babes never die
holiday and post-holiday food, plus hopes for the new year
Isn’t it great how every year, by the end of it, has become a hellfire of trash and horrors, and every new year, in comparison, a beacon of hope and promise? I’m not even being sarcastic, I honestly love the way the human spirit is driven to reflect on things in this way and find renewed drive and vigour in the idea of a fresh start. Jeff and I are preparing to move later in January— I don’t think it’ll feel quite real until we have the keys to our new place in hand, but we’ve been in our current home almost seven years, and it will be a feat to face all the belongings and memories we’ve accumulated here in that time. Change is almost always hard, especially for someone like me, someone who is very grounded by routine and places and things that feel safe. Change, though, can also make you feel like a weight has been lifted, sometimes a weight you didn’t even realise you were carrying.
2023 was, creatively, pretty spectacular for me— I wrote a ton, and Jeff and I played a great set of songs with some great musicians at Chris & Ed’s New Year’s Eve party— and I’m hoping I can keep that energy going in 2024. In other ways, though, the past year was incredibly difficult. To keep taking hit after hit while watching the ways in which society continues to fail its people— as those in power do nothing to stop the genocide of Palestinians or the drastic effects of climate change, as basic human rights of sustenance and shelter become less and less accessible, as so many are willing to step on the face of someone in need if it gets them a little closer to their own goals— often made me feel like giving up. But I continue to believe that most of us want to do good. This is something I love about Star Trek: that it constantly reminds us of the idea that goodness isn’t something inherent inside you, it isn’t a thing that you are; it’s something you choose to do. And that it isn’t always clear what is the good choice, and sometimes it feels easier to choose the less good thing, but that the ability to do so is part of what makes us human.
It sounds so corny, but doing good truly is its own reward: it feels good to help people. It feels good to do something where you get nothing out of it except the knowledge that you did something for someone else. The way our world has tried to shape us into these individualistic tools for capitalism to exploit has driven us to types of loneliness we can hardly understand. Finding community in a society that works to isolate us from each other is more difficult than ever, and all the more rewarding when we do manage to find it.
This year I hope to be able to better recognise what it looks like to do good for myself and others. ‘Self-care’ doesn’t have to mean skipping an event because it feels more comfortable to stay home and do a face mask and watch tv— sometimes it means going to the event even when it feels hard, and finding healing in being around others. Sometimes it means forgiving myself when I break a routine, and other times it means choosing to break back into a routine when I’ve lost it. And sometimes it means doing something simply to bring joy or relief to someone else. In 2024, may we all find a little more joy and a little more relief.
As I mentioned in a previous newsletter, my mom, who is usually the champion of our family holiday celebrations, is still recovering from one broken ankle and one sprained one, so Jeff and I took over much of the Christmas baking and cooking since she still can’t spend a lot of time on her ‘good’ foot. The two of us made six different baked goods: my lavender snickerdoodles and ginger-molasses cookies and Jeff’s zimtsterne were givens, but we also made chocolate-peppermint crinkles (there’s a vegan version here which I’ve made before), Eric Kim’s gochujang caramel cookies, and shortbread with Drambuie glaze. The peppermint crinkles came out great, because I followed the tip of rolling the balls in granulated sugar before rolling them in icing sugar, which helps the powder not melt into the cookies so that you end up with a more stark black-and-white effect.
The shortbread was Jeff’s idea, after bringing home from his dad’s trailer a bottle of Drambuie in a paper bag by accident, thinking it was a (much more useful) bottle of Maker’s Mark. We used a dough recipe that has more cornstarch in it, which gives you a softer shortbread— this basic recipe has lots of variations for different types. To bake, we ended up pressing it into a square pan rather than rolling and cutting it since they’d be easier to glaze that way. The glaze was pretty powerful on its own— the flavour of Drambuie is intense, which is why we’re looking for ways to use it that don’t necessarily involve having to drink it— but it was actually really mellow and tasty in combination with the shortbread. We’ll probably make it again next year. My mom made her usual lemon bars and shortbread with sprinkles, as well as some brownies using a Ghirardelli mix from Winners (usually she makes them from scratch, but needs must, and they were perfectly tasty).
