woodsmoke | gingerbread bundt cake

I started this post a few days ago, well before Christmas Eve. In a quiet, dimly lit area of a fairly empty terminal in Amsterdam Airport. Before the boarding crush I could find a seat on tired, cracking vinyl, by the floor to ceiling windows that looked over the runways. The fields and the tarmac were dark, the bodies of planes loomed in gray shadow, brooding and immobile. Like the darkest clouds of a winter sky on the coldest days when rain would fall as snow, casting deep shadows, swallowing the moonlight. 

I wasn’t at a window seat but when the plane, enlivened in flight, dipped its wing, Amsterdam played out in lights far below us. The warm golds from street lights, the cheery red blinking of cars heading home for the holidays, white glow from illuminated buildings. Like the lights on a Christmas tree, with the colour from strands of tinsel, full of memories, familiar. 
I had a long wait in Abu Dhabi. A wait with a lot of anticipation, eagerly checking my watch, wishing for progress. It reminded me of the night before Christmas when I was very young and impossibly charmed by it all. Finding it so hard to lie in bed and wait for the morning, the expectation so palpable.

It was early morning when I arrived in Bangalore. Warm, thick tropical darkness, loaded with fumes, throbbing with action, like how the thin winter air clings on to the scent of pine and woodsmoke. Something celebratory in how India does chaos, like everyone is waiting for something to happen. The taxi guys with their windows open played the morning prayers and Bollywood pop, some background similarity to it all, something different woven into each. Telling the same stories to different beats, like Christmas music. Dawn breaks, the red roofs echo the pinky streaks of hot morning sky, doves cry from deep in the clumps of bougainvillea. There’s a whispering breeze through the palms and the clearing night clouds are violet, indigo, pillowy. Someone is cooking in another house, something with spices. Chilli maybe, red and intense; turmeric, powdered gold; ginger, the rounded spice.
There were lights and anticipation; music, people on the move, heady air filled with spices. There was Christmas everywhere, and all the time. 

"and all my soul is scent and melody"  Charles Baudelaire 

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Wow. Christmas Eve already. A little last minute perhaps but if anyone is considering some Christmas baking, this cake is perfect. If you don't have a small bundt pan it will also look cute as a real gingerbread loaf in a regular loaf pan (just keep an eye on the baking time). This cake somehow encapsulates the holidays so I hope you try it.

Merry Christmas to you all. Much love xx

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gingerbread bundt cake

1 3/4c spelt flour 
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg 
Pinch cloves
1 tsp baking soda 
1/2 tsp salt 
1/4c olive oil
1/3c pure maple syrup
1/4c pure cane molasses
1 free range egg
3/4c milk of choice 
2T coconut sugar (or other dark type of sugar)

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Preheat the oven to 180 c, 350 f.

In a large bowl combine the flour, baking soda, salt and spices.
In another bowl beat together the egg, oil and maple syrup. Add the sugar, then the milk and molasses. If the molasses isn’t combining well it may help to heat the whole mixture a little.
Pour the wet mix into the dry and stir gently until just combined.
Prepare a 6 cup bundt pan: oil and flour it well so that the cake comes clean out with the beautiful shape. Prepping the pan right before baking means the oil won’t slide down the sides and pool at the bottom which wouldn’t help much for sticking. If using a different kind of pan, you can prepare it how usually works for you.

Bake 40-45 minutes, until the cake looks deep golden brown and a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.
Allow the bundt a little time to cool in the pan, then gently release onto a cooling rack. It will be a little fragile to cut at first so if you can resist the ginger-y smells, it will cut cleaner after it’s cool.
This baby bundt will keep well for a few days in an airtight container and tastes as good (better?) with time. It will also frost and defrost nicely.

fervent love | ginger brownie cookies

Have you ever met someone and just thought, wow, you are so plastic. Like you can just see right into them, the mass of veins and nerves and a heart that pumps nothing but blood. It’s like that’s all they are. There’s nothing else there, no deep, intense passion bubbling inside them, about something abstract, obscure. They just absorb whatever it is that’s in the air, whatever is going around, and it never gets deeper than the skin. Surface passion, at best, and it’s difficult to ignite.

But there are people who have it. A fervent love somewhere, buried under a skin that’s just like everyone else’s. When they talk about this - their passion, the ignition, you know they’re in their element. You can see them come alive. It’s like you strike a match and light up the whole room, they’re not just a shell anymore, they’re a warm blooded person with stories to tell. And you might not know what the stories are. You can’t see into where it is they keep their spirit, but at times it will burst through, given the right conditions. Perhaps someone like minded, someone curious, another dreamer, another believer, another fan. Fire doesn’t start without fuel. 

I always admire people who have that - such a deep passion. People who’ve given their lives to obscure causes. I saw a documentary with a team that devoted its time to studying prairie dog behavior, people who spend their lives restoring classic Land Rovers, divers who dedicate each trip into the ocean to search for Atlantis. They have something. They must get up each day and think, this is my thing.
I guess that’s the deepest level. People for whom each cell in their body is filled with passion. But maybe there are other levels too. The bloodstream intensity, for people who can talk for ages about a topic. Perhaps not one they love per se, but something that triggers feelings. Impassioned rants of passive aggression, peppered with emotive anecdotes, enough to get you thinking. Because they care so much and it’s so tangible. They have something too. They can get up each morning and say, I can make someone think, make someone feel different. Those people, they all have nerves and veins and hearts that pump blood. But theirs are filled with much more, they overflow, there’s a side to them that is their own, that makes them so much more than what you see. 

