Annual Hoska-thon

Dec . 9, 2006. An all-day hoska-baking session with my dear friend, Valerie.


Valbo arrives!


Before coffee....

Measuring, scalding the milk, melting the butter....


The bread bowl goes back for at least four generations in my maternal family.



Behold, the miracle and magick of the yeast!



After coffee.... (Maybe coffee is to tired women as yeast is to deflated bread dough?)


Adding flour....



Ernie seemed unimpressed. But can this position really be comfortable?


Eggnog-- nothing like a bit of energy mid-way!


After a lot of kneading, the first batch of dough was ready to rise. We used my office as our rising room, thanks to the toasty wee electric 'fireplace' in the corner.




During the first rising, we dashed to Albertsons for eggs and a couple of extra lemons-- a quick jaunt. Little did we know it would be the first of three store trips we'd make that day.

By the time we put the dough down for a second rising, we'd realized that we didn't have any candied pineapple. Horrors! This time, we headed to Sheridan . Could we have gotten away without using pineapple to decorate the loaves? Nope. Mom would have noticed. It was fun, though. Sheridan is this really amazing greengrocer on Portland's industrial east side. Lots of wonderful produce, artisan cheeses, imports, good wine, etc.





On the way home, we picked up a Papa Murphy's pizza for lunch.

The risen dough was punched down and shaped into loaves. You start with "ropes," and braid these to form the main loaf. Smaller braids top the larger ones.



The loaves are decorated with nuts and fruit, brushed with an egg wash, and sprinkled with poppyseed.




Pizza break.... Funny that Ernie work up right about then.



We made four batches, so repeated the whole process four times!


When the loaves came out, they got a nice brush with melted butter and a rest under a clean towel.

We had to return to the store for a third time, when we realized we needed plastic bags and a couple of other things. By then it was very dark outside.




Those of you who know me won't be surprised at all by knowing that I always put up holiday lights inside of 'Xena, Warrior Car.'


Here are some of the fnished loaves-- we made 4 batches, or 16 loaves.


And of course we had to have a sample.


Valerie's Bill brought Thai take-out. My Bill poured eggnog all around.



Bye, Valbo. See you next year....


For those of you who survived this photo essay and might be interested, here's the recipe.

Hoska

2 C. milk
1/2 C. sugar
2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. grated fresh lemon zest (peel)
1/2 tsp. mace
1/2 C. warm water (110-115°)
2 packages fresh dry yeast
1/2 C. unsalted butter
1/2 C. cold water
4 eggs, well beaten (reserve 1 T. for glaze)
1 T. fresh lemon juice
1 C. raisins and currants
1 C. chopped, peeled almonds
10+ C. flour (all-purpose, bread flour, or a combination of both)
Candied pineapple (green) and candied cherries (green and red), for garnish
Whole almonds, peels removed, for garnish
Poppy seed, for garnish

Scald the milk. (Do this first and it will scald and begin to cool while you get other items ready.)

Combine sugar, salt, lemon peel, and mace in a very large bowl and set aside.

Dissolve the yeast in the warm water, stirring thoroughly. Set aside.

Add the butter to the scalded milk. Stir until melted. Add this mixture to the sugar-salt mixture. Stir well. Add the 1/2 C. cold water and stir again.

When this mixture has cooled to below 115°, add the yeast mixture, eggs, and lemon juice. Stir well.

Begin adding flour, 1 cup at a time. Stir in with a wooden spoon. After 6 C. of flour have been incorporated, add the raisins and chopped almonds.

You’ll likely use at least 10 cups of flour, but don’t be afraid to use a bit more or less—aim for a dough that remains sticky enough to almost—but not quite—stick to the surface as it is kneaded. After all the flour has been added, turn the dough out and knead for 5-10 minutes. You may actually have to “knead in” the last cup or two if stirring becomes too difficult. The end-point for kneading is when the dough is satiny, barely "tacky" to the touch, and blistery.

Place the dough in a clean, oiled bowl, turning the dough so that all sides are oiled. Cover with waxed paper and then with a clean towel. Leave to rise in a warm room until doubled*, 1 1/2-2 hours.

