby Boy", and Sarah McLaughlin's, "River". My all time favorite is Emmylou Harris's, "Light of the Stable". There was another variety CD I bought at StarBucks a few years ago called, "Santa Baby". As I sang along to my favorite Christmas songs, I happily kneaded bread and smelled my memories wafting through my mind. It was such a calming and healing festive activity.

While the bread was rising, I began measuring brown sugar, flour, cinnamon and nutmeg to make the "Cranapple Walnut" cake recipe from Moosewood. It is my favorite cake recipe, and after making one for Larry and I to eat with coffee every morning, I made one for each of my siblings. I had leftover festive holiday, ceramic baking dishes that I made the cakes in and gave one to each of my siblings. It made me feel good to give them something, and reminded me once again, that in the future, I want to get back to making presents instead of buying them. Making homemade gifts is totally doable, it just requires some planning.

The problem with multi-tasking, is paying attention. While making sure the cake came out moist, I over cooked the bread. I wasn't used to making it in muffin pans, especially mini-muffins, so my lesson there was, "Don't use the time according to the recipe." Pay more attention, and bake it in shorter intervals. I still overbaked it, and the rolls came out dry. I made white rolls the second day, and they also were dry.

I was very embarrassed and disappointed by my efforts, although my family was very kind. Brother Jimmy was honest at my encouragement. He took a bite then trashed the rest. Sistah Margie said it was delicious and just needed butter. Niece Tricia exclaimed, "Why don't you let me taste it first before you discourage me from trying!" I couldn't help it. I slaved over this food, and didn't want to imagine whispers behind my back of how dry it was. I just wanted to fess up and declare my failure. But it wasn't a total failure. I loved making it, and some people ate it. That's good, right? The point is, we all enjoyed a good laugh and I had fun. Isn't that part of the "holiday season"? Merry Christmas and Happy Chanukah to all. Love and Peace.