There’s a trail of wrapping and tissue paper that leads from the Christmas tree, up the stairs, and into each room.
Wrapping paper, you see, was the cats’ present this year, since they already have every kind of fuzzy mouse and assorted other vermin.
GINGERBREAD
1 cup butter 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour 1/2 tsp. baking powder 1/2 tsp. baking soda 1 tsp ground cinnamon 3/4 tsp. ground ginger 3/4 tsp. ground nutmeg 1/4 tsp. ground cloves 1/2 cup packed brown sugar 1/2 cup granulated sugar 3 large eggs 1/3 cup buttermilk 1 tsp. pure vanilla extract 3 tbsp. finely diced candied ginger Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and spices into a large bowl. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and sugars on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, followed by buttermilk, mixing well after each addition. Beat in vanilla. Reduce speed to low. Gradually add flour mixture until just incorporated. Fold in candied ginger. Transfer batter to a buttered loaf pan. Smooth top with an offset spatula. Bake at 350 F until a tester comes out clean; about 40 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Dust with confectioners’ sugar, or spread with cream cheese frosting and diced candied ginger.They have a jingly octopus and a quacking duck they stole out of a bag of birthday presents intended for a then-two-year-old nephew.
They have dozens of plastic springs that zip around the floor (better than any hockey puck being stickhandled in the NHL today), and which disappear beneath the stove at a rate that forces us to sweep places we might otherwise neglect from season to season.
Besides our house full of toys (which some people have suggested is “worse than most houses with children”), our girls have all the chicken-flavoured treats a pair of unanimously fish-hating girls could ever want.
And they have boxes.
This year they have boxes stuffed with spent ribbons and bows and tissue paper.
They have a box that lately contained a medium kitchen appliance.
And, between all the paper and all the boxes, I feel certain they’re having more fun than most kids who have already forgotten about half of the plastic, made-in-China toys they received such a very short time ago.
To prove it, I’ll be picking up bits of green- and red-coloured paper, along with tearings from my favourite glittery blue paper, right up until I get tired of slipping and tripping over it — which, incidentally, should be about the same time as I run out of gingerbread.
For now, though, I’m content to sit on the couch with a coffee, a notebook and a pen, next to a plate topped with said gingerbread, and contemplate a list of New Year’s intentions and changes.
These are not resolutions, which tend to be grand and doomed to fail.
I keep to small things, mostly, things I know I can manage and which may have a ripple effect throughout the years.
For example, last year I intended to eat more vegetables — and eat more vegetables I did.
This year, I’ll be writing fewer food columns — every other week, instead of every week.
It wasn’t an intention or, in the end, my own decision (rather, due to cutbacks at another newspaper, and not at Kamloops This Week).
But, as we go into next year, it will ripple through my life as both multiple losses and a blessings.
After 10 years of weekly columns, I’ll now spend more time with my second book (a first novel) and co-editing a nearly-finished anthology of food writing by writers of Mennonite descent.
Meanwhile, for this last column of the year, I’m pleased to share this recipe for gingerbread.
It’s subtly spiced with a soft, yet sturdy, crumb.
I sincerely hope it brings you moments of comfort and joy as the last days of the year flow into the next.
Until early January, Happy New Year, Dear Readers.
It’s been, and continues to be, my privilege to write for you.
Darcie Friesen Hossack is a food columnist and author of Mennonites Don’t Dance, Thistledown Press Sept. 2010, shortlisted for the Commonwealth Prize (first book, Canada and Caribbean) Danuta Gleed Award runner-up. She can be reached by email at onepotatotwopotato@shaw.ca.
