I was too summer-lazy to measure. Use my guestimates as a guideline, and know your fruit-eating crowd.

1-2 lbs. fresh fruit, may include:

1 lb. strawberries, hulled and halved
1 pint blueberries, picked over
1 small seedless watermelon, rind removed, chunked or scooped with melon baller
1 medium cantaloupe, rind removed, chunked or scooped with melon baller

can also use raspberries, blackberries, honeydew or other muskmelons

1 – 2 tablespoons powdered sugar, to taste
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
small bunch fresh mint, about 1 dozen large leaves, torn or roughly chopped

Place prepared fruit in large bowl. Sift powdered sugar over fruit, tossing to coat. Add balsamic vinegar and mint, tossing once more to coat. Serve immediately or refrigerate, up to four hours. (I prefer to refrigerate 30 minutes – 1 hour, allowing fruit to steep in flavor.)

This is not new to me, missing the view, especially in the kitchen. Mostly I see cookies through a camera, or sauce on the back of a spoon. I whip meringue peering into a mixer by the second, watching for the right curve to appear on the right shiny peak. Details follow me out of the kitchen, too, as they did last summer when we tripped up to the North Woods for our annual beloved cooling-off. I brought my camera and also an unfortunate new habit, the blogger’s eye, which I turned first on breakfast.

We love to start the day in Lutsen Resort’s rustic dining room. There’s a hearty breakfast buffet, no tepid Sunday brunch but a much-loved, locally fresh, rush-the-table buffet. Now, we are people who drink coffee – for breakfast. We like to eat properly on Sunday, but nothing in our daily routine suggests even toast, let alone heaped plates of cheddar and wild rice eggs, smoked sausage, buttermilk biscuits and peppered rivers of gravy. And because you’re breathing brisk pine air and are certain you’ll hike it off, how about those pastries? Lemon custard squares, cinnamon bear claws, airy chocolate croissants. Wild blueberry danish.

It’s all tremendous – the glittering lake, fresh-baked danish, healthy air and caution to the wind. Feeling good, and a camera near the fork. Why not some pictures for the blog?

So I snapped away while they ate, aiming for special breakfast sunlight on special danish glaze. When Josie saw the pictures she said “Too much close-up or something.”

Too close? “I don’t know, the bacon. You made bacon look…gross?”  She was right. How did the smokiest bacon lose its looks? What’s with that blueberry? I backed the lens off the breakfast.

Out by the lake I tried pondering the horizon but wound up sifting tiny rocks, lake treasure. Cold waves rushed my feet and I tumbled sandy jasper, granite and maybe-agates through my hands. I brought the camera.

Further down the shore Greg and Josie were skipping rocks, the same rocks. Like shell seekers, the three of us like to wander the lake beach, sometimes separate, sometimes in all directions, somehow together. This time I sat in the sand, and told them I’d catch up.

I played with my camera, closer and closer to the rocks, mesmerized by green stripes and egg shapes and fossil dings.

Just around the time I found the zoom could capture jean fibers, I looked over, and up.

My husband loves to skip rocks. Lake Superior rock-skipping is art and sport, a thousand smooth chances to both relax and get it right. For a man who uses his brain all day – or perhaps precisely because of it – Greg is surprisingly devoted to throwing rocks into water. He’s as good at this no-brainer as it is good for him, nothing but bounces over waves. “Five,” he’ll say, “did you see that? Five.”

Josie’s been working at it for years too, with each summer using longer arms to best the master. When I looked up from my rocks that day, I saw this:


If I were still sifting rocks I’d have missed it, and if I’d followed them, I’d be in it.

We frequently wish to be where we’re not, always why am I here and should have been there, but for a few minutes in July I was right where I was supposed to be, wet feet and sandy rolled jeans, windy hair and heart bouncing down the shore, seeing what we’ve wrought and for once saying yes, here and now. Oh, yes to the wide view.

Because the owner friend was a guy, a special brand of chill out guy, he gave the guy cooks a pass. Guys who, while slapping out breakfast, enjoyed vodka and orange Crush. In that light it was difficult to wield authority, impossible really, when a red-rimmed dude could come in three days late and get promoted. What I could do was focus on pastry, which desperately needed attention. The bakers had no set morning menu, browning whatever came to mind any sunrise of the week. There might be cherry chocolate scones for three days, no scones for two days, and a creative burst of pistachio-pineapple-something toward the end of the week.