When doubled, punch down** and let rise again for about 45 minutes, until close to redoubled.

Divide the dough into four portions. Each of these will make 1 loaf of bread. Cover portions 2-4 with a towel so they won't dry out.

Divide portion 1 into fourths—we’ll call these A, B, C, and D. Set D aside covered with a towel—this will become the small braid that sits atop the loaf.

Roll and shape A-C into three "ropes" of the same length (12-16" long). Braid these, squeezing the ends together so they won't spring apart when the dough rises. This will form the large braid that makes up the bottom of the loaf. (Note: if you aren’t happy with your braid, start over! Bread dough is very forgiving!)

Take portion D and divide it into three pieces. Form each piece into three “ropes” of the same length (about about 12”) and braid them into a small braid Arrange this braid atop the larger one. You should now have a finished load that looks like a big, plump braid topped by a very small decorative braid.

Repeat with the reserved dough (portions 2-4). In the end you will have four finished loaves.

Place each loaf (as you make it) on a lightly greased cookie sheet. Decorate by pushing almonds and candied fruit into the "holes" in and between the braids. Be liberal with the decorations—they will make the loaves festive. Push the almonds and fruit deeply into the dough, so that they don’t “pop out” as it rises; however, be careful not to crush the braids.

Brush the finished loaves with the reserved beaten egg*** (thinned with a dab of water) and sprinkle lightly with poppy seed.

Cover loaves with waxed paper and towels and leave in a warm place to rise until they appear doubled (don't stick your fingers in to test!).

Bake at 325° for 40-50 minutes. Turn cookie sheets around once, midway through the baking. Check at the 35 minute mark—if already a dark golden, cover loosely with a shield of foil to prevent over-browning.

The loaves are done when they are a deep golden and smell heavenly. If you lift one and thump with your finger on the bottom of the loaf, it should sound hollow.

Notes:
Hoska stores at room temp for at least a week, and also freezes well.

* To test, poke two fingers deeply into the dough. If the dough has doubled, two deep holes will remain.

**To punch down, literally punch and hit the dough with your fists, driving out all of the air and air bubbles (which is exactly the point--this is how out pioneer forebearers took out their frustrations!). You can also pick it up and slam it down on a countertop.

***The egg yolk wash gives the bread its golden color. Make sure to spread it over every nook and cranny for a uniform glaze.

Right knee, two days postop

It's been 25 hours since surgery, and here's the result.... Still swollen (I mean, come on. It's only been 25 hours! Have someone whittle on your knee and see how good it looks the next day!), and still yellow (thanks to some seemingly indelible Betadine that didn't come off in this morning's shower). But overall, I am doing great. Minimal pain-- probably less than I had preop. Slept very well last night. I'm up and walking today (full weight-bearing is encouraged) but am spending most of my time on the couch, with the knee elevated and packed in ice, and will be doing so until Monday. The eight-sided steristrips cover the three suture sets (one for each arthroscopic entry port). PT starts Tuesday.

It is alive.

Surgery went well. Two meniscial tears-- lateral and medial. All fixed now.... Must sleep.... Enjoy weird photo-- odd perspective making my leg look bigger than the rest of me.

A Dickens of a Story....

Those who know me know that one of the things I do every Yule is read Dickens' A Christmas Carol. Something about it feels just right admidst December's cold dark nights. Especially if you read it by the fire, sipping a cup of cocoa. Ahhh.....

And by the way-- it's available on line, in its entirety.

Anyway, in today's Portland Oregonian was a piece by storyteller Garrison Keillor-- a wonderfully funny take on the Dickens story. I've pasted it below. Enjoy!

-----

I've a Dickens of a story to tell

By Garrison Keillor

(From the AP Wire)

And so Mr. Scrooge kept Christmas in his heart and made his clerk Bob Cratchit a partner and found an orthopedic surgeon who fixed Tiny Tim's gimpy leg.

Scrooge was a friend and benefactor to all and he also got his hair and eyebrows trimmed and bought a new suit, a blue pinstripe. People called him Ben. When he died, the entire city mourned.

