Brushing Teeth and Stealing

Have you thought lately? Really, just sat or laid down with no other purpose than letting your mind wander? I haven't. I try not to let my mind wander these days. It is difficult to focus on your focus when your focus is thinking about recipes for whipped cream while your trying to switch lanes, eat an apple and sing along to Taylor Swift. You end up with apple on the steering wheel, warbling like a bird and getting stuck behind a car going 50 on the highway.

Last night while brushing my teeth, a task which is fairly thought-bankrupt, my mind was wandering. I was thinking about what I needed to write about. Not want, need. These are things that I've been mentally masticating, stuck in the depths of my mind like leafy greens in your teeth. Life will not and cannot continue until you get them out. While I should have been focused on battling periodontal disease, I was struck by the thought that I had left two blocks of tofu on the counter, just chilling, waiting for a marinade. It was 12:30. I was tired. What to do what to do? You guessed it. I 86ed the tooth wash and ran downstairs to save the tofu from its imminent death-non-death. I lathered those guys up with a tasty marinade and fridged'em. I could then sleep in peace with the mental-spinach -in-the-teeth removed.Whew. 

Aside from when I have actual things that I have forgotten about and need to address promptly, of late, my musings mostly relate to my recent stint at Flour. These three months were some of the most grueling, thought provoking and rewarding I have ever had. I met fantastic people- and that is not just limited to the day I chatted with Dorie Greenspan, spotted Bobby Flay or was lucky enough to converse with Ming Tsai. The prep cooks Baby Johna and Orlando always made me laugh, taught me Spanish (Adras- meaning behind-the perpetual cry of the kitchen) and jokingly scolded me for stealing bites of their roasted tofu. Chef Jeff and his effusiveness cheered me on my worst days.He regaled me with stories of his old mustangs, experiments with veganism and adoration of cooking with fresh ingredients. I'll never forget the day he brought Maine-grown carrots strung with ornaments of dirt, gleefully offering me a bite of freshness at its finest. It was the first afternoon I actually felt like I belonged.

But they and their stories will be later additions and editions.

I've sidebarred them in my mind and on paper. Sidebarring in our kitchen was and is life. You are sidebarred if you forget to clean a station, make a bogus batter, or send out a product that is just not up to par. When you still have your training wheels on, you may as well expect to be on the sidebar daily because there is always an aspect of your day with needs improvement. That is the left hand side of the sheet. The middle is the task list. Straightforward for me, considering I was responsible for the same production list everyday. The right side is where you noted what needed to be made. For me this was life and death. If I didn't have my cookie dough made, there would be nothing for me to bake. And if per chance someone took the back up cookie doughs in the walk-in fridge without telling me, then friends, I was a canoe with a hole in the middle of the Atlantic, simply and utterly screwed. So now I have adopted this method into my writing madness. The left side of my planning sheet is for articles I need to read, the center for things I have in the works currently, and the right is ideas for future stories. Sarah, my former boss and now perpetual source of inspiration, would be proud of my writing sidebar.

Mondays and Thursdays were my favorite days in the kitchen because there were more relazed than the frenetic hurry of the weekend and it was always tofu day. Orlando, one of the prep cooks, would take the marinating tofu out from the fridge and roast it, the smal little cubes adopting a deep tone of caramelized brown after their 40 minute stint in the convection oven. Although I attempted to be covert about my snacking, there was always a soy sauce outline of the tofu announcing the robbery.

The markings of my crime as obvious as this guy ^

Soy and Sesame Tofu

1 Package of Extra Firm Tofu

1 Cup of Reduced Sodium Tamari (for Gluten Free Version) or Soy Sauce

1 Tbsp of Wasabi

2 Tsp of Ground Ginger or you can grate fresh

¼ C Rice Wine Vinegar

1 Tbsp of Sesame Oil

1. Preheat Oven to 375 Degrees
2. Drain your Tofu from the packing liquid. Wrap that little guy in a towel or several paper towels and let him hang out under a book or a basket of bananas while you prep everything else
3. In a 9X11 Pyrex baking dish or large bowl, add all of the other ingredients. I start with the wet and add the dry at the end for sake of ease.
4. Whisk together, making sure to break up the wasabi in the marinade.
5. Slice your tofu into cubes or steak size depending on how you like to eat it. Although be forewarned that in cubes it inspires stealing bites from the pan
6. Put them in the oven for 40 minutes, stirring every 8-10 minutes so each side gets that amazingly crisp exterior
7. Try to stop yourself from eating as they cool. Or don't

The Hurricane

You know those times where everything in your life, seemingly unrelated, come together in one cosmically unexplainable marriage. It would be like only having peanut butter, root vegetables, wine, and maybe some lemons in your kitchen and you somehow make a wonderfully delicious Thai inspired dinner.