This would not do. I wanted to see a schedule. Schedules with headings, and attached pens, and clipboards.  I wanted staff and customers to know what to expect, sure that if flour, sugar and order prevailed, the line would be out the door. I held a staff meeting to discuss the impending change.

“Why do we need a scone schedule?”

“Because when you get here at five a.m., I don’t want you to have to think.”

They were looking at me, at their phones. What am I saying? They don’t think about anything now.

I proposed doing a plain scone every day – a traditional Cream scone – in addition to a variation, say, Blueberry Oatmeal on Monday, Apricot Pecan on Tuesday, and so on. They cast suspicious looks at the typed lists I passed around, as if I were an uptight mayor cracking down on deviant art.

“Does anyone have questions?”

One agitated look. “Yeah…what’s a cream scone. Don’t we put cream in all the scones?”

“Yes…but that’s just a traditional name, Cream scone. Something we can call the everyday one.”

Dead air.

“So customers know what the everyday scone is called.”

“But…it’s just, you know like, cream. It’s one word.”

“Yes. Yes it is.”

“All your other ones have two things in them, like two names.”

“Yes. But this is a CREAM scone. Our flagship scone!”

“Customers want two names for everything.”

“Fine. We’ll call it Cream and Sugar Scones. Two things.”

Grumbling, shifting of car keys, and one confounded cook.

“I just…that just sounds weird, Cream and Sugar.”

“It does.”

“Yeah…I mean, one word sounds plain, and two words sound stupid, and…whatever.”

I took the sheet from his hand and pulled a pencil from my apron.

“Well, I’ll tell you what. I will take care of the menu, and I will make the scones, and you guys just come in late and drink heavily and clean the grease traps. Okay?”

This threw them. One elbowed another.

“Yeah. So I guess Cream and Sugar is fine.”

“Good.” I scratched out Cream and wrote Cream AND Sugar, then handed back the lists. “Meeting adjourned.”

DOUBLE CHOCOLATE GINGER SCONES

The slacker boys got this much right: people do love combination scones. This might be my all-time favorite, a signature flavor from my old Scone on the Range frozen scone business. I am happy to bring it back for your chocolate (and ginger!) enjoyment.

makes about 1 dozen large or 24 small scones

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon sea salt
6 oz. cold butter, cubed (12 tablespoons)
1/4 cup sugar
4 large eggs
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 cup semi-sweet (or darker) chocolate chips
1/2 cup roughly chopped crystallized ginger, in chunks

extra sugar for sprinkling

———————

Preheat the oven to 400 F.

Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large mixing bowl or stand mixer bowl.

Cut in butter. You can do this one of two ways:

Electric stand mixer With the flour mixture in the stand mixer bowl and the paddle blade attached, turn on the slowest speed and slowly add butter chunks, mixing to a coarse meal texture, with only a few remaining large flour-butter crumbs.

(or)

By hand Using a sharp-bladed pastry cutter tool, or two knives, “cut” the butter pieces into the flour mixture until you have a coarse meal texture.

In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, cream, and vanilla.

Add liquid mixture to dry ingredients by hand or with stand mixer on low, using “on-off” mixing. Stop just long enough to add sugar, chocolate chips, and crystallized ginger, then continue mixing briefly to form a soft and sticky dough. Scrape dough onto lightly floured surface and turn over a few times to combine, adding flour if necessary.

Form scones You can divide dough in half, form each piece to a 1″ thick round, and cut into equal wedges, or you can pat to 1″ thick and use floured cutters for rounds or triangles.

Transfer scones to cookie sheet pan, preferably lined with parchment paper.

If desired, brush the top of each scone with a small amount of milk or cream. Sprinkle the extra white sugar thickly over tops. Bake 15-18 minutes, or until set and tops are golden brown. For the chocolate-ginger variety, watch the bottom of the scones for darkened color. Cool on baking sheet a few minutes, then transfer to racks, and serve.

