The Firsts: A Look Back, A Why, and A Thank You

Pumpkin Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

The First Year

One year ago today, I stared at an unfamiliar web page, on an unfamiliar account, and asked my sister if my choice for the URL was alright, if it was good enough to head-line a tab on Mozilla Firefox. My heart drummed, my pinky finger twitched, and I was absolutely certain I was going to be the first person in the history of the universe to have a panic attack over choosing a font type.

One year ago today, I hit the enter key and created an account different from ones I was already logged into. The new account wasn't for the whereabouts of my social life. Nor was it for filtered photographs of my heartbreakingly adorable dog. The account was made to shelter recipes near-and-dear to my heart.

One year ago today, I created this blog.

Sea-Salt Brown Butter Rice Krispies

Rosemary and pink flowers in an empty vanilla extract bottle. 

Clover Honey Graham Crackers

Thank You's

Thank you for following my ramblings about room temperature butter and brown sugar.

Three hundred and sixty days later.

Seventeen blog posts.

This makes eighteen.
Thank you to those who've bookmarked it.

Thank you to those who've shared it to friends and family.

Thank you for the kind words.

Thank you for reading.

Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies

The First Reason

For years I found solace in the blogs of other bakers. Their posts, recipes, and pictures were secret homes to me. As far as I knew, it could have been hailing and thunder-storming outside my bedroom window, but if I was reading up on how long to bake rosemary palmiers, the sun may as well have been shining and the sky may as well have been crying diamonds and rose petals.

JoyTheBaker's warm honey-pink blog sparked in me an inspiration to stir together ingredients I never would have dreamed up.

SmittenKitchen's rustic authentic feel makes one believe that her photographs are not actually of braided blueberry bread or chocolate swirl rolls, but of goodness, integrity, and honesty.

So, for the longest time, I wanted to be that to someone. I wanted to bake and write and share and let it out in the universe, or in this case, the inter web to see what someone thought.

I wrote at peace, letting the love that curled around my kitchen, patter through a keyboard and weave Times-New-Roman lines.

Orange-Chocolate-Chip-Pound-Cake

Apple-Cinnamon Bundt Cake

I am immensely proud of Good Night Nutmeg and of the creativity it has fostered.

Good Night Nutmeg is about pantry staples that create magic when folded together.

It's about gourmet additions that embellish simple treats.

It's about patting yourself on the back, even if the apple pie turned out too watery or the oatmeal raisin crisps crackled an inedible black.

Shirini Kishmeshi 

But mostly, it's about the recipes and the life in the recipes.

Recipes are beautiful things.

One year ago today, I wrote my first blog post. It was about characterized recipe cards, Hello Kitty band-aids, and lemon pull apart bread.

If you feel like taking a look at the beginning:

http://goodnightnutmeg.blogspot.com/2013/01/recipe-ramblings.html

Here's to another year!

Good Night, Nutmeg.

With Love,

Susan

"Shirini Kishmeshi" for Winters that feel like Springs

In my town, winters do not feel like winter.

Lakes do not freeze and automobile tires do not require chains.

The most popular number on our thermometers is one-hundred-ten; the least popular is anything below the seventies.

In my town, October, November, December, January, February, March are not grouped into their own white-blue season. They are just crisper versions of spring. They are dewy golden mornings, before grass dries and rose petals warm.

The seasons in my town speak a language more united than the seasons 'round the rest of the world.
Across the calendar year, wild honeysuckle blooms in home gardens and neighborhood trees shed amber-orange leaves in such a smooth and flawless metamorphosis, that the first week of a season is not a staccato disruption, but a gentle slide down a playground swing.

The seasons in my town are tangled together by equal temperatures.

In my California town, the sun is president for the infinite orb is almost always shining. On grey days, if you look hard enough, it can still be seen, tucked away behind the fog.

The seasons in my town have the same background: a clear cerulean sky. An overhead painting so glorious and picturesque, it makes you wish you could stroll through, take a day trip to the atmosphere.

It is natural for December to feel like May.
It is natural to light candles that smell like apples instead of gingerbread.
And that is exactly what happened this winter.

A couple days ago, I was in the kitchen. The unsalted butter had reached room temperature and the oven had been cleared of extra cookie pans and muffin molds, but I didn't really know what to make. Christmas hadn't even hit but I was already sick of anything peppermint or cinnamon or chocolate.
How can I bake like I'm at the North Pole when it feels like I'm in the Caribbean?

And I really did feel like I was in the Caribbean (except there was no seven-level cruise ship or black-toothed pirate) because it was 80 degrees outside and I seriously contemplated chucking all my winter clothes into storage and driving to Old Navy to buy twenty pairs of their ridiculously-cheap-but-still-great-quality-because-they-last-forever-and-come-in-every-color-imaginable flip flops.

Alas, I did not do that.

But I did bake something that is reserved for spring.

Shirini Kishmeshi. 

Shirini Kishmeshi is Farsi for "Raisin Cookie".  Every 20th of March, Persian households display supermarket containers of the chewy, light cookie. Every 20th of March, Persians celebrate the New Year.

Flour being mixed into the butter/sugar/egg mixture

Last week, my inspiration for baking the cookie was simple. The New Year was on the horizon and it felt like spring.

The promise of a new year + springlike weather = anything that has to do with Norooz.

This cookie has a special place in my heart. It is my favorite shirini and when I was in elementary school, every Norooz, I would take a store bought container of these raisin cookies and happily pass them out to my classmates (who loved them. everyone always does :)

This was my first time making them at home and they turned out exactly like the ones we buy. The cookie is delicate. The currant raisins add sweetness and texture. The outer edges of the cookie are golden brown and crisp. All around, it's a complete win.

Shirini Kishmeshi Recipe (adapted from The Pomegranate Diaries blog)

(approx 3 dozen cookies)

1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tspn vanilla
1 cup flour
1/4 tspn salt
1/2 cup currant raisins

-Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
-Cream butter and sugar.
-Add eggs one at a time. Make sure to beat well after each addition.
-Add vanilla.
-Slowly add flour. Mix till it becomes dough.
-Gently fold in raisins
-Drop a teaspoonful amount of dough onto cookie sheet lined with parchment pale.r
-Bake 13-15 minutes, until edges are gold.

Thank you for reading.

Happy baking, and happy new year. :)