Tonight

Latke Love

Most people have special holiday treats they look forward to all year. It might be so decadent, so buttery, so sweet that we set "do not eat before" deadlines. One friend loves almonds covered in toffee and chocolate. Another waits patiently for homemade truffles. My thing is latkes. For a quasi-Unitarian from Maine, this might not seem like the most logical choice. I was 19 the first time I tried them, at an IHOP of all places. It was an inauspicious beginning to my love affair.

Once I was living on my own, I tried a lot of recipes, and consequently made a lot of terrible, half-cooked potato pancakes. Then came the winter alone on the Navajo Reservation in New Mexico. With not much to do other than listen to the wind tear at my roof, I made batches of latkes until I had perfection. I don't use a recipe anymore, but if I did, this is what it would look like.

Latkes

1 large onion

2 medium russet potatoes

2 medium yellow potatoes

3 eggs

3 or 4 tablespoons of flour

1.5 teaspoons of salt

pepper

oil

I used one of my own purple potatoes for this batch.

1. Pour oil in a large skillet. It should be about 1/2 inch to an inch deep. Heat the oil slowly over medium heat.

2. Meanwhile, scrub the potatoes. Then shred potatoes and onion in a food processor. I prefer the smallest shredded setting.

3. Put shredded potato and onion in a bowl. Add flour, salt, eggs, and pepper. Mix well.

4. Test to see if the oil is ready by dropping a few shreds of potato into the skillet. If it bubbles and floats, the oil is ready.

5. Spoon small mounds of latkes into the pan. I prefer mine to be 2 - 4 inches wide.

6. Cook over medium heat until bottoms are golden brown. This usually takes 3 - 5 minutes. Then flip, and repeat on the other side. Watch carefully near the end. Once they turn a little dark, they taste burnt.

7. It's helpful to place latkes on paper towels after they come out of the skillet. Also, I keep batches warm by placing them on a cookie sheet in the oven on some very low setting

Serve with sour cream, applesauce, and (my favorite) Meyer Lemon Cranberry Sauce.

Umm...

Martha Stewart Living craft-fail?

*sigh*

You'd never guess I went to art school...

Let's Not Pretend, Shall We?

I recently discovered the website Design*Sponge. Okay, Kathleen may have mentioned it once or twelve dozen times in the past two years. Look what good listening skills I have!

In my defense, a home decorating website is not entirely sensical in my world. My interior design style relies heavily on plastic dinosaurs, piles of books, and furniture I found in the bargain section of IKEA. Let's graciously call this style Benign Neglect.

Now, the past week has felt a bit like clinging to the roof of a high speed train as it wobbles over some fabulously tall suspension bridge in the Pacific Northwest. It had something to do with two publication deadlines while simultaneously teaching sixth graders about equivalent fractions, scientific inquiry, research papers, and the intricate composition that is US modern immigration policy.

In case you were wondering, this is what your desk might look like if you try to cram all of those things into the span of one week. I anticipate Grace Bonney of Design*Sponge will contact me any day now to feature my "dishelved elementary school teacher-chic."

In the meantime, I know you were also wondering what your tea kettle might look like if you were so busy/crazed/exhausted that you left it on the stove, boiling, while you slept.

Beautiful, right?

I think I'm starting to get this home decorating thing.