Simple Gifts: A Story About Giving, and Celeriac Soup

It's pretty clear from the insane traffic around here (because NJ is Mall Central ... haven't you seen the Kevin Smith movies?) that the holiday shopping season has reached full-on crazy, and though I did not stand in line anywhere for Black Friday (except in a row of people lifting weights at the Y--go me!), I've been thinking about gift-giving.

My husband pokes fun at me for my notoriously poor gift-receiving skills.  And in many ways he's right.  I don't give a second thought to returning something that I don't want, or passing it on to someone who might make more use of it than I would; I don't like waste, and I hate to see something sit in a closet and gather dust.  And maybe that's a character flaw.  But I do appreciate gifts that have meaning, even if they may not be the right size or color, and maybe the reason I hate holiday shoppers so much is that I see gift-giving as an art, not an obligation.

***

It was a Sunday afternoon in the spring of my junior year in college when my parents and brother appeared in the doorway of my bedroom, laden with the usual parcels: a few items of clothing from home, a box of cookies from the Italian bakery, my mail.

I was starting to sort through the mail, making small talk with my family, when my father produced a small wrapped package.  "Here," he said, handing it to me.  "From Disney."


I once read that many Japanese tourists take photos as a matter of politeness; it's expected that you bring the experience back for those people who couldn't come with you.  It's part of the collective nature of Japanese culture.  In my family, when you go somewhere, you bring something back.  Because that's what you do.  It's sort of like the T-shirt so many of my friends had when we were growing up: "Grandma and Grandpa went to (name exotic place) and all I got was this lousy T-shirt."  And I've gotten some strange stuff over the years.  Bookmarks.  Potholders.  Maracas.  On the one hand, it's nice that the buyer is thinking about me; on the other hand, I feel like I'm on a list in the souvenir shop: J-check-maracas.  B-check-keychain ... you get the idea.

I knew that my family was going to Guatemala without me to visit my ailing uncle, but they hadn't even mentioned to me that they'd be going to Disney.  I found myself feeling strangely hurt about being excluded, even though I'd just taken a trip, myself, to California, to visit some graduate schools, and though I was "too old" to care about a trip to Disney.   But taking the package in my hands, I also felt excited: what could he have brought for me?

Gingerly, I lifted the folds of tissue paper.  And nearly dropped the object when it was unwrapped in its entirety.

It was a scarlet unicorn head, a four inch tall wooden figure with a wild, frightening look in its eye.  I held it, looking at it, unable to speak.  From Disney?  Why?  Why had he gotten this thing for me?  What did it mean?

"You like unicorns," he said, almost triumphantly.

I think I nodded, feeling terribly immature, biting back the tears, holding in my hand what felt, at the time, like proof that my father never knew me, would never know me, and didn't care to get to know me.  Yes, I thought; I liked unicorns ten years ago back in the fourth grade, when my favorite color was also purple.  Maybe he thought he was giving the perfect gift.  After all, he didn't have to bring me back anything.  But at that moment, to an adolescent who desperately wanted her father to get her, it felt all wrong.

After what seemed like an eternity, I managed to set the offending item down on my desk.  I swallowed hard.  "Thank you," I said.

Long after we returned from dinner, and my parents and brother had returned home, I found myself at my desk, face to face with the blood-red unicorn head.  I turned it over; fingering the small gold "Made In China" sticker, and, selfish as it sounds, felt alone in the vast universe.

***

Twenty years later, the unicorn head is long gone.  Or maybe it's somewhere in the recesses of my mother's closets, and I'll find it when I inevitably have to clean out her house some day.  But the memory of it returns every year when I start to think about finding holiday gifts for the loved ones in my life.  Because each year I'm determined to try to get people the kinds of gifts that say "I know you, I am thankful for you, you matter to me."

***

Two weeks ago a good friend and colleague finalized her move to Boston.  She won't be far away, but it's not close enough for an impromptu cup of coffee any more.  Even though we hadn't gotten together all that much since both of us left our last place of employment, it was comforting to know she was right there.

She came to have lunch with me before she left, and after we'd placed our order, took from her purse a small tissue-paper-wrapped package.  "I wanted to give you something of mine," she said, smiling broadly, handing it carefully to me.  I opened it gingerly, unfolding the paper in my hands, revealing these small Chinese mud men.  I knew immediately: this was us.  The older and the younger friend, a mentor and his student, thinking and reading and working together on a project of great philosophical importance, focused on a similar, if not identical, outcome.  When I asked her to tell me about the piece, she described this relationship, too.  "But colleagues, equals, not a mentor and student," she said.

It was perfect, and I was touched.