Christmas Eve we always have dinner with Jeff’s side of the family. They are Swiss, so that is the day to celebrate for them, and I can definitely get behind important traditions such as eating a lot of cheese and chocolate. We do raclette for dinner, which is a little like fondue but better in my opinion because you get to cook miniature little meals for yourself on the hot plate, so it’s sort of more like hot charcuterie? Or a grilled cheese sans sandwich? And potatoes are involved? Anyway, it’s a beautiful thing. For the vegans and lactose-intolerant, we’ve found Chao cheese works well and has a pretty good flavour.
On Christmas Day with my family after exchanging gifts, we had a good, easy brunch with lots of options: yogurt and granola and fruit, scrambled eggs, bacon, english muffins and bagels, cream cheese and lox with dill and capers. And mimosas with a choice of grapefruit, cranberry, or orange juice with or without pulp (personally I consider pulpless orange juice an affront to the gods, but you do you).
Jeff and I made the turkey the same way we do at Thanksgiving, unstuffed and with lemon-dijon herb butter under the skin, maple glaze and bacon on top. And because there was so much else to do, I didn’t get fancy with the brussels sprouts like I have in the past, we just roasted them with fresh thyme and served them with a warm pancetta vinaigrette I’d made the day before using the recipe in Six Seasons. They were really good; it’s nice to have a little more acidity alongside the savouriness of mashed potatoes and stuffing and gravy. The turkey was ready earlier than expected and the stuffing later, but what’s a holiday dinner if parts of it aren’t cold by the time you actually sit down to eat?
I was smart this year and put more than half our leftover baking in the freezer when we got home, so that it wouldn’t have a chance to get stale or for us to get sick of it. We also got sent home with a full packet of cured meats leftover from our mid-afternoon lunch (my mom doesn’t eat meat and my stepdad can’t have too much salt) and a few chunks of cheese. Most of our post-holiday foods, then, have involved trying to use those things up— little charcuterie plates when I was home alone for lunch, grilled cheeses alongside soups from the freezer (roasted tomato and curried carrot, so far), sandwiches with crunchy pickles and lettuce and red onion, a half-assed carbonara with tiny pieces of prosciutto.
We made pizza the day after New Year’s, a Tuesday rather than the usual Friday pizza night, which really messed with our heads— we forgot we were out of fresh mozza. Normally we buy this from Costco and cut it into pieces large enough to cover two pizzas, then freeze them, but we’d used the last one up before Christmas. So we got a little creative, using a pepper-crusted fontina on one with hot salami and mushrooms and olives, and goat feta and pecorino on one with kale, prosciutto, and roasted red pepper. Both got the seal of approval.
We had egg yolks to use up after the zimtsterne, so I made a variation of this tart, something that’s been a staple of my repertoire for a few years, but which I haven’t cooked in a little while. It’s pretty versatile if you want to use onion or shallot rather than leek, or another green instead of chard. I’ve added mushrooms or cheese to it as well and it’s always held up and tasted great. I use oat milk instead of cream more often than not, too; it just needs a few extra minutes in the second half of the cook time so that it’s not too soft. Sometimes I turn the broiler on for a minute if it still looks a little soggy in the centre.
This time, in my endeavour to use up some cold cuts, I put a few slices of prosciutto-salami on top, and they got nicely brown and a little crisp at the edges. But this is also just a really great veggie quiche to share the plate with a green salad, which is how we usually eat it. I’m not the kind of person who believes we need to feel ‘guilty’ about the pleasures of holiday food, but there is something in your body that will often crave crisp greens and vegetable-filled soups after a lot of rich things, and I am always glad to give in to those desires as well.
Thanks for reading— if you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with someone new! I like providing this to you for free, but it does still involve time and effort, so donations for cookbooks or future treats (or to support moving costs 😓) are much appreciated. Anyway, according to the sacred texts (Star Trek), there is lots to look forward to this year! ✊