Most times it would be an epic failure.You would probably find yourself dipping carrot sticks into the peanut butter and maybe drinking tap water with lemon. Whole heartedly awkward, and unfulfilling. 

It seems as though all of the things that I am attempting to control in my life at the moment, working, training, coaching, cooking and just living could all be improved by one simple ingredient. Focus. Like the disparate ingredients mentioned above, everything in my life at the moment seems hodge podge. Sometimes running is going well, sometimes work is going well, sometimes I make it home on time and clean up the kitchen  after I cook (not often-sorry Mom). 

When I was about 4, so old enough to open my Christmas presents, I started a tradition. Not purposefully, but it started nonetheless. I would run downstairs, barely wait for my sisters and tear through my presents. One after another, I made it rain wrapping paper, barely looking at what exactly it was I was unwrapping. Hey- I was four, things were shiny, and I was excited- cut me some slack. I think around age 12, still continuing this blitzkrieg of unwrapping, my sister Deirdre dubbed me Hurricane Fiona, I left a swath of devastation everywhere I went.

I feel as though my life has been a little too much unwrapping bonanza-esque for my own good. I have been attacking various tasks with unbridled ferocity without actually paying attention to what I am doing. 

For example,  I cannot run a workout from 7-8:30, drive home immediately afterward, make dinner and be in bed by 11. No, I cannot remember cards for everyone's birthdays, work, volunteer and go out on a Friday night. I will end up eating peanut butter on your kitchen floor with carrots and maybe a turnip- unfulfilled and awkward. 

Something will give. It may just start with a few cracks here and there, a missed birthday, an allergy disguised as the flu, a fender bender, or an injury. Or in my case all of the above!

To cure this malady, I have to thank Flour for shaping my unfocused willy-nilly self, into a focus ninja. It's all about the mise- ie mise-en place. The french word that is ubiquitous in every kitchen means "everything in place." So get your act together before your act has to be together.

 I can't make my morning breakfast pizzas (brioche dough crust, creme fraiche, cheese and assorted toppings) without having every ingredient and tool I need, next to me. You want to have everything in place before attempting to accomplish a task- no distractions- 100% focus.

Bacon, Parm, Egg and Roasted Tomato Breakfast Pizza @ Flour

So my Achilles blowing up? I had warning signs that I ignored because I wasn't focused on running. Car accident circa a few months ago? Perhaps if I had focused on how tired I was, the gratuitous heat of my car and more sharply on the road, I wouldn't be in such a pickle and eaten the bumper of a Suburban in front of me. So now focusing on my focus- is my goal. Short bursts of intense focus on one particular task- like writing, like cooking and like training (more often not so short bursts- more like long extended efforts). 

So in the vein of managing your life-here's something short and simple that gets seemingly disparate ingredients to harmonize, a melody in your mouth so to speak. I recently used it with shaved carrots, minced roasted beet and lentils to make an unbelievably satisfying dinner post pool workout.

Spinach Basil "Pesto"

Makes 1 and a half cups, Refrigeration necessary

Tools

Spatula or scraping object

Food Processor

Cutting Board

Pan (for Toasting)

Ingredients

1.5-2 C fresh Basil

1 Heaping handful of Spinach

3 Cloves of Garlic

1 tbs of Salt (guideline- I usually go by pinches from my countertop salt bowl)

1 tsp of black pepper- By Choice

I cup of Roasted Cashews

Olive Oil

1. Find your food processor and get that guy ready for some action. Preheat oven to 325.

2.If you are roasting your own cashews, get those little guys toasting in the oven for about 15 minutes. Occasionally stir them to make sure for an even toasting. To check for doneness bite into one and it should snap pleasantly. Color will change from sandy to Necco wafer brown. (If you are buying pre-toasted nuts -skip this step.

2. Pop the top on your food processor and load it up with the greens, garlic and seasoning.

3. Process those guys into submission. You will have to stop and scrape down twice or three times to make sure you get everybody incorporated.

4. With the processor running, add oil to personal preference. I wanted my pesto to be a semi solid. So I added about a tbs. Others prefer theirs oilier.

5. Scrape, and place into your favorite tupperware or mason jar and use with vegetables, pastas, or meat as desired!

Banana Hugs

Do you ever feel like everything and nothing at the same time? Welcome to 24. That's what I have decided. In the past year two years, it seems like I have gone everywhere and nowhere. I'd apologize for sounding like a Dr. Seuss book, but I've also decided not to be sorry.