It's difficult to give good gifts all the time.  It takes a great deal of forethought, and energy, and care.  And hell knows, there are many times when I get it all wrong, too.  But it's good to remember that the best gifts, like the best meals, are often the most simple ones, not the ones from the mall, or from the mega souvenir shop, but given from the heart.

Have you ever gotten a perfect gift?  Have you ever given one?

Celeriac Soup
This soup is made from a less-than-beautiful root, but it is comforting, warming, and not too rich, like some cream soups tend to be.  Serve with your favorite crusty loaf of bread for a simple dinner on a cold late-autumn night.

2 T. butter
3/4 c. chopped onion (about 4 ounces)
3/4 c. chopped celery (about 4 ounces)
1/2 t. minced garlic
1/2 c. white wine
1 lb. celeriac, peeled and coarsely chopped
1 large potato (1/2 pound), coarsely chopped
1 1/2 c. low-sodium chicken stock
1 1/2 c. milk
1/2 c. evaporated milk
1/4 t. celery seed
1 t. salt, or to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Freshly grated nutmeg, to taste
1 teaspoon lemon juice

In a small stockpot, melt butter.  Saute onion and celery until translucent.  Add garlic and white wine and cook until the wine is reduced by half.  Add the celeriac, potato, stock, celery seed and just enough milk to cover the vegetables simmer over low heat, covered, until the vegetables are tender (check at about 15 minutes).  Add the remainder of the milk and bring almost to a simmer.  Remove from heat.  In a blender or food processor, puree the soup until very smooth. Strain back into the stockpot, heat to a simmer and season with salt, pepper, nutmeg and lemon juice. Add additional milk, if necessary, to achieve desired consistency.

Thank You.

Thanks so much to all of you who "baked a difference" by baking, bidding, tweeting, sharing, writing blog posts, and otherwise supporting the baked goods auction to benefit the United Way Hurricane Sandy Recovery Fund!

I couldn't have done this without every one of you, and it was truly humbling to watch my blogging community and my friends come together to rally around this cause with me.

We raised a total of $367 in winning bids, and the good news is that many of you even increased your bid level when you submitted your donation online!  Those of you who didn't win can still support the cause with us; I've included the button at right again so it's easy to click over.  Where it says "organization," please write "A Half Baked Life Auction" in addition to any other organizations that may match your donation.

Next week, BlogHer will be featuring a post about using social media for good, and I was contacted by the author, who asked me about my reasons for turning this into a community event, rather than just a link to a donation website.  It was an interesting question.  Why bother with all of the complications?

First, I'm convinced, through my work over the years with various fundraisers for a host of different organizations, that people are more likely to give at an event than through a direct appeal campaign.  Most of us don't like simply giving.  We want to connect.  There's something about belonging to a community of committed donors that makes us feel more generous than we would as an individual.  Perhaps it's feeling the ability we have to be change agents when we work together, rather than wondering how our small contributions might make a difference.

I also believe that if you want to raise awareness, you can't do it by simply providing a link to a donation website.  It's easy to click a button and feel like we've done our duty.  It's a lot harder to read a blog post like Dana's or Ilene's and not personalize the loss, the cause.  The stories are just as important--if not more so--than the statistics.

Even if we didn't raise thousands of dollars, some great things happened as a result of the event.  Bloggers met new bloggers, people whom they might not have happened to read otherwise, because they're not in the same interest area.  A fabulous cross-section of people came together for this: participants (both bakers and bidders) included blogging friends from the ALI community, from the parenting blogger community, from the wellness blogger community, general diarists, and a number of my own non-blogging friends, many of whom didn't even know I had a blog until this week.  (Yes, I outed myself on Facebook for this event, and it was scary as all hell, thank you very much.)

And maybe this event, like some of the events I've participated in myself over the years, will inspire someone to do something similar somewhere down the line.

Because giving (whether we're talking about time, or talent, or money, or even empathy) isn't something that we do on the day after Cyber Monday.  (Though God help us, it's a small antidote to the post-Thanksgiving capitalist frenzy that I hate so much.)  It's something that we do because we're human.  Because we are connected.  Because our stories have meaning.  Because we matter to each other, even if we don't know each other yet.

So one more time: thank you to everyone who hung with me on this one.  Even if you didn't win, you are cordially invited to my virtual table for tea and cookies, any day you want.

Perfect Moment Monday: Turkey Trot 5K

Each month, my lovely friend Lavender Luz sponsors Perfect Moment Monday, an opportunity to notice and reflect on the "perfect moments" in our lives, rather than create them.  These moments can be ordinary, momentous, or somewhere in between.  While you wait for me to get a night's rest before posting auction results and matching winning bidders with bakers (THANK YOU to everyone who participated!!), enjoy this small PMM.