The firm of Scrooge & Cratchit became ScratchitInc, and it got out of the countinghouse business and into condominiums. Old blacking factories and woolen mills and foundries were converted to luxury apartments with wood-burning fireplaces, eat-in kitchens with marble countertops, and hot tubs on the balconies.

Vast gritty industrial sections along the river were made over, with ethnic restaurants and health clubs with acres of treadmills - and Bob Cratchit, or R.W. Cratchit, was in the forefront of it all.

Tiny Tim was no longer good as gold. He'd become a hulking lummox and shaved his head and gotten a spider web tattoo all around his neck. He was now called Spike. His band, the Demented Beggars, recorded songs like ''Go Take a Pill'' and ''God Help You, Everyone.''

The other Cratchit children, Peter and Belinda and Martha, were employed: Peter in product resourcing, Belinda in process imaging, Martha in production processing, but they were - how should one say it? - rather stupid.

This can happen when you spend eight hours a day staring at a screen. Your brain turns to bran flakes. And for Christmas, they all went to the beach and lay in the sun.

R.W. got awfully depressed on Christmas Eve.

They lived in a penthouse atop the old barrel factory and there, late at night, brooding (despite his anti-brooding medication, Welloft), R.W. saw the ghost of Scrooge. He was with his old partner, Jacob, helping him carry a load of chains. Scrooge looked terrific.

''You'll be visited by three spirits,'' he said. ''You know the drill. Just do what they say and you'll be fine.''

And then at midnight, a spirit appeared. Not the jovial spirit with the crown of candles or the fatherly one in the long white cassock, but the spook in the hangman's hood, with the long bony fingers - everybody pays attention when he comes to talk to you.

(The jovial spirit had gone to a party at Fezziwig's and danced a jig and his hair caught on fire. The fatherly spirit had taken a wrong turn and gone to Spike's room, who sprang out of bed and reinjured his leg.)

The hangman told Mr. Cratchit that the condominium market was heading south and that ScratchitInc stock was headed for the toilet.

''What can I do?'' whimpered R.W.

''Not much. You're in hock up to your frammis,'' said the spirit. ''Try Chapter 11.''

R.W. waited for hours for the other two spirits and then went to sleep. When he awoke, it was Christmas. A fat lumpy stocking was plopped in a chair. A note said, ''Bob.'' It had licorice in it, and a rubber ball, a puzzle, a book and a big Christmas orange.

It was a proper large navel orange with thick skin, fresh, fragrant, and the smell brought back all the jolly Christmases Past when they played whist and laughed and the bubble lights twinkled and the radio played carols.

Grief and misery tend to be amorphous and make everything taste bitter, but small things, such as a well-turned sentence, the chorus of a song, a cup of peppermint tea, Jane Austen, an orange, have some power to break the spell.

The injured Spike took the visitation as a sign from the Lord that he should become a Christian pop singer. He took back the name Tiny Tim, acquired a sturdy crutch and a passable Cockney accent, wrote 10 rather similar songs that all said, ''God, you made me a shining star and rich and famous, and hey, thanks,'' and he toured the country doing sold-out shows in hockey arenas to ecstatic teenagers, but that's his problem, not yours or mine.

Let me get us an orange and we can split it. If you want to sing ''Silent Night,'' I'll sing with you.


GARRISON KEILLOR can be heard Saturday nights on public radio.

Yummy cookies!

I’m driving over to see my mom tomorrow, and as a treat, decided to make a small batch of cookies for her. Our family does a lot of baking at the winter holiday season—this is one of our favorite recipes.

It’s an unusual cookie in that there are no eggs, which make sit a good one for people who are sensitive or allergic to eggs. You can also eat the raw dough with no worries about salmonella!

It’s also an all-butter cookie, so no evil trans fats. Best of all, the bright flavors of orange and cranberry and the chewiness created by the coconut make it perfect for the winter.

Enjoy!

-----

Coconut-cranberry chews

(Originally printed in Sunset magazine, Dec. 2001; credited to Nancy Jamison of Woodside, CA.)