* For a look at scone-mixing process (same method) visit this post: Scone, Scone on the Range

Note: use the best cocoa powder you can find for a rich chocolate dough. Cocoa tends to dry out baked goods; these hold very well for several days wrapped at room temperature, but after 1-2 days are best briefly reheated in a microwave, for just a few seconds. This also gives you the added, insanely pleasurable bonus of gooey chocolate chips.

Oh, that Donald. In our house he’s come to symbolize little tortures – ultimately the spoon will bring comfort, but first the miserable gauze, and pain, and that fixed orange smile! My oral surgery wish for you: may all your teeth show themselves, and remain useful, and may you enjoy soft Banana French Toast without ever, ever having to sit in that chair.

from January 6, 2009 (original post here)

Here’s the thing: I don’t love Jell-O, and most of America does. I’d bet that even foodie elite, people who’d never be caught with a two-tone wiggler, dig strawberry banana when no one’s looking – I believe it. There are a few distinct groups of Jell-O lovers – 50′s kids who grew up with it, like my parents; crafty cooks who make projects of rainbow parfaits; and the rest, like my daughter, who just plain like its slippery cool. And in there, there we have it. The only time I like Jell-O is when I’m sick – when I’m good and sick and low, those unnatural tones look like comfort, and taste easy. A delightful slide down, and too smooth to refuse.

Josie had some oral surgery done last weekend, the poor thing. Whenever she’s legitimately sick or injured – antibiotics or 100 degrees, whichever comes first – she will get tucked into our bed with quilts, movies, and the dog, and luxuriate in being The Poor Thing. A diminished state will also make her The Nice Thing – a fever or post-anesthetic haze will do that to a kid, I guess. She lays positively docile, sipping Gatorade and following orders, her parents stroking hair or bringing treats. What – a – trouper.

Can we get you something, something soft? Jell-O? Okay. The lime kind, and Donald? Sure. You just wait right there.

That’s right. When in need of true comfort, dental or otherwise, we call on The Donald. Promise not to tell her friends; she’d kill me. With the spoon.

Anyway, as soon as you could say Tylenol 3, the two full days of Jell-O, soup and yogurt made her bored with movies, sick of codeine, restless and newly charged as The Crabby, Hungry Thing. She was starving, she said, we were starving her. I believe that’s called taking care of you, I said. You wanted Jell-O. Well yeah, but now – now she was just mad to have missed the whole weekend, sure that she was wasting away, and maybe she would like a large steak. Or a dozen buffalo hot wings. And celery. The dog leaped off the bed, and the spell was broken. She was feeling better.

Not wishing to undo the surgeon’s work, I nixed the chewing, but offered real food. How about…French toast?

Eh.

I looked around the kitchen. A banana in the fruit bowl straightened, hopeful.

Okay. How about French toast…with caramelized bananas?

Ooh.

Aha! Soft for the mouth and sweet on the tongue. Now we were talking, and even better, healing. There’s still Jell-O in the fridge, and sore mouth or not, she’ll eat it. Me, I’ll wait for the fever.

Caramelized Banana French Toast

This method lets you use one pan for both the French toast and the bananas; just make sure it’s good and non-stick.

8 slices bread (I like to use stale baguette bread, cut on a thick angle)
4-5 eggs *
1/4 cup milk or cream
splash orange juice (optional)
dash of cinnamon
dash of nutmeg

1 tablespoon canola oil, or butter, for frying

1-2 bananas, in thick slices
1 tablespoon butter
1 1/2 tablespoon sugar
splash orange juice

In a large bowl, whisk the eggs, milk or cream, orange juice, cinnamon and nutmeg until smooth. Add bread slices to bowl, turning pieces to coat with egg mixture. Leave slices in the egg mixture 5-15 minutes (thick, dry bread can take longer) or until bread is soaked through, but not falling apart.

Using a large, non-stick frying pan, melt oil or butter over medium-high heat. Add soaked bread slices and cook 1-2 minutes per side, turning, until evenly browned. Remove French toast from pan and set on a paper-towel lined plate.

Leaving heat at medium-high, immediately add sliced bananas and tablespoon of butter to the same non-stick pan, shaking pan as you add to keep bananas moving. Sprinkle sugar over bananas, then the splash of orange juice. Keep the pan moving as they cook, using a heatproof spatula to help turn bananas fast. Both sides of bananas should brown quickly, melting the sugar and juice together, about one minute total cooking time.