***

November has been a little crazy.  We began the month without power, and with kids out of school for a week and a half, due to a wild late season hurricane.  My mother had moved in with us just before the storm, after falling down her stairs and breaking six ribs and her scapula, deputizing me as LPN and OT.  I ran as a last-minute write-in candidate for our local Board of Education, using only word of mouth and social media to campaign, and on the day after we got power back, won the seat.  My mother-in-law came to visit for a long weekend, bringing the total number of grandparents in the house to two.  And then there was the the Thanksgiving meal and my mother's departure, five weeks after she'd arrived.

So I was especially relieved to have a low-key weekend.

We don't do Black Friday around here.  In the morning, I went to the Y, and in the afternoon, we went geocaching at a local nature preserve, driving in the opposite direction from the mall.  On Saturday, we supported Small Business Saturday by going to one of our local farm markets, and then buying ingredients from our local health food store for the cookies we'd make for the online bake sale (final tally to be announced later this week!). On Sunday, we went to a fabulous playground and ate what may possibly be the best pizza on the planet (kale and butternut squash pizzas, be still my heart), and then we came home and made a fantastic mess with flour, rolling out gingerbread dough, N. eating about dough as much as she rolled.  That night, I watched as the bids began to come in for the Hurricane Sandy Relief bake sale items, and the tweets started to appear, and the blog posts started to proliferate, feeling amazed and proud and overcome with emotion that my fellow bloggers had rallied around and stepped up to the plate when I asked them to lend their time, their talents, even their blog space.

Any of those things could have been my Perfect Moment for the month.

But there was one moment on Thanksgiving that moved me, that grounded me, that I thought was worth sharing.

Almost every year we run the 5K Turkey Trot in my town.  It's practically shameful for us not to run, given that the race course goes right down my street, allowing for ample porch space for visitors to watch.  It's quite the show: some people run in Santa suits, one team in a large cardboard replica of the Mayflower, many with turkey hats, some in tutus and suits, and this year, even a random banana.  It's a huge race; this year, over 6,000 people participated.  And because it's so large, it's not really possible to run your best race; there are too many people with strollers, or dogs, or small children running, and no one seems to pay much attention to the signs at the beginning that tell you where to stand if you run a 5-minute or 6-minute or 10-minute mile.

At times, this becomes frustrating.  If you are me, you're trying to run off your apple pie in advance, you see.  You have the best intentions of completing this course in less time than last year.  And you can't do it if there's a six year old in the way, or a wall of sorority sisters trotting, arms linked, five across the road.

But there's a point in the race, on the uphill coming back into town, where you can see ahead and behind you.  If you're in the middle of the pack, which I usually am, you can see the throngs of people, all running together.  And suddenly, this sea of people feels important. We're all bent on the same goal.  We're there to support each other.  It's not a race, but a challenge.

As I ran up the hill this year, looking ahead of me and knowing that I was more than halfway done, I felt an adrenaline rush.  It really was an amazing thing, this running together.  I felt strong, and connected, and free, and part of something much larger than myself.  And it was, for that moment, absolutely perfect.

Have you ever felt like you were part of something much larger that yourself?

Baking A Difference: A Bake Sale/Auction for Sandy Relief

Welcome to our nation-wide blogger baked goods auction to benefit victims of Hurricane Sandy!  UPDATE: BIDDING IS NOW CLOSED.  PLEASE CONTINUE TO DONATE TO THE UNITED WAY HURRICANE SANDY RELIEF FUND, BELOW.)

Though the headlines have begun to fade from the national media, the work to rebuild in New Jersey has barely begun.  Many people, especially those at the shore and in Staten Island, are still without power, weeks after the storm.  Cleanup will take months (see the image below, courtesy of one of my blogging friends, Mastering Mommy Brain, whose parents' home in Ortley Beach was among the affected properties).  Families have been displaced, forced to leave their homes.  Though donations of food and clothing have been plentiful, the difficult work is still ahead, and I'm proud to have so many blogging friends who agreed to participate in this auction, and raise some awareness and funds for the ongoing relief effort!

Proceeds from the auction will go to the United Way Hurricane Sandy Recovery Fund.  My family has worked with the United Way over the years, and I feel confident about their plans to support communities through the rebuilding and recovery process, not just in the short term, but in the long term.  Moreover, they have informed me that they will charge no administrative fees on donations to the Fund!  They are making cash infusions to community-based organizations currently unable to deliver at full capacity, so that those organizations can better serve the needs of those affected by Sandy at the grassroots level. Rebuilding and expanding the capacity of these organizations are critical to overall recovery efforts.  The Fund will be distributed through grants to community-based health or human services organizations in order to bolster or create services that directly address the unmet needs of individuals and families adversely affected by the hurricane.  Near and long-term supports may include: basic needs, such as food; medical and mental health services; transportation assistance; housing and utilities assistance; legal assistance; and job retraining and counseling.