Ingredients:

1 ½ C. (3 cubes) butter (preferably unsalted)
2 C. sugar
1 T. freshly grated orange peel
2 tsp. vanilla
3 ¼ C. all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. salt
1 ½ C. sweetened flaked dried coconut
1 ½ C. dried cranberries (e.g., Ocean Spray “Craisins”)

In a large bowl, with a mixer on medium speed, blend butter, sugar, orange peel, and vanilla until smooth and slightly fluffy.

Add flour, baking powder, and salt to mixture. Beat on low speed until dough comes together into a smooth mass—about 5 minutes. Important: the dough must form a mass. If still crumbly, beat it longer until it comes together.

Stir in coconut and cranberries.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Form dough into 1-inch balls. Place on lightly buttered or cooking sprayed baking sheet. Flatten balls slightly with the bottom of a glass (they will flatten a little more as they cook).

Bake for 8-11 minutes, just until they begin to show a bit of golden color around the edges.

Cool on a wire rack.

Note: you can frost these, if desired, with a mixture of 2C. powdered sugar, a bit of fresh orange peel, and with orange juice added to create the desired texture (around 1 ½ T.); however, this isn’t necessary. I prefer them plain.

Makes 6 dozen. Store in tight containers at room temperature.

Finals Week

Not much to write about, but rest assured that I am alive. On the action item list right now....

FINALS WEEK. Big seminar paper due no later than Thursday. I'm hoping for sooner.

Bunged up knee-- MRI tomorrow. Like I can afford it.

Holidays coming! Hoska-baking next Saturday with Valbo. (See December 05 archives)

Need to go see Mom, but the doc has had me housebound and off the knee until the MRI.

Gargoyles galleys should be coming any time now! When those come, everything else will be dropped so that I can attend to the proofreading.

Cute poodle picture above. He was almost killed by a pancake today, but survived.

P.S. Mark your calendars now for 10 pm on Dec. 13-- the Janice Dickinson Christmas Special!

Thanksgiving Two: The Gamminator

Bill and I drove over on Thursday, Nov. 24, for a turkey day celebration with Mom and Joe.

While I cooked, and Bill made a last minute run to the store, Joe vacuumed and tidied up. We got out some of Mom's 'Spode' dishes for the meal.

Gussie watched.


Joe took the Grape to fetch Mom.

Trying out the new front ramp. (Joe almost dumped her out on the first try!)


Joe poured champagne to celebrate the occasion.


The feast! (Turkey, sausage stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, mashed sweet potatoes with a sugared pecan crunchy topping, rolls, fresh cranberry sauce, olives, and cranberry salad.) (And pumpkin pie with heavy cream for dessert.)

The diners....


Even Gussie had a plate of turkey.


Happy turkey, everyone!

A lovely garnish for your turkey....

As if the world isn't weird enough... and just in time for the holiday gift-buying season... comes a wonderful new gift: The Dr. Laura talking action figure!

You, too, can buy one for your misogynistic, judgmental, women’s rights-hating, homophobic, holier-than-thou friends—it’ll be the best gift they ever received!

The website is suspiciously silent on where the profits for these dolls will end up. This is odd, as in the past, the good "doctor" (in physiology-- not psychology!) has been most vocal about her funds ending up supporting abstinence education or other right-wing conservative causes.

Anyway, I suggest you use the doll to stuff your turkey. Stuff it right up the turkey's... Well, you know. Kind of unfair to the turkey, though.

Happy Turkey Day!

Or as my Spanish teacher taught us, "El dia del massacre del pavo!" (pavo = turkey)

More later, but see above for the picture of our early family celebration on 11-19. L-R: Erin, Ernie, me, Bill, Scott, Rebecca, and Pookie Moose.

Stay tuned for more photos....

Toasty warm

Bill got me a really neat early Yule gift the other day: a portable heater that looks like a little fireplace. It's very cute and also a very effective heater, and it heats for only pennies. We put it in the corner of my home office; I spend most evenings in there, working, and this will keep the room snug.

I moved Ernie's dog bed over in front of it, and... well, you can see the results.

I drove over to see Mom today. Not much to report-- she's having some pain relief from the Celebrex. However her therapy has been slowed up by her problems with atrial fibrillation. She wore a portable cardiac monitor/recorder for two days, and Joe is now waiting to hear from the doc re: the results. She may need a pacemaker to stabilize her heart. Stay tuned on that. Anyway, it was good to see here-- she was cheery, although tired. Joe seems to be hanging in, too.