Set French toast on plates, spoon warm bananas over the top, and serve.

* so, what’s with “4-5 eggs?” Well, eggs will vary in size, volume, and how long they’ve been in your fridge. Start by whisking up four – if there’s enough liquid to generously cover the bread, stop there, and if not, add another.

serves 3-4, depending on your own Hungry Things

Can we get you something, something soft?  Jell-O? Okay. The lime kind, and Donald? Sure. You just wait right there.

That’s right.  When in need of true comfort, dental or otherwise, we call on The Donald.  Promise not to tell her friends; she’d kill me.  With the spoon.

Anyway, as soon as you could say Tylenol 3, the two full days of Jell-O, soup and yogurt made her bored with movies, sick of codeine, restless and newly charged as The Crabby, Hungry Thing.   She was starving, she said, we were starving her. I believe that’s called taking care of you, I said.  You wanted Jell-O.  Well yeah, but now – now she was just mad to have missed the whole weekend, sure that she was wasting away, and maybe she would like a large steak.  Or a dozen buffalo hot wings.  And celery.  The dog leaped off the bed, and the spell was broken.  She was feeling better.

Not wishing to undo the surgeon’s work, I nixed the chewing, but offered real food.  How about…French toast?

Eh.

I looked around the kitchen.  A banana in the fruit bowl straightened, hopeful.

Okay. How about French toast…with caramelized bananas?

Ooh.

Aha! Soft for the mouth and sweet on the tongue.  Now we were talking, and even better, healing.  There’s still Jell-O in the fridge, and sore mouth or not, she’ll eat it.  Me, I’ll wait for the fever.

Caramelized Banana French Toast

This method lets you use one pan for both the French toast and the bananas; just make sure it’s good and non-stick.

8 slices bread (I like to use stale baguette bread, cut on a thick angle)
4-5 eggs *
1/4 cup milk or cream
splash orange juice (optional)
dash of cinnamon
dash of nutmeg

1 tablespoon canola oil, or butter, for frying

1-2 bananas, in thick slices
1 tablespoon butter
1 1/2 tablespoon sugar
splash orange juice

In a large bowl, whisk the eggs, milk or cream, orange juice, cinnamon and nutmeg until smooth. Add bread slices to bowl, turning pieces to coat with egg mixture. Leave slices in the egg mixture 5-15 minutes (thick, dry bread can take longer) or until bread is soaked through, but not falling apart.

Using a large, non-stick frying pan, melt oil or butter over medium-high heat. Add soaked bread slices and cook 1-2 minutes per side, turning, until evenly browned. Remove French toast from pan and set on a paper-towel lined plate.

Leaving heat at medium-high, immediately add sliced bananas and tablespoon of butter to the same non-stick pan, shaking pan as you add to keep bananas moving. Sprinkle sugar over bananas, then the splash of orange juice.  Keep the pan moving as they cook, using a heatproof spatula to help turn bananas fast.  Both sides of bananas should brown quickly, melting the sugar and juice together, about one minute total cooking time.

Set French toast on plates, spoon warm bananas over the top, and serve.

* so, what’s with “4-5 eggs?” Well, eggs will vary in size, volume, and how long they’ve been in your fridge.  Start by whisking up four – if there’s enough liquid to generously cover the bread, stop there, and if not, add another.

serves 3-4, depending on your own Hungry Things

But here’s the thing – I don’t have one, and though there are hundreds of versions out there, I wanted to give you mine. I seriously use a crumb-as-you-go method, no recipe at all, and it never occurred to me to write it down. You’d think I would, with the blogging and all, but no, I just stick my hands in the buttery flour and scrunch away. Heck if I know what’s in there. I just bake, photograph and eat.

the elusive crumb cake

Anyway, a few readers – led by Carol, carrying a flaming torch and fork – demanded crumb cake. And I kind of broke that promise, but this is a campaign year, so I’ll do as the candidates do, and offer you…a distraction!   Hey, look over there! You wouldn’t turn down an easy golden cake with juicy berries and crunchy pecans, would you? Warm from the oven, a shower of powdered sugar, kind of like crumb cake?