 

Let's Bake a Difference for the Garden State!

We have fabulous items up for auction below!  However, we understand that some of you might prefer to contribute directly to the cause; if you would like to make a contribution to the United Way Hurricane Sandy Relief Fund without bidding on an item, click on the button at the right, and where it says "organization," please write "A Half Baked Life Auction" in addition to any other organizations that may match your donation.  I'd love it if you'd leave a comment on this post, too, or email me, letting us know that you donated, even if you didn't bid, so we can include your donation in the final fundraising tally.

Now without further ado, on to the auction details:

• Bidding opens at 8pm EST on the evening of Sunday the 25th.  Bidding will close at 11:59pm (one minute before midnight) EST on Monday the 26th (Cyber Monday!).  Please tweet the auction as much as possible, so that we get lots of traffic and bidders during the day!  It would be great if you would use the hashtag #Sandy in your tweets, and #bakeadifference.
• Each individual item has its own page with its own comments section.  These pages will include information about the starting bid, and will be available for you to view by Sunday night.  The bidding will happen in the comments section on each item's page; it will be up to you to refresh the item page to see the highest current bid and bid above that amount.
• In order to be eligible to win an item, bidders are required to leave a name and valid email address in EACH bid comment.
• Your bid must be at least $1 higher than the starting price or previous bid (if there are any) but can be as high as you’d like!  Bidding will go up in increments of $1 (not $.50, or $.25, etc.).
• Comments/bids are timestamped; if you are the final high bidder, you will be notified that you won within 24 hours.  Timing of shipping for items won may be negotiated between bidder and seller, though we prefer that items be shipped within a week, and all transactions must be complete by January 1.  Seller will cover shipping costs.  (UPDATED in response to comment below: items will be sent to U.S. shipping addresses only.  Apologies to my international blogging friends!)

Winning bidders must make payment and send their mailing address to me via paypal within 72 hours of the auction ending.  If payment is not made, winner forfeits item and the next highest bidder is awarded item. Once payment is made and shipping address is received, winning bidders will receive contact information of individual in charge of shipping their item.  Once all payments have been received, I will send a single donation, on behalf of the auction participants, to the United Way fund.

Get ready, get set, BID!  Here are our Fabulous Auction Items:
(click on the link above the picture to go to the bidding page for that item):

Ten Trail Mix Cookies As Big As Your Head

One dozen Vegan Gingerbread People

A 9"x13" Pan of Blondies

Holiday Set: Key Lime Fudge and Dark Chocolate Espresso Shortbread

photos courtesy of Southern Living

8x8" Pan of Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge

Gourmet Granola (2 winners)

Two Dozen White Chocolate Chip Cranberry Cookies

Fifteen Gingerbread Muffins

Four Dozen Stained Glass Cookies (2 winners)

Banana Bread (with mix-ins of your choice, 5 winners)

Completely Delicious Oatmeal Cookies (with mix-ins of your choice)

Zucchini Bread

The Cobbled Together Holiday, and Tuscan Bean Soup

When I was younger, Thanksgiving was defined, as it is for so many of us, by meals with my small extended family.  Thanksgivings in my early years belonged to my aunt and uncle in central New Jersey, where there would be turkey and stuffing and sweet potato casserole with marshmallows and my mother's pumpkin pie and creamed onions, and early birthday presents for my brother, my cousin, and me.  Later, as I grew older and my aunt and uncle moved away, Thanksgiving meant a trip to Kennebunk Beach, Maine, where my grandmother lived with my other aunt and my cousin.  We still brought the pie, and there was still a turkey with all of the trimmings, but there were also my grandmother's meatballs and spaghetti and banana bread and coconut bread.  By the time I got to college we were spending most Thanksgivings alone, just the four of us, but that was fine, too; it was tradition.

I remember the first Thanksgiving I spent in Los Angeles; it was the first time I wasn't going to my relatives' house for the holidays, and though I didn't even feel like being with family was the happiest of holiday experiences, the palm trees wrapped with Christmas lights did little to quell my homesickness. After a halfhearted mid-day potluck with some fellow graduate students, I went to Ralph's, the local grocery chain, where I bought a store-made ready-to-eat pumpkin pie and a tub of Cool Whip, which I ate in their entirety that night, alone, watching reruns of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

But over the years, Thanksgiving with friends became easier; my friends became my family when my blood relations weren't available.  And sometimes I did both; there were Thanksgiving potlucks before Thanksgiving, and then meals with family later.