Weather watching

It's a helluva day at sea, sir! (Trivia buffs... name that film!)

In the last week or so, we've had something like 8 inches of rain here in Portland. In the last two days, we had a windstorm (gust to 70+ mph) and more rain; the same storms are dumping feet of snow in the Cascades. It's a mess-- flooding, trees, down, power outtages, roads washed out. Hwy 35 on Mt. Hood lost 23 miles (!) of roadway, completely cutting off the Mt.Hood Meadows ski area from humanity; repairs will cause many millions and will take many months (interestingly, said ski area continues to sell season passes. Hmmm....) The gorge is on landslide watch, and the old highway is closed.

Milwaukie is only 39 feet above sea level, so flooding always gets my attention. But thanks to the French drain bill installed aorund the foundation we've stayed snuggly dry. Yay!

Anyway, I've stayed close to home. Was going to go see Mom yesterday, but didn't think it was wide in terms of the multi-dimensional horrible weather.

That's the report. Boring, I know.

Another interesting few days.

Nov. 2: Went to the Schnitzer to see Stephen King, in one of his very rare public appearances and readings—this one a benefit for Literary Arts in Portland. It was everything I hoped for, and more. He’s one creepy guy—and funny, too. He walked on stage in a black T-shirt and blue jeans, hair sticking up all mohawkish, and then started saying how he didn’t want to scare us, but he hoped we’d remembered to lock our cars before coming into the concert hall, and that when we went back to our cars, he hoped we checked the back seat before we got in. Because insurance statistics say that one in twenty people forget to lock their cars. And sometimes crazy psychopaths hide on the floor in the back seat. And sometimes they have knives.

Nov. 4: Chris Anderson’s funeral. Our family knows Chris (and family) through a combination of the Milwaukie community, school, Boy Scouts, and his photography studio. Chris took all of my kids’ senior pictures, and a month ago handled the photography for Lora (Spencer) Reilly’s wedding. We camped together on many a Boy Scout family trip, and bumped elbows at school, and he and his wife Debbie gave Katie her very first job—a receptionist position at their photography studio. Chris was one of those people who has a truly kind, sweet spirit, who seemed to delight in people, and who made you feel a little easier just because he was there. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer almost a year ago, and given a couple of months to live. He lived almost a year. Toward the end, he stopped the chemo and spent his remaining time fishing and just being with his family. The love of the Milwaukie community for this man was shown in the hundreds of people who attended his funeral, spilling out of the church and into the reception halls, where cameras with video feed had been set up for those who couldn’t fit into the sanctuary. You couldn’t find a parking place in downtown Milwaukie. It was something. The world was better for this man having been here. I can’t imagine the sadness of his family. I am glad I was able to know him.

Nov. 5-6: I went to Redmond to see Mom. She’s in what Joe and I call “The Home” right now. It’s kind of nursing homey, but really pretty decent. They are keeping her clean and shiny, and she’s having regular rehab. But the rooms are small, it’s noisy, the food is so-so, etc. Joe is starting the process to get her moved home as soon as he can. This will mean arranging in-home care for several hours each day, bringing in therapists, etc. Also making some modifications—he’s already installed a wheelchair ramp outside the front door. The shower needs modification, the bathrooms need grab bars, the bed needs lowering, etc.

Mom looked stronger and more Mom-ish when I was there. No huge jumps in her overall status, but her speech is better and she’s able to reply more intentionally to conversation, which is great. She seems cheerful about being where she is, which is good, and seems more aware of the world.

Today, Nov. 7: It’s raining here in Portland. I mean, really RAINING. We’ve had 5.5 inches in the last two days and are supposed to have another 1.5 inches today. See the picture below, taken in Tillamook, where they’ve had almost 9 inches in the last day and a half. Everything is flooding. And it’s really warm out, too. In the 60s. And dark. And windy. Thanks to Bill’s fine ditch-digging last summer, and his extension of our French drain, our basement is (knock on wood) still dry. Cross fingers….