It has taken me far too long not to be sorry about not knowing what to do or where to go, but my shoes are now on my feet so to speak and I'm approaching the a starting line.

I've worked in art, I've worked with food, I've worked in kitchens and offices and in the middle noweheresville New Hampshire. I've written newsletters, emails, articles, presentations, tweets, speeches, labels, ingredient lists, orders and posts. No novel yet but its coming...one day.

I've been burned by pans, harangued, hit, hated, loved and liked. I've fit people for socks and shoes and races, cried crybaby tears and whined about places.

But I'm not sorry.

I can make granola by the pound, cookies by the hundred and run for miles. I can do more pull ups than most men and run in heels or even discuss the state of American painting or the Patriots, whichever you fancy.

So on days when my tray of sticky buns, studded with pecans and oozing with molten lava goo, crash onto the floor and the damage rivals the Valdez Oil Spill and I get a ticket at Harvard while volunteer coaching and I find out I'm allergic to wheat... I have to remind myself of all the above. (Insert All the Above by Maino here for a comic reprieve)

I don't know where you're at friends, but if you're having one of those days where you are everywhere and nowhere at once, sit down for 3 minutes and write yourself a list of things you can do well... and then bake.

Its accomplishment, its deliciousness and its healthful. What more can you ask for?

Banana Chocolate Chip Bread
Inspired by Babycakes Bakery

Makes Two Small Loaf Pans

1 Cup of Gluten Free All Purpose Flour (Bob's or Trader Joe's will work)
1 tsp Baking Powder
1 Tsp Baking Soda
1/2 Tsp Xanthan Gum
1 Tsp of Salt (I used Sea Salt)
1 tsp Ground Cinnamon
1 tsp All Spice
1 splash (2-3 second pour) of Vanilla Extract
1/4 C Coconut Oil (Liquified or semi-solid works)
1/3 C Agave nectar
1/3 Cup Almond Milk
3 Medium Bananas Roughly Mashed or 2 Medium Bananas and 1/4 C Unsweetened Applesauce

Preheat oven to 325. Step One Accomplished

Take your bananas and mash them separately. Do not completely liquify them. Leave some good and chunky pieces. Now put them aside for awhile. Don't be sad though, they make a reappearance in Act Three.

Whisk together Dry ingredients in a Medium Size Bowl. Think 3x by Cereal Bowl .
-Flour
-Baking Powder
-Baking Soda
- X-Gum (sounds so much cooler than xanthan gum)
-Salt
-Spices

Now, Add your wet ingredients. LOOK AT YOU GO
-Agave
-A.Milk
-C-Oil
-Vanilla

Stir this bad boy up until it is SMOOTH. That means the coconut oil bombs have disappeared. You have taken your whisk and dug down to the crater of the bowl where Flour mines are often buried. LEAVE NO CREVICE UNWHISKED.

Now Put the dirty whisk in the sink. Take a spatula or wooden spoon and Fold in the Bananas until its evenly mixed in. Resist the temptation to take your spatula and just spin it around the bowl a few times.

Remember the game hot hands? You put your hands on the bottom palms up, someone puts their palms on yours face down and you have to slap the living daylights out of their hands before they pull them away..? That flipping motion is what you should be doing with your spatula and bananas- but slower and with less intent to injure. Maybe that's my third grade demonic side coming through. But I digress.

At this point, I highly suggest adding dark chocolate chips, cacoa nibs, or dark chocolate chips. The banana and the chocolate are about as meant for each other as Sunny and Cher, Pb and J or Kanye and Kim.... 

Spray the loaf tins with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray (or C oil). These guys need roughly 30-35 minutes to bake. I turned mine 180 degrees after 17 minutes and checked for doneness starting at 30.

Doneness check method? Find yourself a toothpick and insert it in the cake. Clean? It's done. Besmirched with crumbs? Not so done.

It will be a toasty mahogany color when done. It should not look liquidy in the slightest at the top.

Now you've taken them out of the oven. Restrain the urge to dive right in for at least 20 minutes. All the banana-y goodness needs to set itself up in the pan. Run your knife all around the pan to loosen-er up. Cover the loaf pan with a dishtowel or plate and flip it, flip it good to remove the loaf from the pan.

Now you can set this little guy up on a cutting board or plate and slice it warm or if you can bear it, wait till its completely cool.

When you're done eating half the loaf...wrap it in plastic wrap and store at room temp. It will be okay for up to 4 days but I will be shocked if you don't inhale it before then.

Don't tell anyone its GF and vegan until after they eat it. They won't have a clue...or you can keep it our little secret.

 Finished Product? Banana Chocolate Hug