The older I got, the more I started to feel like the best holidays were the cobbled-together ones; the ones that involved both family and friends, or ecletic mixtures of friends from different corners of my small universe.

I remember talking with my friend N. about this last year; her parents were coming to visit, but they'd also managed to invite parents of a friend who couldn't speak English and didn't have a place to go for the holiday, and some of her husband's graduate students.  Initially, she was dreading playing hostess, but she mentioned later that it was one of the most fun holidays they'd had in a while.

Friends of ours were coming by in the morning to watch the Turkey Trot 5K, which passes right by our house on Thanksgiving morning.  They usually run the race themselves, but were benched by injury and recovery from surgery this year, so they wanted to cheer on the other runners.  I asked if they would stay for the meal, if they'd help us eat our turkey.  After an initial hesitation, they agreed.

And honestly?  It felt the most like Thanksgiving around here that it's felt in years.  I was deeply thankful not just for family, but for the friends whom we can choose to be family, the ones for whom we can be simply ourselves.  I was grateful for the destabilization of old conversations around the Thanksgiving table, the way in which new presence changed them or silenced them entirely.  I was appreciative of the extra hands and the extra ears and eyes, not just in the kitchen but everywhere.

This soup is one of those cobbled together meals, using up some of the things you probably have in your refrigerator from the preparations of the Thanksgiving meal, and some things you probably have in your pantry.  It's light enough to detox from the holiday indulgence, but heavy enough to make you feel warm and cozy after a late autumn day.  It was a staple in my graduate school years, and I still make it today.

Tuscan Bean Soup

1 T. olive oil
1 T. butter
1 onion, chopped
1/2 c. carrot, sliced
1/2 c. celery
2 cloves garlic, minced
rosemary to taste
15 oz. can black beans
19 oz. can cannellini
15 oz. can broth

Melt the butter and olive oil together over medium heat in a large saucepan.  Add the onion, carrot, and celery; saute for four minutes or so, until just translucent.  Add the garlic and rosemary and saute for a minute or two longer.  Add the beans and broth, and simmer for about 12 minutes.

Serve, if you like, with some grated Parmesan, or a crusty loaf of bread.

Difference at the Table: Moroccan Root Vegetable Stew

Despite my love of the harvest, and the falling leaves, and the apples and squash, and even the raking, I don't love November.

It's something about the darkening sky, the full-tilt rush towards Christmas and the pressure to give extravagant gifts, the starches of the Thanksgiving meal, the conversations I'm doomed to have around our Thanksgiving table.

World War Three, the Passive Aggressive version, came early this year.  With my mother's fall down her stairs, and her move to our house for her recovery, we've been dancing around difficult conversations for weeks now, me sometimes biting my tongue, and sometimes not.  Imagine Thanksgiving, with all of its family land mines, stretching out for three, then four, then five weeks, and you'll get some sense of what it has been like around here.

Reflecting on the difficult topic of religious pluralism in church this week, our minister reminded us of another meal that wasn't exactly the most congenial of meetings.

Edward Winslow wrote, in a letter dated December 12, 1621:

Our corn [i.e. wheat] did prove well, and God be praised, we had a good increase of Indian corn, and our barley indifferent good, but our peas not worth the gathering, for we feared they were too late sown.  They came up very well, and blossomed, but the sun parched them in the blossom.  Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors.  They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the company almost a week.  At which time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain and others.  And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.

Can you imagine?  The Pilgrims had invited Massosoit to sign a peace treaty, and spent three days eating with ninety surprise guests with whom they couldn't communicate (except through Squanto), warriors who were bearing arms, not really sure whether they were going to be killed.  And you thought your Thanksgiving table conversation was a little tense?  Not that I am entirely sympathetic with the colonists, but it sort of puts things in perspective, doesn't it?  At least we're not armed.  And the one thing I've noticed is that over time, even if the conversations are still difficult, they've become less charged, as if time has diffused them, just a little bit.  Maybe we are figuring each other out, even if that understanding doesn't make us best friends.

Much has changed since 1621; though we haven't entirely abandoned our "roots," there's a lot on our Thanksgiving tables that is hardly "traditional" fare.  This dish is a nod to those early settlers and to their native American guests at the table, a stew made with traditional root vegetables, most of which actually were around for that first Thanksgiving (no potatoes, since they hadn't yet made their way across the Atlantic).  It's a perfect example of the meeting of cultures, American vegetables fused with the flavors of the Middle East.  Even if peace may be hard to imagine, perhaps at least we can appreciate the result of the marriage of flavors, knowing that the longer we sit around the table together, the more likely it is we'll at least achieve some kind of understanding, if not agreement.  And we can give thanks for that.

