Once upon a time, during a visit to my grandmother in West Seattle, I accidentally said the S-word in front of my grandmother.
Her instant reply was, “Margy, if you wouldn’t hold it in your hand, what is it doing in your mouth?” I never forgot her words, obviously, although I can’t say the word never again escaped my lips.
Back in those times, there were well-known dirty words, words you just never used in polite company, or in any company for that matter,
if you were female. They’re heard everywhere now, however, in polite company or otherwise, on television, in the movies and in a great deal of teen everyday conversation. In cartoons they are usually represented as *@!!* or some such combination of characters.
Well, times change. We have an entire new battery of dirty words to hurl into the void now, should we wish. Words like smoker and/or smoking, as in “He’s a smoker, you know; you can tell.” Or, “Hey, you with the cigarette! Put it out; this is a no-smoking zone in case you hadn’t noticed!”
Or, “I wouldn’t go in there if I were you; the place is filled with smokers and you don’t wanna be around them”
There are others, equally as full of evil connotation. Words like fructose, obese, transfat, saturated fat, cholesterol and, dare I even suggest it, organic!
“Hey, dude; why are you drinking that *&#@; it’s full of fructose, you know. Man, you’re a real fructose sucker! You keep that up and you’re just nothin’ but a big blob of obese!”
“You’re full of saturated fat, man, and I happen to know the truth about your cholesterol, so stay away from my sister. She’s pure organic and I want her to stay that way, not be hanging out with a bunch of transfat-heads.”
It’s not necessarily a bad thing, having some new dirty words in our vocabulary. Frankly, I was getting tired of the same old *^$@ and *+&@!# and especially $%@**=^, so now I can perhaps expand my verbal repartee.
“Oh, fructose!! I just locked my keys in the car.”
RECIPES
Here are some recipes guaranteed to be almost totally free of the above-mentioned dirty words, with the exception of organic. It’s entirely up to you whether you want to use that word in conjunction with any of the ingredients in these recipes. With holidays soon upon us, you might like to have a couple of loaves of special bread on hand for a gift or for guests. You could make both of the following loaves pre-holiday and freeze them, or wrap and gift them as soon as they’re cool.
CRANBERRY SPICE BREAD
2¼ cups flour
¾ cup sugar
¼ cup cornmeal
2 t. baking soda
2 t. cinnamon
1 t. ground ginger
½ t. ground allspice
½ t. salt
¼ t. ground nutmeg
1 cup dried cranberries
1 cup low-fat buttermilk
1/3 cup light molasses
2 T. vegetable oil
2 large eggs
Combine first nine ingredients (through nutmeg) in a large bowl. Stir in the dried cranberries and make a well in the center of the mixture.
Combine buttermilk, molasses, oil and eggs in a bowl, stirring with a whisk. Add this to the flour mixture, stirring just until moist. Spoon batter into a 9×5 loaf pan coated with cooking spray. Bake in a preheated 350-degree oven for 1 hr. or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool 10 min. in the pan on a rack, then remove from pan, cool completely on rack. Wrap snugly in plastic wrap and foil until ready to use or gift. Makes about
16 slices, depending upon your slicing thickness.
Carrot bread is almost as delicious and welcome as carrot cake in my kitchen.
FRUIT & NUT CARROT BREAD
¾ cup hot water
½ cup pitted dates, chopped
½ cup golden raisins
1 cup shredded carrot
½ cup coarsely chopped walnuts
3 T. vegetable oil
2 large eggs
1 large egg white
2 cups flour
¾ cup sugar
1 T. baking powder
1½ t. ground cinnamon
½ t. salt
Combine water, dates and raisins in a bowl; let stand
15 min. Stir in carrot, walnuts, oil, eggs and egg white.
In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Add carrot mixture to flour mixture, stirring just until moist. Spoon batter into an 8×4-inch loaf pan coated with cooking spray. Bake in a preheated 350-degree oven for 1 hr. and probably about 5 min. more, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool 10 min. in pan on a rack, remove from pan and cool completely. Makes about 16 slices, depending on thickness of slices.
For another great recipe — one for peanut butter chocolate chip bread — visit my expanded column online at www.southwhidbeyrecord.com.
This recipe is one I’ve had in my “Holiday Recipes” file for years. It sounds strange for a holiday bread, but give one of these to anyone with kids and they’ll be asking for the recipe. This one does contain one dirty phrase, just a wee bit of saturated fat. Sorry.
PEANUT BUTTER CHOCOLATE CHIP BREAD
3 cups flour
1 1/2 t. baking powder
1 t. baking soda
1/2 t. salt
6 T. unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups chunky peanut butter
1 cup (packed) light brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 1/4 cups buttermilk
1 1/2 cups miniature chocolate chips (I’ve also used mini-butterscotch chips)
Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt into a bowl. In a large bowl with electric mixer, cream together the butter, peanut butter and brown sugar. Beat in the eggs, one at a time. Beat in the buttermilk and beat mixture until well combined.
Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture; beat until just combined. Stir in the chocolate chips.
Divide batter among 5 buttered and floured small loaf pans (5 3/4×3 1/2) or between two 8×5 buttered and floured loaf pans. Bake in the middle of a preheated 350-degree oven for 40-45 min., or until a tester comes out clean. (The larger loaf pans will take longer, probably another 8-10 min.) Remove breads from pans and allow to cool completely on a rack. Wrap in plastic wrap and foil; keep chilled for up to a week, or frozen for up to a month. Makes 5 small loaves, or two large loaves.
Lots of holiday recipes coming up during the next few weeks, so stay tuned!