It’s one of my old favorites – perfect for brunch, good in any season, and best of all, I wrote it down. While I document my crazy crumb-ing, you enjoy the distraction.

Blueberry Pecan Brunch Cake

6 ounces unsalted butter, softened
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 large eggs, room temperature
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tablespoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup pecans, finely chopped
1 1/2 cups fresh (or frozen) blueberries
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
powdered sugar

Using an electric mixer, beat the butter until light and smooth. Add the sugar and vanilla and beat on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating on medium speed until each is incorporated, stopping to scrape the bowl as necessary.

Place the flour, baking powder and salt in a small bowl, and whisk lightly to combine. With the mixer running on low speed, add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture. Mix just until the batter is combined – scrape once – and briefly mix again to finish.

Spray a 9 x 13-inch baking pan with baking spray. Dust lightly with flour, tapping out excess. Scrape the batter into the pan. Sprinkle 1/2 cup of the chopped pecans over the batter. Sprinkle the blueberries evenly over the batter and top with the remaining pecans. In a small bowl, combine the sugar and cinnamon and sprinkle the mixture evenly over the entire cake. Bake the cake on center rack in the oven for about 45 minutes, until golden brown and an inserted tooth pick or wooden skewer comes out clean.

When cake is cool enough to handle, sift powdered sugar lightly over the top and cut into squares, serving warm or at room temperature.

Serves 8 to 12. Cake be made 1 – 2 days ahead. To store, cover tightly with plastic wrap and store at room temperature. Re-heat briefly in oven, if desired.

* one printable recipe, coming right up: blueberry-pecan-brunch-cake

I love oatmeal, especially the steel-cut version, which is supposed to be healthier – and given the price, it better be.  Unfortunately, steel-cut oatmeal takes longer than the quickie 2-minute stuff and I rarely make it at home – but I did enjoy some recently at Ingredient, a local restaurant that really did it up right with heavy cream, toasted pecans, brown sugar and bananas.  Oatmeal heaven!  So good it deserves its own paragraph, but let’s do it in ten words:

Thank you, steel cut oatmeal, for keeping things on track.

I believe that about says it all.

Anyone else have an ode to oatmeal?  In ten words, give it your best shot.

Remember these?

Somehow, a few caramelized bananas escaped Josie’s ice cream bowl, and let me tell you, that’s no small feat. They sat in the refrigerator quietly until Sunday morning, when I whisked them back to the counter…

…and pressed them into service. Literally.

At first glance, a handful of formerly sizzled bananas don’t look so hot – but after a toss through batter and a trip through the iron, they look delicious. They look like Caramelized Banana Waffles, and Sunday morning suddenly recalls the sundae last night.

We bite into the creamy-crisp bananarama’d waffles and I realize…they’re gone. No more toasty bananas. Oh, it will be a cruel, cruel summer and now I’m getting misty about the leftovers. Clearly there’s only one thing to do:

Make more!

My friends, sometimes coffee is not enough. Sometimes you must start the day with more than one shade of brown.

Just a little something. And at the end of the day, maybe a little something again?

——————————

Chocolate Breakfast Muffins

makes 12 full-sized muffins (or 24 minis)

2/3 cup (2 oz.) cocoa, Dutch-process or natural
1 3/4 cups (7 1/4 oz.) unbleached all-purpose flour
1 1/4 cups (10 oz.) light brown sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup (6 oz.) chocolate chips
2 large eggs
1 cups (8 oz.) milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 teaspoons vinegar
8 tablespoons (one 4-oz. stick) butter or margarine, melted

granulated sugar, for sprinkling

Preheat the oven to 425 F.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together cocoa, flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and chocolate chips. Set aside.

In a medium-sized mixing bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, vanilla, and vinegar. Add this egg mixture, along with the melted butter, to the dry ingredients, stirring to blend until just well-combined.

Scoop the batter into 12 papered muffin cups (or 24 minis). Sprinkle with an even layer of granulated sugar. Bake muffins for 15-20 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean. Watch muffins closely – they can slightly burn around edges if overbaked. Remove the muffins from oven.

Allow to cool about 5 minutes in the pan, then remove to cool slightly on a wire rack before serving.

adapted from The King Arthur Flour Baker’s Companion