What--and who--will be at your Thanksgiving table this year?  What do your Thanksgiving roots look like?

Moroccan-Style Chicken and Root Vegetable Stew

4 c. canned low-salt chicken broth
1 T.olive oil
1 lb boneless skinless chicken
1 1/2 c. onion, chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 t. garam masala
2 t. ground cumin
1 cinnamon stick
2 c. sweet potatoes, peeled, 1/2" cubes
2 c. parsnips (I used kohlrabi, because I had one) peeled, 1/2" pieces
1 1/2 c. turnips, peeled, 1/2" pieces 
1 large carrot cut in 1/2" pieces
1 c.  rutabaga, peeled, 1/2"pieces
1/4 c. golden raisins or apricots (chopped)1 14-oz can fire roasted diced tomatoes, drained
Juice and zest from one lemon

In a small pot, bring chicken broth to a boil, continue to boil until reduced by half, then set aside.

Heat oil in heavy large pot over medium-high heat. Sprinkle chicken with salt and pepper. Sauté chicken for about a minute until light golden and remove from pot; set aside.

Add onion to pot and sauté until golden and translucent, about 4 minutes. Add garlic and stir 1 minute. Add spices and stir 30 seconds until just fragrant. Add sweet potatoes, parsnips (kohlrabi), turnips, carrot, rutabaga, broth and currants. Cover and simmer until vegetables are tender, about 20 minutes. Add tomatoes, lemon zest with juice, and chicken, and simmer over medium heat about 5 minutes, or until chicken is thoroughly cooked. Sprinkle with cilantro if desired.

Baking a Difference: A Half Baked Auction for Sandy Relief!

Plans are moving forward for the bake sale auction to benefit victims of Hurricane Sandy! 

After a thorough review of the options, I've decided that the proceeds from the auction will go to the United Way Hurricane Sandy Recovery Fund.  My family has worked with the United Way on previous projects in our community, and I feel confident about their plans to support communities through the rebuilding and recovery process, not just in the short term, but in the long term.  Moreover, they have informed me that they will charge no administrative fees on donations to the Fund!  They are making cash infusions to community-based organizations currently unable to deliver at full capacity, in order to get them back up and running quickly so they can better serve the needs of those affected by Sandy in their communities. Rebuilding and expanding the capacity of these organizations are critical to overall recovery efforts.  The Fund will be distributed through grants to community-based health or human services organizations in order to bolster or create services that directly address the unmet needs of individuals and families adversely affected by the hurricane.  Near and long-term supports may include: basic needs, such as food; medical and mental health services; transportation assistance; housing and utilities assistance; legal assistance; and job retraining and counseling
 
Let's Bake a Difference for the Garden State!

Here are the details:

The auction will be hosted here on A Half Baked Life.  I will be posting all the items by Saturday, November 24th.  The bidding will open at 8pm EST on the evening of Sunday the 25th.  Bidding will close at 12:00 midnight EST on Monday the 26th (Cyber Monday!).  Please tweet the auction as much as possible, so that we get lots of traffic and bidders during the day!

Each individual item will (provided I can get this together in time) have its own page with its own comments section.  These pages will include information about the starting bid, and will be available for you to view by Sunday night.  The bidding will go on in the comments section; it will be up to you to refresh the item page to see the highest current bid and bid above that amount.

In order to be eligible to win an item, bidders will be required to leave a name and valid email address in EACH bid comment.

Your bid has to be at least $1 higher than the starting price or previous bid (if there are any) but can be as high as you’d like!  Bidding will go up in increments of $1 (not $.50, or $.25, etc.).

Now do I have your attention?

Comments/bids are timestamped; if you are the final high bidder, you will be notified that you won within 24 hours.  Timing of shipping for items won may be negotiated between bidder and seller, though we prefer that items be shipped within a week, and all transactions must be complete by January 1.  Seller will cover shipping costs.

Winning bidders must make payment and send their mailing address to me within 72 hours of the auction ending. If payment is not made, winner forfeits item and the next highest bidder is awarded item. Once payment is made and shipping address is received, winning bidders will receive contact information of individual in charge of shipping their item.

Please let me know if I've missed anything, or if you have any questions.

Spread the word!  There are some amazing baked goods on the way ... and there's nothing better than getting treats delivered to your doorstep for a good cause!