“Now she went blossoming in her blood, and her blood went rushing deep beneath her”
Rainer Maria Rilke 

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First I would like to say this post was for mum for her birthday. She’s one of those kind of passive-aggressive but inspiring people. It’s probably what makes her such a good teacher, and so nice to be around. 
Transition to cookies. These cookies are quite special - a bit soft with under-baked centers, like brownies, but with a bunch of warm spices that works so well together.
The method may come across as a little finicky but it’s all easier than it sounds and totally worth it.
Love and cookies to you. Who knows, they may just become your passion.
xx

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ginger brownie cookies

makes around 12 medium cookies

1/2c coconut oil, melted 
1 large free range egg
1/2c coconut sugar 
1/4c turbinado sugar (or pure cane sugar)
1 tsp pure vanilla extract 
1/2c brown rice flour
1/2c oat flour 
1/2c almond meal
1/3c natural cocoa powder
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt 
1 1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground nutmeg 
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon 

Optional: 100g / 4oz chopped dark chocolate 

Preheat the oven to 180c, 350f and line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
In a large bowl combine the flours, baking powder/soda, salt and spices. Sift in the cocoa and stir to combine.
In another bowl, beat together the oil and egg - make sure your egg is room temp or the oil with harden if it meets anything cold.
Add the sugars and vanilla and combine until the mixture comes together.
Add the wet mix to the dry and stir until evenly combined. 
Refrigerate the dough for about 15 minutes (in the bowl is fine, the chilling will make it easier to scoop).
Using a cookie scoop or a tablespoon, scoop out balls of dough into the cookie sheet leaving room to spread. 
The cookies need in total about 10-12 minutes to bake. Halfway through baking (5-6 minutes) take the tray out of the oven and use the back of a spoon to flatten the tops of the cookies slightly - the tops of the cookies will look quite cracked.
Bake for the remaining time. Allow a few minutes to cool on the pan before gently transferring to a rack: they will be fragile and a little puffy, brownie style. 
The cookies will keep a few days at room temp and you can also freeze the cookie dough. 

daisies | apple & pear buckwheat crumble

We are fickle. We change our minds, we accept that very little about us is concrete and that's ok. It's the funny thing with dreams, they grow wildly, like daisies. There are some people that cling onto theirs - that childhood idea that's grown with them from just imagination into something tangible. The dream that's been riding the train through all the valleys and the peaks, the highs and lows. And there are so many others that never make it and are left lying by the tracks, bright and visible. Forgotten daydreams; filaments of childhood fantasy; wanderlust on cold, dark winter nights; or ecstasy from sunny Saturdays when anything seems possible. 
They leave a map, markers along the rail tracks, little pieces of who we are, how we’ve changed. How we’ll keep changing, how we’ll never really know what we want. And the seeds of those daisies keep growing untamed and unruly in our minds.

Update 2022: the text for this post used to be longer, but rereading it I wasn’t too happy with the earlier sections so I decided to remove them. Like I say, we keep changing :)

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Happy December. Time for gingerbread everything and everything in gold, red and green editions. There is still some nice fall/winter fruit around, perhaps not the most photogenic, so perfect for fruit desserts like these. With the spices and the dark sugar it kind of has that apple pie vibe without rolling dough or such niceties.
You could use all one type of flour in the crumble if you prefer, this recipe isn’t super fussy.
Love xx

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apple & pear buckwheat crumble

1/2c buckwheat flour
1/2c brown rice flour
1/3c oat flour
1/4tspn salt
1/4c coconut oil, melted and cooled
1/3c milk of choice, room temperature 
1/4c coconut sugar 
1/2tspn pure vanilla extract
1/2tspn cinnamon

//filling
600g-800g mixed apple & pear (I used more pear than apple)
1 tablespoon coconut sugar
1 teaspoon lemon juice
2 tspn arrowroot powder / similar starch
1 tspn each cinnamon and nutmeg 
1/2 tsp ground ginger 

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Preheat the oven to 180’C, 350’F. Prepare a baking dish with around 2L (2 quarts-ish) real estate, so to speak. An 8x8inch square pan would work.
In one bowl combine all dry ingredients for the crumble topping. Add the coconut oil, milk and vanilla and stir to combine using a fork. Continue until the dough reaches a sort of coarse-sand texture with some small chunks. Set aside.

For the filling: Chop the apples and pears - you don’t have to peel the fruit and the pieces can be chunky. In your baking dish toss together the fruit with the sugar, lemon, spices and starch. Using your hands is a little messy but effective here.
Crumble the topping over the fruit, by hand is again easiest. It should be spread relatively evenly over the fruit.
Bake for between 25-40 minutes, until the fruits have softened and the crumble is golden. This will vary depending on the shape of your dish and the juiciness of your fruit.

Serve as is, or with yogurt (or ice cream…) if you’re feelin’ fly. You really should try this crumble warm once. Not least for the smell.
The crumble will keep well in an airtight container in the fridge for a few days and also freezes and reheats well.