A Love Letter from New Jersey to the Power Crews, and Kohlrabi Puree

On the way to yoga last night, I passed about ten power trucks.  I have a lot of "Sandy heroes"--the volunteers who rescued people, the volunteers at churches working triple shifts to shelter those who have been displaced (many still have no homes to return to, at the shore, in Staten Island, and all over where trees fell into people's bedrooms), the people organizing drives for underwear and personal hygiene items, the people who came to pump water out of people's houses for free, even the school maintenance workers that have managed buildings turned into shelters--but among the unsung ones, for me, have been the power crews.  They've been here for almost two weeks now, since the day after the storm -- crews from Texas, Ohio, Virginia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania -- working around the clock, in the cold weather, trying to restore the damaged power infrastructure.

The work has been slow, not because of the lack of manpower, but because of the sheer magnitude of the task.  So many lines are a tangled mess, so many poles were snapped, so many trees down, preventing access to make repairs.

And while by and large people have been patient, they've also started to complain.  At times it feels a little like the Star-Bellied Sneetches.  Why do they have power but we don't? they ask, looking down the street to their neighbors' houses, ablaze with light.  When will it be our turn?  We see each other in the grocery store, and we no longer want to ask the question, because we're afraid of the answer, afraid that we might rub salt in the open wound.  We open our homes to each other, we share what we can, but we know that in some ways, it's not enough.

I've taken to waving at the power trucks, my window open, screaming "thank you!!" at the top of my lungs.  I don't know if they hear me, but I want them to know that I'm grateful.  That regardless of the union politics (which I can understand, too--people are trying to protect your jobs in the long term, even as you give so generously of your time in the short term), the lack of supplies, the people who are grumbling and impatient, we are grateful.  You've come here under the least desirable conditions, because you felt that you could help.  You took risks, left loved ones behind.  You rise at the crack of dawn when the temperature is still barely above freezing, and work out of cabs where the floor is littered with Red Bull.  You labor by flashlight long after the sun goes down.  Every time I see a power truck pass by, especially those from another state, I find myself moved almost to tears.

Our CSA season is over; it was supposed to end anyway, even without factoring in the effects of the hurricane, though I was impressed by what my farm was able to pull together on the day after we got our power back, even when they still had no power themselves, and weren't expected to get any back for some time.  There were turnips, and rutabaga, and celeriac, and carrots, and kale, and kohlrabi.

Kohlrabi gets a bad rap.  One of our neighbors, a fellow CSA member this year, refers to it as the "evil kohlrabi"; their son actually now draws comics in which the kohlrabi stars as the main antagonist.  But it's really an impressive little vegetable, not beautiful by any means, but hardy enough to resist being destroyed by the hurricane, resilient, versatile enough to have a presence in soups and stews and curries without taking over, and surprisingly tasty even on its own.  A little knobbly around the edges, but tasty when you get to know it, and salvagable even when it's been split wide open.  Sort of like the people of New Jersey in general, really.

So, to the power companies from across the nation who have come here in our time of need: thank you.  From the not-always-beautiful, but remarkably resilient and strong-willed people of New Jersey.

*I am still taking interested bakers for the online Sandy Relief Bake Sale/Auction.  So far my bakers include JeCaThRe of Bread, Wine, Salt ... (Not)Maud of Awfully Chipper ... KeAnne from Family Building With A Twist ... Ilene from The Fierce Diva Guide to Life ... Jennie from Still Life with Crockpot ... and ManyManyMoons of Many Many Moons ... (all of whom, by the way, absolutely rock as bloggers, and you should go read them).  If you're interested, please leave a comment on the original post by this Sunday, November 11 at midnight.  I will be in touch with all of the participating bloggers next week with details.

Kohlrabi Puree
My mother used to puree kohlrabi.  I don't remember it tasting this good; this version could actually find a place on your Thanksgiving table.  The original, from the New Basics, includes leaves and mushrooms, but I have mushroom haters in my family, and the leaves were no longer attached.

4 kohlrabi bulbs
2 T. extra-virgin olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic , minced
3 Tablespoons vegetable or chicken stock
Salt and pepper to taste

Trim the kohlrabi bulbs, peeling them if the skins seem tough.  Cut the bulbs into 1-inch chunks.

Bring a saucepan of lightly salted water to a boil, and add the kohlrabi chunks. Reduce the heat and simmer until tender, about 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat the olive oil in a skillet. Add the onion and sauté over medium-low heat until softened, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and cook, stirring, another 1 to 2 minutes. Don't let the garlic brown.

Drain the kohlrabi chunks and place them in the bowl of a food processor. Add the stock. Purée until smooth. Salt and pepper to taste.
Transfer the purée to a saucepan and reheat over low heat, stirring, 2 minutes. Serve warm.

Power in the House: A Post-Sandy Post

I was wrong.

I was wrong when I scoffed at the storm, posting on a friend's Facebook page, "people.  It's going to RAIN."

I was wrong when I didn't bother to stock up on more than a few days' worth of boxed milk.

photo by flickr user dvidshub,
used under creative commons license

I was wrong when I almost didn't fill my gas tank.

Because I didn't take Sandy seriously.

Though I hadn't spent much time online, I saw enough in the newspapers and in occasional log in to know that we were lucky.  My brother was evacuated from Hoboken, where his building was flooded with several feet of water.  Here, at my house, we were inconvenienced, but not devastated.  We sustained only minor property damage (if you could even call it that).  Though we lost power for a week, we had an inverter, powered by my husband's Prius when he was home from work, that gave us intermittent heat and chilled milk in the refrigerator (because there wasn't much else in there by the second day).  I made a conscious decision not to use my computer or my phone if I could avoid doing so, because doing so would mean sucking up gas, which was--and still is--in very short supply here, and desperately needed by so many other people.  Even in my town, downed trees cut houses in half, squashed cars.  Transformer explosions caused fires.

It had been a week since we'd seen lights on my block.  Generators droned on in the background, day and night.  Our town postponed Halloween until tonight, and though it was going to be pitch black out, I decided to take the kids out anyway for a little while, just to feel normal.  My son walked proudly down the street in his home-made sea captain costume, made out of a cardboard box, to which we affixed a pinwheel for a propellor, hand-made fishing pole, and a hand-sewn (by him) felt flag.  My daughter barrelled down the sidewalk in purple tuille, in an oversized freecycle ballet costume we refer to around here as the "poofy dress."  And some of my power-less neighbors really came through: one of them built a fire pit in his front yard; another lit candles across the porch; another came over with giant Hershey bars for the kids and Buttershots-spiked cider for the adults.  It was a quiet Halloween, but I was impressed by the tenacity of my neighborhood.

Of course, it wasn't all hand-holding and kum-ba-ya here this week.

I was cut off when I was on the road driving my mom to physical therapy by two people who needed to get in line for the Dunkin' Donuts drive through, presumably because they didn't have working coffee makers at home.

I witnessed two neighbors come close to fisticuffs over the noise of the generator at night, which was powering a house blazing with light and TV.

I saw gas lines three hours long (and actually sat in one for an hour and a half), with people waiting for cans of gas.  One of them complained in our local paper that he had to fill his generator twice a day.  I couldn't help but wonder: for what?

But I also saw Jersey drivers being courteous at traffic lights that no longer functioned.  And I had friends all over the state (and in the next state over) offering me a warm place to go, or a hot meal, or a hot shower, or a washing machine and dryer.  And when the power came back on tonight almost a week to the hour that the lights went out, I determined to pass that same invitation on to anyone who needs it.

Disasters like Sandy make you think about what's really important.  Filling up cars with gas?  Yes, if you need to get to work or to the doctor or to the grocery store for essentials.  Doing the laundry?  Not so much, provided you have a little clean underwear to change into every once in a while.   Showers?  Maybe, if you're going to work.  TV?  Dunkin' Donuts coffee?  Low priority.  Internet?  Maybe for basic communication.  But certainly not for the kinds of things so many people think they need it for.  Cell phones?  Again, yes, for communication about where to find food or gas ... but maybe not so much for texting about what's on TV.  Shelter?  Yes.  Warmth?  Yes, with the caveat that it's possible to wear enough clothes to stay warm as long as you have shelter.  Food?  Yes.  Basic food.  Not beautiful food.  Healthy, nutritious, life-sustaining food.  That maybe even came out of a can.  Like peanut butter.

Still, in my area, thousands of people remain without power, and a nor'easter is scheduled to hit on Wednesday, with snow accumulating up to a few inches.  Thousands are displaced, some without things like diapers for their babies or food or warm winter clothing.  People will be cold, even if they are lucky enough to have a home.  There's a collection center at my local library, just down the road.  It's the sort of thing you never expect to see in your back yard.  If you're local, and in a position to do so, I encourage you to find a donation center.

If you can't donate locally, I urge you to consider donating to OccupySandy and OccupySandyNJ, because they are on the ground right now helping people get access to food and basic supplies, at least at the Jersey Shore.  (You can get to their Amazon wish list by clicking on the Wedding Registry.  It's weird, but it works.)

I would also like to host an online bake sale/auction to aid in the long-term recovery efforts for Sandy victims, because the rebuilding process is not going to happen overnight, and because a case of diapers isn't going to make the disaster disappear.  If you're a blogger and baker, please leave your contact info in the comment section.  If you know of a food blogger and baker, please pass them alone.  I don't know much about online auctions, but I think we can do this simply and still amass some amazing looking treats, and send them around the country for a good cause.

Powering down for now.  Because I've used my share.